by Noel | Dec 3, 2012 | CobraHead, Gardening
These two cold frames should be in production right now, but as can happen, I never got around to seeding them this September. If I had, we’d be eating salad greens, right now. I’ve had several plantings with some excellent production out of my one frame: Greens Under Glass, and the second one was give to me this summer by my friend Dave Peterson, who was the primary instigator in getting them built. I discussed the construction of them in a...
by Noel | Nov 16, 2012 | CobraHead, Gardening
As I work on putting my garden to bed for the winter I’m realizing how much I like working with open raised beds. I’ve been working with them for nearly thirty years. Soon after starting my Wisconsin garden in 1986, I knew that, for me at least, maintaining a relatively large garden did not require power equipment and I gave away my rototiller. All the work in my raised bed garden is done with hand tools. I’ve become an advocate for growing...
by Noel | Oct 28, 2012 | CobraHead, Gardening
Carrots in Hoop TunnelI planted a bed of carrots and beets on August 12th. Here are the carrots, eleven weeks later. They’re doing great and we’re harvesting some fairly large ones, already. The beets are doing just fine, too. I’m hoping to keep the harvest going well past when the hard freezes set in by using a low hoop tunnel with two protective layers. The outside frame of the tunnel is covered with clear poly sheeting. Directly over the...
by Noel | Oct 10, 2012 | CobraHead, Gardening, Recipes
Continuing the discussion of sweet potatoes which I started with a post about my harvest a couple days ago, these are the last two sweet potatoes from the 2011 harvest. Sweet potatoes, when stored properly, last a long time. We’ve frequently kept them well over a year. Getting a crop to last that long without having to freeze or can makes sweet potatoes ideal for the home grower. Our storage method is simple. Lay out the sweet potatoes to dry for two...
by Noel | Oct 3, 2012 | CobraHead, Gardening
With frost forecast for later this week and knowing that I would be out of town, I decided to harvest my sweet potatoes. Sweet potatoes cannot tolerate frost, so I did not want to take a chance on losing any of my crop. I had previously put a clear plastic cover over the bed as we had some nippy temperatures a week ago. The leaves under the plastic were already showing black from the previous frost and wilting badly, so I didn’t think I would lose anything...
