Carrot Harvest

We picked all of our carrots today.  We had really good germination and growth rates.  Our total harvested weight was 30-40 pounds with the tops. 

Summer carrot harvest

 I surprised Debbie by coming to the house with the entire bunch on my shoulder.  As we were processing them outside, Debbie couldn't resist the urge to make vegetable soup for dinner.  It smells so good in the house right now.  Fresh garlic, onions, zucchini, squash, carrots, green beans, and canned tomatoes from last year.

We also had some more zucchini and squash to pick.  We will cut some of the squash and zucchini up and freeze for the winter.  We also like to shred the zucchini and freeze it that way for making zucchini bread all winter long.

Zucchini and squash harvest

Now I will wait 3 weeks and plant 256 more carrots for a fall harvest.  The fall ones have been a lot sweeter carrot for us. 

Zucchini, Squash, and Beans - Oh My

It has been 1 week since our first bean harvest.  Our first week of harvesting beans has netted us 35 pints of beans.  And that was during a week where the temperature was regularly above 90 and hit 98 several times.  The high temps meant harvesting beans at dusk and once with a headlamp after the sun went down.  The cool thing about beans is that if you continue to harvest them religiously every 2-3 days, you will be rewarded with more beans.

We've been getting 4-5 large zucchinis every 2-3 days as well.  And now that the crooked neck squash is coming in as well, I think we'll be having some veggie only meals.  Our peppers look great and are just coming into harvest with 1 or 2 ready to pick.  Also our cucumbers have produced several fruits.  Too bad there aren't any tomatoes ready yet so Debbie can make a tomato and cucumber salad (for herself).  But I'm not going to cry about the tomatoes not being ready yet because in a few weeks it will be crazy in the garden.

Besides the beans, the onions are all out of the ground now and drying in the barn.  I have a 36" barn fan set on low to keep the dry air moving around them.

The garlic is done drying and ready for storage.  Debbie tasted it raw last night and couldn't believe how much stronger it was than the stuff she was buying at the store.  In order to plant 256 heads in the fall, we will only have about 4-5 heads for eating this year.  But then in 2 years from now, I should have enough to grow 1/2 acre.

Tomorrow I will pick about 75% of the carrots.  The rest aren't quite ready yet.  I've picked 2 test carrots and they were beautiful.  8-9 inches long, 1 inch in diameter, and very sweet.

Garlic Harvest

The garlic was ready to harvest today.  We only planted 36 heads of Purple Italian this year.  We will use about 10 heads to make spaghetti sauce and use for cooking, then I will plant the rest for next year.  That should give me around 250 heads next year.

Garlic harvest and ready to be cured

 I tied them into 6 bundles of 6 heads with a long piece of binders twine.  I put a loop at the end of the twine and hang them from nails in the barn.  They will hang there for 3-4 weeks before they are ready.  To tell if they are ready, you cut the stem off of one and squeeze it to see if there is any liquid in it.  If there is, then they aren't ready yet.

The onions are also getting ready to harvest.  There were 12-18 that were ready today, so I pulled them and set them out to start curing.  Tomorrow I will put them on wire racks and hang them in the barn for about 30 days to cure for storage.  With how fast they grew this year, I'm tempted to plant again since we have 3-4 months of growing season left.

And one final surprise, our first mature pepper is ready.  That was kind of surprising considering that the plants aren't that big yet and they've only been in the ground for a month.  Being on so early, I'll wait until they turn yellow, orange, or red before harvesting.  They are a lot sweeter when they aren't green.

First mature pepper

The Garden is Growing

The garden is in full bloom.  We harvested the first zucchini today, about 7 inches long.  The garlic is almost ready to harvest.  Onions are bulbing up really nice.  Beans have the first flowers coming on.  Peppers, tomatoes, and cucumbers all have fruit that should be ready in 2-3 weeks.  Here are some pictures of the garden.

Full Garden in the late afternoon

Peppers in the front two boxes, garlic & onions on the left, onions/lettuce/spinach in the center box

Beans in the front two boxes, carrots in the back, cucumbers and winter squash on the right

Winter squash climbing the trellis. Save space by growing vertically

Two 10x1 foot boxes for the tomatoes, zucchini in the foreground, crooked neck squash in the center