by Noel | Dec 21, 2021 | CobraHead, Gardening, Vegetable Growing
I like to grow food. My partner likes to cook. Those complementary interests lead to great meals. This year we had another good garden and as every year, some crops grew better than others. The advantage of growing a lot of different food is that a singular crop failure will never put you in dire straits. I’ve been able to spend time pursuing my hobby, but I hardly live in the garden and I consider myself a lazy gardener. Trying to get the most output from the...
by Noel | Nov 30, 2021 | CobraHead, Gardening, Vegetable Growing
Most years I use the month of November to get my garden ready for the next spring’s planting. Preparation includes removing all the trellising I’ve set up, a thorough weeding of most of the beds, cultivating and shaping the beds, and covering both my garden plots with a thick layer of leaves. This November was different, and the garden is still a weedy mess, with only a partial leaf cover and most of the beds unprepared. I lost almost three weeks of work...
by Noel | Oct 26, 2021 | CobraHead, Gardening, Vegetable Growing
Bed of Galinsoga Galinsoga (galinsoga parviflora) is often called gallant soldier, and also quickweed, or potato weed, or by many other common names. It’s native to South America and was brought to Europe, where it’s now pervasive, in the 1700’’s. Its presence in North America may either be up from Mexico or brought back from Europe. Galinsoga is named after the botanist and physician to the Queen of Spain, Ignacio Mariano Martinez de Galinsoga, who...
by Noel | Aug 30, 2021 | CobraHead, Gardening, Vegetable Growing
After years of growing half a bed of pole beans and half a bed of bush beans, I’ve given up on bush beans and I’m not going to plant them anymore. This bed was planted about July 16th. It was previously a bed of garlic inter-planted with lettuce. I’ve had very good luck planting a late crop of green beans mid-July right after the garlic is harvested. We don’t grow beans for drying. Organic dry beans in bulk are quite inexpensive, so it doesn’t...
by Noel | Jul 29, 2021 | CobraHead, Garden Tools, Gardening
On July 14th a thunderstorm flattened our two beds of sweet corn. It was déjà vu all over again. I wrote this post in July of 2009: https://blog.cobrahead.com/2009/07/11/corn-corrals/ I usually prepare for events like this by corralling my corn ahead of time using T-posts and jute twine. If I do this while the corn is still relatively small, the stalks will stand up to even very heavy winds. This year, I didn’t get around to it and paid the...
