Local Delicious

There are some strange goings-on in the garden:

First the slugs. Let’s just say they died happy…

I have strange fungi growing under one of my strawberry boxes. It’s fascinating and intricate and beautiful in it’s own way.

Having said that, I’ve left it open to the elements to see if that takes care of it.

Yesterday was the day.

The surest signal of Fall.

The day the teepee came down.

The last of the beans are long finished but only now after a few days of rain and autumn chill am I resigned to taking down the teepee for the season. The transition to winter gardening has officially begun.

Also in true autumn fashion, after the record size beans harvested this year I saved some seeds for next.

Not all of my gardening this year has been riddled with blunders and mystery. In fact, I’m rather proud of how much food I’ve cultivated in the garden as a novice gardener.

Below is some of the bountiful harvest I have been enjoying all summer, often in a quick and healthy stirfry.*

*Note: All it takes to make a delicious stirfry is a little (or more) organic butter or cold pressed olive oil (both are optimal sources of the good fat you need in your diet), a bit of this and that — whatever you have on hand from the garden. Add a dash of salt and a squeeze of citrus and you have a quick, healthy dinner.

Verdict in two words: Yum. Yum.

When I posted the photo and story about the freakish Strange Seeding Strawberry the other day, a lot of people asked what was going on and commented that they’d never seen anything like it. But no one could shed any light on the mystery.

See, typically strawberry seeds need to overwinter (a.k.a. freeze) in order to germinate. Having them germinate on a strawberry that was still attached to the plant seemed more than a little unusual.

Well, I’m all about local so I decided to give our very own Driedeger Farms, a local strawberry farm dating back to the mid-1940′s, a chance to weigh in on the topic.

Rhonda responded to my query asking a few identifying questions that I couldn’t answer about what kind of strawberry it was. “Uhm, a red one” was about as specific as I could be.

In the end Rhonda did her research online and found me an article on how to grow strawberries where the comments below referred to strawberries being planted in soil and sprouting that way. I appreciate that, but it was a bit disconcerting that the strawberry expert relied on eHow.com, even more so when her parting comment was, “It was definitely interesting to see them in their ‘natural’ state.”

I can cut Rhonda some slack given that strawberries naturally propagate via runners and on a 65 year old farm it’s not likely they’ve needed to rely on seeding in quite some time.

But it still doesn’t explain why a strawberry that has neither been frozen nor planted in soil, sprouted on the vine.

It has come to my attention that I haven’t posted a picture of my full garden since July 9th, and it’s not from lack of taking the pictures. While I was excited about the burst of garden glory back then, it pales in comparison of the garden at the height of its glory.

By mid-July the “tee pee” was completely covered in greenery in a combination of peas, snow peas and giant pole beans.

By early August most of the brightly coloured snapdragons were finished blooming, the rhubarb was in full spread, and the broccoli was well on it’s way to growing a lovely head. The beet greens continued unabated and the carrots were still a bit too small for harvest. In the photo below you can see that the snow peas are on their last legs, turning brown and suffering from a powdery mildew.

By last August, the peas were long gone, the snow peas had died and been removed, and only the pole beans continued to produce a few beans here and there. The broccoli has all been harvested and one row of carrots has been partially harvested which allows more room for the rainbow chard to flourish. The dwarf tomato plant in the foreground is heavily laden with fruit but none has ripened yet. Brussels sprouts are on the rise, and most of the pole beans (behind the chard) have been removed.

It’s hard to believe the difference a couple of weeks make.

In just under 3 weeks, since the last garden update, my plot has gone from “it’s coming along” status to lush and full.

The first photo, taken June 20, 2010, shows some decent sprouting, particularly of beets in the bottom left. The snapdragons have buds but no flowers, and the snow peas are making headway up the mesh on The Teepee at the back of the plot.

The second photo, taken just under 3 weeks later on July 9, 2010, shows a fabulous burst of growth and colour, thanks to our finally having received some steady sunshine. Hurrah!