Category: Grandpa’s Garden

I direct seeded a row of spinach today because the Perpetual Spinach is so slow. I’ve only gotten 3 gallon size Ziploc bags of it from the 18 plants in the greenhouse, as opposed to 8 bags of lettuce from the opposite side of the aisle. The outdoor direct seeded row is only about 3″ tall so they will take […]

Eleven corn came up in the second planting yesterday, and there was a frost this morning. I found an old box fan in the barn loft, and blew air across the garden, so I didn’t have to cover everything up. Moving air can help keep frost from damaging plants. You can put an overhead sprinkler on in the garden on […]

I got to pick a handful of radishes today. The cats had run so many laps through the wire hoops covering them that they had banked the soil up over them. Usually you can see when your radishes are ready to pick because they pop up, but I didn’t know until I started weeding them. I also got the second […]

The second week in April is the traditional time to direct seed broccoli and cauliflower, so if you haven’t gotten around to it yet, there’s still time. I’ll be planting my second patch of corn because the first planting is doing so well. I’ve had to cover it four nights so far so I wouldn’t recommend that early a planting […]

I was surprised the overwintered kale has bolted and formed flowers already. It seems too early for that to happen. Then I realized that they are on the cycle to get their seeds formed, dried, planted, germinated, and the plants grown large enough to overwinter. Unlike the spring planted kale that sets it’s seeds in late summer, to overwinter in […]

We tried the Perpetual Spinach last night and it does indeed taste like spinach. It’s slow growing though, so I may plant a Savoy or New Zealand type next spring to get plenty of early spinach. If the Perpetual Spinach goes all summer, as advertised, it will be a welcome addition to my future spring plantings. On the downside of […]