Category: Food

Veggie garden for the Pacific Northwest ! 

Actually planted one week ago (MARCH 24), after we set up and filled the second of our raised planter boxes. They are 4 x 2 feet, and raised about 3 feet off the ground. Next to each other, they are 16 square feet total planting space:

The photo below is peering in……the radish seeds sprouted after 4 days, the lettuce after 6!! Probably due to the cloches, keeping the cold rain out.

We bought two large plastic and metal cloches to extend the growing season and speed up some of the plants by providing warmth and protection from all the cold spring rain we’ve been getting and from sprout-eating vermin. Unfortunately, sprout eating vermin appears to likely involve deer now. We found deer prints in the soft ground in the back yard yesterday, and of course caught one red handed last fall, the first sighting of a deer in the twenty two years we’ve lived here. I didn’t want to bother with the fabric type cloches, those would blow away with our first good wind!  Even these need little metal spikes to secure them. They cover most but not all of the space, but this works for an early planting.  I will probably remove these cloches and plant along the uncovered borders when it warms up. Also got a square metal trellis that attaches onto one side of the planters for the bean and cucumber vines. Soil is potting soil in the back one from last year, and some compost, soil and peat in the front one (dave filled that one). I mixed in some vermiculite and fish fertilizer in each, especially the non-composted one.

I planted the early spring garden: spring onions, carrots, butter lettuce, spinach and radishes inside, and nasturtiums on the corners outside. Except for the north side, with the bean & cucumber trellis. 

Next phase will be the later spring stuff, like pole beans and cucumbers, and finding tomato plant starts. I will be looking for tomato plants that advertise tolerance below 55 degrees…..we had too much ‘flower drop’ happening last year, losing many potential tomatoes to the inevitable temperature dips. So far no tomato starts to buy, must be too early.

Summer sowing is broccoli, and maybe brusssel sprouts ( only got broccoli seeds so far). Also endive is supposed to be good to plant then, for fall. Lettuce is supposed to be cold loving, and if they are protected with cloches, supposedly I can get lettuce nearly all year. But Lettuce doesn’t like the heat. Bulb onions, garlic and leeks are the other fall plantings. Carrots are supposed to be sensitive to the waning light and warmth, so they stop growing in the fall. I actually had tried a container of carrot seedlings from late last summer and they germinated fine but basically stopped growing, though they did withstand all the below freezing temps and snow we had. They are tiny white things that aren’t worth eating, so I turned over the soil in the container.

Recommendations are to take cloves from storebought garlic heads and plant them pointy tip up about two inches apart, in October. This is faster, easier and cheaper than seeds, since we always have some cloves in the house. 

Seed story, beginning of spring (march 26)

Seeds coming up now: Oregon geraniums, Desert Parsley and some Allium, and maybe Gaillardia in pots. Definitely some seedlings out in the yard, maybe gaillardia, Indian Paintbrush, and maybe Woodland Penstemon. Desert Parsley seeds germinate well but seem to be getting eaten out in the yard.

Bought 3 tall Red Ovalleaf huckleberry bushes (4 ft tall and narrow) and transplanted two smaller ones into the south west lower back yard, in an area cleared by removing a maple tree. It gets dappled and indirect sun, and the soil is better and moister than where the two i transplanted were. We have two thriving in a similar environment. Other understory plants put there, some  earlier and  some recently: several Wild Ginger txs, several bluebell rotundifolia txs, clusters of brodiaea, Fairy bells, Trillium Chloropetalum and Ovatum, Pink Fawn Lily, Kitten tails, Miterwort, Hookers Onion, Prunella, and Loganberry. 

Transplanted about half the cluster of Trillium Ovatum in the lower back yard, which I had sown many years ago, maybe six. I transplanted ten bulbs with their three-leave tops into another area, to give the remaining ones a little more room. There are about ten or more left. There are more than germinated the first year or two, and they are of varying maturity. I think some of the seeds are latent or take longer to appear above ground. The cholorpetalum doesn’t seem to do that, I left the 8 or so plants alone.

