Mountain Biking: Rubber side down- Time for a TurnaroundWell, my friends, things are finally looking up, and good timing, too, since I’m sure you’re all sick of me bitching. Recent bike build, including wheels… fun! In what feels like a fairly short time, I’ve come from sitting around … Continue reading → […]
- This Raised My PulseHey, baby… wanna ride? I may be injured, but I’m not dead yet. I can still have racy thoughts. Here’s more info. In other news, UBI was an awesome success! I had a blast. I highly recommend it. Overhaul day…. … Continue reading → […]
- Time for a Turnaround
- Edgy Veggie
Colorado square-foot gardener answers beginner’s questions
A great post for veggie garden daydreamers over at Jacqueline’s Journey. Go check it out and find at least one nugget of information that’ll make your local veggie garden better this year!
7. What are good crops to grow for Colorado’s climate? Colorado has cool, wet springs and hot, dry summers which is pretty annoying to the vegetable gardener. Cool weather crops like lettuce and radish will do great if you get them going early enough but by the time late June’s heat and lack of humidity come along they will require intensive watering and may even stop producing edible leaves. I found that Collards and Kale are cool weather crops that also do very well during the summer months. Other excellent crops are raspberries, onions, garlic, chives, shallots, tomatoes, tomatillos, potatoes, and squash.
8.What was the most difficult thing for you to grow? I have had particular problems growing peppers, eggplant, and okra. These plants require steady warm temperatures or they will drop their flowers and/or fruit or not grow. Depending on your Colorado micro-climate these plants may work great for you or may never get enough heat to be productive.
Found via Tall Tara!
Urban potato crop in a bin on a balcony
Ed. note: Thanks to Camera editorial page editor Erika Stutzman for this guest post!
I’m an accidental organic potato farmer, and you can be too. Even if your only outdoor space is a balcony. Even if, like me, you happen to be a rather inexperienced, ineffective home gardener plagued by pests. Sure, I had a lot of hot peppers and a few tomatoes and herbs, but what I really had was a bumper crop of pests, including earwigs, slugs and a tenacious 11-year-old Bichon Frise with a taste for organic kale and corn. Want to know how a small white dog could pull ears off a 4-foot corn stalk? So do I.
A potato bin in action
But we harvested this week, just ahead of the frost, and to my surprise: My otherwise mediocre home garden yielded nearly 40 pounds of perfect potatoes. Surprisingly large, with picture-perfect roundness and smooth skin, and creamy interiors that taste amazing even without cream or butter.
The secret is inexpensive “potato bins,” great seed and the tenets of potato farming: Not too much fuss, no daily watering, and letting the stalks wither and die before harvest. Wither and die? I can do that! I did that to my entire garden all summer long! Read more
