I harvested winter onions a week or two ago. It was a clump of four; we ate two and I replanted two.
I picked and dried some parsely during the winter, and put a leaf of fresh parsley into today's tartar sauce. I also pulled one of the garlic bulbs I buried in the herb bed last winter; the bulb was still usable, but I put only the roots and leaves into the tartar sauce. (I may put the bulb into hamburger soup tomorrow.)
The rhubarb has been up for some time. No sign of the asparagus.
I've been harvesting the kow choi.
The daffodils are threatening to bloom.
I raked the leaves out of the herb bed this evening, then raked some of the leaves out of the garden.
Spent over half an hour in the garden this morning. I collected most of the leaves, including (thanks to the shrub rake) the majority of those in the winter onions.
I ran the cultivator around most of the garden even though the soil is a bit wet; it isn't going to get dryer any time soon.
I used the five-tine hoe -- lucky I changed my mind about using the slicing hoe when I saw that the five-tine was already fitted. I strongly suspect that the thing I heard clanging and rattling off the back of the cabinet while I was trying to lift the cultivator off it was the slicing hoe. I can't see it, and it will be even harder to get it out.
The hill and hole where I dug potatoes last fall is mostly raked flat.
I plan to plant the multipliers there as soon as I've got it tilled. I'd planned to put them in a furrow and fill it in with potting soil, but didn't have the wit to buy potting soil while I was still allowed to shop. The old compost heap should do -- I think. I haven't dug into it lately.
I pushed the five-tine hoe over the garden again. Still not honestly dry enough.
I was delighted to see that the multipliers that vanished last summer are coming up. They are small and feeble and not very close together, but they are definitely present.
I dug up eight fat little carrots that I failed to harvest last fall -- just in time. I had to scrape off a lot of root hairs, but they are still sweet and crisp. I ate five of the tops while cleaning them, and left the tops on three. I'm not sure I didn't eat one whole carrot while hosing them off.
Oops, I forgot to put the slicing hoe on and go back to cultivate the asparagus bed. Still no sign of coming up, but the stumps of last years stalks are a sufficent guide. The bed looks clean from a distance, but weeds are starting to come up.
Two spears of asparagus are poking out.
The rhubarb got frosted last night, and it's snowing now. More snow is predicted for the next few days. I should have bundled up against the wind and cultivated yesterday; the ground will be wet for a while after the snow ends.
I planted the multipliers on the fifth. Wisely, they are staying underground.
I dug the end clump of winter onions on the eighth, and we have eaten more than half. I re-planted three to make new clumps.
The hyacinth are in full bloom. I first noticed them on the seventh.
It's snowing again.
I dug a clump of winter onions, replanted a pair that couldn't be separated without damage, and cleaned fourteen scallions.
Also pulled up one of the garlic plants where I buried the left-over bulbs when they started to spoil last fall. I should have spaced them more.
Three asparagus up, "harvested" two. At first I thought they had been stepped on. I picked up the largest, which had come up first, saw that it was hopelessly mangled at the dirt line, and cut it with my knife. Then I turned my attention to the smaller two west of it, picked up the one that had fallen over, saw that it necked down where it came out of the dirt, tugged slightly to straighten it, and it broke below the dirt, and came up with about half an inch of white stem attached. Closer inspection showed that the neck came out of the center of a flat top to the white stem. It must be a disease similar to damping off in seedlings.
The ends of leaves are breaking the surface in the multiplier row. The volunteers haven't grown much.
I cut *four* flowering stalks out of the rhubarb today, and cut the stems up to boil for beverage.
Perhaps the snowstorm made it think the end is near.
An asparagus shoot has replaced the once that looked broken, the surving shoot from the other root is still there, and a third root has sent up a shoot.
The multipliers are coming up nicely, and the volunteers look healthy.
I dug a clump of ten winter onions and re-planted one.
Then I picked five asparagus spears and added them to the two already in the fridge. The end plant -- I think it's the one I dug up in the garden and moved -- has sent up two thin sprouts, and one of the productive plants has sent up a thin sprout. I'm leaving the thin ones alone.