The lower back yard (west) is getting to be a GROTTO with FERNS (thriving licorice, leather leaf, sword and maiden hair) as well as TRILLIUM, HUCKLEBERRIES and the other ground covers like Wild Ginger. Turns out we don’t have very many pictures of this area, probably because it had never been particularly photogenic, it is a shady slower growing area and we’ve cleared the area relatively recently.  But now it is starting to fill in, and a rangy maple taken out (full disclosure, my fault, I kept it low for view), so here are the “before” pics: I may wait for a couple of months for the follow up “during” or “after” shots, as much of it is herbaceous, deciduous and/ or growing still!       

BEFORE PIX: circa 2013 or so    .

Looking south towards new grotto area (upper right in photo)
 Above: The foreground is Vancouvaria and Goats beard coming up…the ‘grotto’ area is in the background. The pic below is taken from the grotto area itself, looking back east.

Goin’ Native

  
We decided to finally try out the Native Americans’ favored food, Camas. This was a a highly valued food that was widely traded and given as gifts by Chiefs. They cultivated large areas using controlled burns and limiting the number of bulbs taken at any site.  It was dug up around flowering time due to the fear of Death Camas, which looks different but the bulbs look similar.  We don’t have any of that!  We have white camas but it’s a Camassia. The bulbs were eaten after being slow cooked in steam pits for two days, and either eaten right away or sun dried and stored. We’ve had a bunch of it for years now, maybe ten years, and some is growing into the walkways in a couple of places, so it seemed the right time.

They are difficult to dig up, and require a deep tool like a post hole shovel. That’s why the moles can’t hurt them. So far the voles have not partaken either, though they like the bordiaea well enough!  If the moles can’t expose their bulbs, the voles can’t get there!They are about 7 or more inches deep in hard soil and mulch. The native Americans preferred to cultivate these (yes, they sowed seeds and engaged in agriculture) on soil just above rocks like on outcroppings, because they were easier to dig up.

They dug steam pits and cooked them slowly for two days with fern leaves, heated rocks and water. The cooking bulbs were watched round the clock for that time and hot rocks and water were added as needed….what did they use for a thermometer?!  It was a seasonal job – for women, of course. But if the cooking was cut short or insufficient, the results pull be significant gut indigestion! They contain inulin,  which is a polymer of fructose which requires slow cooking over time to break down.  Inulin is indigestible by humans, so it needs to be low-temperature cooked over prolonged period. This gives the cooked bulbs a  progressively more brown color, and the fructose then gives it a mildly sweet, “carmelized” flavor. It peels like an onion but is firmer than an onion after cooking. Their scent is likened to baked pears (true), and their flavor and consistency like potatoes (also true).  The native Americans knew better!

We prepared them two different times. First, by digging them up , cleaning them, slicing off roots and stems, and putting them into a small collapsible metal steamer which was then put into a crock pot. Water added to just below the steamer level, set low, and forget for two days. They turn progressively BROWN, as the inulin is broken down. Then slicing them crosswise and sautéing them in olive oil or butter till golden, and lightly salted. Yum. I will warn whomever that eating them earlier has consequences. I felt a little yucky in the gut the next day after eating them earlier, at 20 hours of cooking.  After waiting a day and then eating them at 40 hours of cooking I had no ill effects at all.

     
           

First out

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Very first is western trillium, which shows up early fall. Now there are several other plants starting to break ground, like shooting stars: dodacatheon pulchellum and dodacatheon dentatum, Trillium chloropetulatum (fragrant), and a couple of rattlesnake plantains (though these are returning there are very few, small plants).

Collected Munro’s Globemallow seeds, looks like ~100 seeds or so. One of the two plants I had is not looking good after transplanting out of a container, so I’m back down to one. Last time I used the seeds, I got exactly one living plant from all of them. They need dry conditions and the containers aren’t ideal.

Almost all the leaves have fallen, so I did my yearly chores of cleaning out the stream and raking the steps. The chickadees seems to appreciate it, they were taking baths in the stream this afternoon.

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We finally did the annual cranberry harvest, from two of the three plantings (the newest didn’t produce any). Record haul, slightly over three gallons! We should be in honey-dried cranberries all year!….or at least until we finish them all.

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Almost summer? Hard to tell with this cool rainy weather…..

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Mock Orange in bloom, and the Swallowtail butterflies have come back to the neighborhood.

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Lupines in bloom. They are a bigger more vigorous plant than before, since they don’t have any more competition from the Mahonia, which had started to overrun the place. Time to start checking for aphids….I use a spray with oil, water and a few drops of detergent to kill the bastards (the aphids, hopefully, not the lupine!).

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