A final garden update

The growing season is quickly coming to an end. In all honesty, it has not been a good season here in southcentral Alaska. We broke records for consecutive days of rain, and the temperatures never got that impressive.

a portion of the harvest...

Here’s my recount of the growing season:

Cabbage:

All my cabbage did well, though the heads were fairly small. I’m not sure if that was a result of mulching with cardboard, or simply because of the weather. I’m hugely impressed with Johnny’s Storage #4 variety. They make incredibly dense heads, and I’m excited to see how long they will store this year.

Carrots:
As expected, the carrots did awesome this year. I grew a purple variety called Purple Haze, which turned out very well. They’re really sweet. I always grow Bolero as my storage variety, using pelleted seeds. Frankly, we’re going to have so many carrots this year, I’m not sure what I’m going to do.

Potatoes

The potatoes were a disappointment again this year. They start really well, but the leaves turned yellow halfway through the summer. I dug all the tubers this weeks, and while I probably have 30-40 lbs of potatoes, I should have had way more considering what I planted. I need to do more research on potatoe cultivation…

Lettuce/greens

Another great year for greens. I tried romaine for the first time, and they turned out great (but I had to wait until the end of July to harvest them). I also grew a baby salad mix this year. A six inch by three foot strip gave me probably a dozen cuttings, and the baby greens were never bitter. I’ll definitely rely on the salad mixes next year to keep us in fresh greens. The kale went crazy like every year.

Corn/pumpkins

As already mentioned I got ripe corn for the first time in four years. I think I’ve come up with a plan for next year to have a decent harvest. All of my transplanted corn matured, but none of the corn started from seed did, although those plants and ears are actually larger.  The pumpkin vines all have cantaloupe-sized fruit on them, and our surprise indian summer has given them an extra week or two. I’m still not sure they’ll mature, but it was fun having them in the garden.

Onions

My onions are tiny again this year. I knew that I did not start them early enough, but I thought they would do better, as I was pretty diligent about weeding their corner of the garden. More research needs to be done on the onions too….

For the winter:

I really need to get a soil test done. I’ve been adding local organic fertilizer the last couple of years, but I need to see if my soils are lacking anything.

I’m going to try propagation this year with currants and gooseberries. I’ll post updates this winter or spring on my progress.

1 Comments

  1. Kaylene on September 28, 2010 at 5:54 am

    Hey, thanks for the carrots! They are DELICIOUS. Put me on the list for any harvest leftovers! YUMMY!

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