tendrils and tillers

there are winter vetch tendrils all over the green manure patch and as the winter vetch pulls itself up towards sunlight they have found the winter rye...hitching a ride as the fast growing grass heads upwards...soon enough there will be vetch blooms and rye seed heads...and lots of nitrogen as the former potato patch rests for a third year...this fall green manures will go into the potato patch i planted last sunday as it begins a rest...next spring this patch will be mowed and turned under prior to planting as spuds make a return to the area...over in the wheat bed many of the plants have deployed a third leaf and i am seeing coleoptile tillers growing out of the bases of many...good news...more seed heads for the "bread from scratch" project Jean and i have going on...a natural sourdough starter and non-rectangular loves on tap in a few months if all goes well...the season's moving tight along.

planting spuds

in a move that may shock some and gratify others i have decided to do away with jerusalem artichokes in the bed on the south side of the house this year and plant a bed of spuds instead ( that i would plant spuds should surprise no one...you can also see by the first two photos i have any number that needed to be planted )...so i prepared the bed with a few bags of topsoil and a few more bags of compost and had at it...papa chonca, early gem, crozon rosado, and nevskii...all government potatoes, went in first ( in the fourth though seventh photos )...then some early blue and elmer's blue followed by the standards such as german butterball and red pontiac..i also planted some tubers that came from plants i grew from true seed ( tenth photo ) this will be the third generation of clones from those true seed plants...hopefully they will be a bit bigger this time around...i'd like to ample one instead of continually saving them as seed...it is time to start preparing for leaf cutter bees too...i have some alfalfa growing out back but alfalfa is auto toxic and i cannot seed the patch with more...so i will container grow some and place it near the bee house for convenient access...the outdoor season is taking hold...there will be more reports as things liven up.

spring green manures

last autumn i seeded some beds that were finished with their seasons with a fall green manure mix of clover, winter rye, and winter vetch to both set nitrogen and act as a cover crop for the beds...those beds have filled in nicely ( top photo ) and will be turned under to add organic matter to the soil...some beds ( second photo ) had things like late potatoes going on and were not seeded at all because it would have been to late for the plants to develop well enough to overwinter...so after work today i went out to the garden with some spring green manure mix to seed those beds...i have inoculated these beds with rhizobia bacteria which can survive several years without any legumes present so there should be enough of them left to join the green manures in setting nitrogen when the sprout...it is a bit late but i am assuming planting day will not be until later in may so there are a few weeks to allow the plants to sprout and develop before turning them under...any additional organic matter will help the plants and feed the worms ...which are critical to the success of the plants in the beds...it will only take a couple of weeks of lead time to get the timing of the process adjusted...that, i believe, we have in hand.

asparagus, garlic, carrots....

...and the relentless jerusalem artichokes ( third photo ) are all up and running...some of the garlic that was unmulched last month has failed...an issue i have at hone as well...no massive loss as the full bed of garlic is coming along well ( top two photos ) and there will simply be more room to plant something else when the time comes...the third year asparagus is all up ( fourth through sixth photos )..still not ready for harvest until 2018 when it will be five years old...i see no signs of the second year spears yet which is disturbing...we will wait a bit before any judgement on that...the surprise of the day was finding carrots in the biology club bed...they have overwintered unmulched and seem to be fit...so the early risers are all accounted for...now we wait for the last average frost date to pass ( may 15th ) and then the warmer weather crops can go in...although a spud or two may yet find their way into my bed.

government spuds.

a small, white box from wisconsin brought four new varieties of spuds for the garden...the "primitive cultivar" papa chonca and the "improved" early gem, nevskii, and corazon rosado...no sign of chitting yet so these will be going in the ground this coming weekend to get an early start on the season...soon enough the ramps, wheat, garlic, and asparagus will have more company.

ramps and wheat

i have two beds of ramps out back...the plants in the top photo were planted as year old root stock in the autumn of 2014 and had a full season last year making this their third...the plants in the second two photos are year old root stock i planted last autumn so they are embarking on their second season...the older ramps came up later and have three leaves rather than one or two.. ,a clear indication of what an additional, uninterrupted, year of root growth will do for the plants...they will not be harvested at all again this year but i am seriously hoping they will begin bunching so i can separate them and expand the population into a sustainable harvested community...in the meantime the wheat bed is moving along and almost all the plants have produced a true leaf and now the hope is for masses of tillering to fill the bed..the weather is still cool but i am not certain it will remain so long enough to encourage tillering..we will see.

teosinte

the teosinte i planted in the basement eleven days ago ( top two photos ) is coming along well...one has deployed a third leaf and both look robust...the seedlings i planted five days ago have begun to green and two have put out their first leaves...throw in the fact that the plant that has com up outside ( last photo ) has a second leaf in spite of the cold and it looks like there will be a fine season of wild and weedy maize ancestor with many tesointe ears to photograph...now to find space.