I cut another flowering stalk out of the rhubarb and boiled it in a pint of water to make a beverage.
The winter onions are going to seed, but the scallions are still edible. I hope they hold until I get clearance to exercise on Tuesday. I hope I get clearance to exercise on Tuesday!
I pushed the Culta-Eze around the garden today, and picked three asparagus. Still not supposed to bend; added restriction: cover wound when outside. Sunscreen isn't enough. Covering will probably continue all summer.
I cut two more flowering stalks and made another pint of rhubarb tea. I think they sprouted from the stumps of the previous stalks.
I pulled the weeds out of the multipliers today, thereby revealing that they are almost ready to harvest.
The volunteer multipliers have vanished again. I'm thinking of putting the soil in that row through a piece of hardware cloth after the other multipliers have been pulled up. I suspect that if I find them, they will be too small to store through the winter; in that case, I'll replant them at once. Definitely not in that row!
I'm still eating bulbils and sprouted bulbils off the winter onions.
Today I brought in the multipliers I pulled yesterday, and laid them on a newspaper to cure. There aren't many, but almost all are fat and firm.
Then I dug up the garlic, hosed it off, and laid it on the picnic table to bleach in the sun.
I also planted three heads of winter-onion bulbils where the multpliers were, and pulled a few weeds. The soil was very dry, but there was a shower in the afternoon.
I dug up a carrot that had hidden in the weeds, washed it, and threw it onto the compost heap.
When I dug up the multipliers I also turned up a marble-size potato.
I dug up an offshoot of the oregano plant and planted it south of the house. Then I dug dirt from the old compost pile to fill the hole and the corners that have leaked.
There are some cucumbers that will probably be large enough tomorrow.
There are enough cucumbers that I've given them a box of their own in the refrigerator.
I finally cleaned the multipliers and put them in a paper-maché box that was packing material for something fragile, with very little effort to separate last year's reserved sets from this year's crop.
Yesterday, the cucumber in the relish plate was found to be starting to rot, so I peeled it and put it into the salad. I haven't inspected the two boxes yet, but it's time to piece them out with onions -- I bought a bag at the farmer's market, and have nineteen winter-onion bulbs -- and make pickles.
Yesterday I dug out the last of the winter-onion bulbs that I plan to harvest. Only one was sprouted enough to spoil the outer layer of the bulb. I did try to leave all sprouted onions in the ground.
This morning I dug out all the feverfew I could find in the raised bed, leaving the original clump, and added it to the bed south of the house. I plan to leave the original clump until spring, then move it if the southside bed is doing well. I also found a stray oregano, and moved it to a new spot south of the house.
No sign of catnip south of the house, but a catnip plant came up in the Joe Rickets strawberry bed. As far as I know, no catnip seed has been anywhere near there.
I wonder whether there is a time when nobody else is using the Beyer Farm Trail? The stretch where the catnip grows is less-frquented than the boardwalk, and close to the road in two places.
The winter-onion bulbils that I planted are up. The first ones are big enough to use, but just barely.
I planted garlic and giant garlic today, and staked seed heads of giant garlic in the furrow.
The winter-onion bulbils are still pretty small. I plan to dig some tomorrow to season poblano stuffing and make mini scallions for the relish plate.
On Wednesday, I put the vegetable garden to bed for the winter. I raked off the leaves, pulled up the stakes for the cucumbers, and pushed the cultivator around one last time. (Not entirely in that order.)
I harvested some mustard leaves and a hill of winter onion to put into the chicken salad today.
The garden hasn't filled up with leaves again yet. When raking, I left the leaves that were caught in the flags anchoring the giant-garlic seed heads, partly to protect them, and partly because It would not have been easy to remove the leaves and leave the seed heads.
Some of the garlic and giant garlic is up.
I buried two rotten onions in the strawberry bed. One of them has come up, and looks healthy.