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Gardening ideas for Boulder, Colorado |
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Archive for May, 2009
Thursday, May 28th, 2009
Herbs-Basil.60 days. From seed, two per planting, 3 inches apart. Keep soil damp consistently damp during germination. Basil is a paradox: it needs warm soil but begins flowering in June. Once that happens, the flavor falls off the table. So the best strategy is to grow a lot of it in a very short window of opportunity, then dry or freeze it. There are dozens of varieties from all over the world. Genovese is the classic wide-leafed sweet basil great in pesto. Thai basil is truly potent stuff with a hint of cinnamon. And spicy globe has tiny rounded leaves and a sharp flavor. There are also red and purple basils, some ruffled and some not.
Chives: 60 days minimum, from seed planted 1″ apart. Chives are without a doubt one of the easiest herbs to grow. Related to onions, they grow in much the same way. Keeping soil damp through germination is the key. Although an annual, chives will continue year after year if you let some of them go to seed. Their pink flowers are edible.
Dill: 60 days minimum, from seed. Dill plants are lovely, fernlike and up to 4′tall. They germinate well when planted in warm soil and kept watered. By seeding out they can return year after year, and the seeds themselves have some culinary value. The larger varieties tend to be less flavorful. Use fresh or dried.
Oregano: Grown from starts. Classic Greek oregano is probably the best, though there are dozens of varieties. Oregano will grow into a small perennial shrub over the course of a few years. It has more flavor before it flowers, so cut your year’s worth of oregano before then and dry it in the shade. Oregano is one of the few herbs that taste better dried rather than fresh. Mexican oregano comes a completely different plant, a tropical shrub, but from the culinary point of view it has a fabulous flavor.
Parsley: 60 days minimum from seed. Plant 8″ apart in mid-spring. Parsley can tolerate some cool weather so you can sow it out a little earlier than most herbs. It can take up to two weeks to germinate. It is a biennial, meaning that each plant grows for two years, flowering and going to seed in the second. Parsley can survive the winter and can also be dried. Moss or curly parsley is the most common variety, but many people think flat-leaved Italian parsley has better flavor. Keep an eye out for parsley worms or maybe plant a little extra for them. These distinctively pretty caterpillars morph into one of our prettiest butterflies, the black swallowtail.
Rosemary: From starts. Usually grown as an annual and planted in a container. “Arp” rosemary is a perennial here but, just to be on the safe side, plant it in protected spot on the east or south side of the house. The most important factor in growing rosemary is drainage. They don’t like soggy soil. Water only when the tips of the plants start to droop.
Herbs in containers: When planting container herbs keep in mind that there are short-term and long-term herbs. Short-term herbs like basil, chives and parsley typically don’t last more than a year and should be planted together. Long-term herbs can live for years. They include oregano, rosemary and thyme and should be planted together.
To read all of Todd’s Avant Gardening posts, see the Avant Gardening Series category.
Posted in Avant Gardening Series, Gardening, Herbs |
Tuesday, May 26th, 2009
Limited Space? Try Tower Gardening!
If your garden is limited by space, try going up. As you can see, you can pack a lot of garden into limited space. You’ll need pots or five-gallon buckets with drain holes, good-quality potting soil and a commitment to building a safe, strong structure. In the first photo, you can see that we’ve packed 25 pots into 16 square feet. In the second photo, twenty-five pots are attached to a ladder, also taking up 16 square feet. You can grow anything in a pot that you can grow in the ground, but it makes sense to stick to tomatoes, peppers, eggplants, cucumbers and melons. Water as needed and fertilize every two weeks. This is an ongoing project, so stay tuned for updates.
Posted in Avant Gardening Series, Gardening |
Sunday, May 24th, 2009
 Sunflowers: 75 days. Planted in late May 24″ apart. One of the best ways to introduce children to gardening is to plant sunflowers, particularly the mammoth varieties. To see such a glorious flower develop from such a small seed is guaranteed to induce wonder. Sunflowers can hit 10 feet in height. There are also double sunflowers, like Teddy Bear, which resemble giant marigolds. They come in a wide array of colors and patterns. Sunflowers exhibit heliotropism. They swivel their flower heads to face the sun. Seen from the east in the morning, a field of sunflowers will be overwhelmingly yellow. By afternoon it will be green, since the flowers are facing west. Over the course of the night the flowers reset themselves back to the east, awaiting the sun.
To read all of Todd’s Avant Gardening posts, see the Avant Gardening Series category.
Posted in Avant Gardening Series, Flowers |
Monday, May 18th, 2009
Snap Beans: 60-80 days. Planted 8″ apart in warm soil in late May. There are two varieties: pole beans and bush beans. Pole beans are vines which can reach to 6′ or more, but need netting or a trellis to support them. They begin producing a little later but can bear pods for up to 2 months. Bush beans are freestanding and earlier but produce only for 2-3 weeks. Solve this problem by planting more than once. Most people harvest their beans too late-pick them when they are the diameter of a pencil or less. In full swing they can be picked every three days. They come in many colors.
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Posted in Avant Gardening Series, Gardening, Vegetables |
Friday, May 15th, 2009
  These tips are also great for peppers and eggplants.
Plant when the weather warms up the soil: usually the last two weeks in May.
Remove the bottom sets of leaves and plant tomatoes deeper. This increases the root mass and means more tomatoes.
Harden off your seedlings by exposing them to increasing amounts of sunlight before planting. A few hours in the shade the frist day, then increase their exposure. Plant them on a cloudy day or in the evening.
For each plant, dig a hole at least 12″ in diameter and 10″ deep. Even bigger is better. Backfill with a misture of 50% top soil, 40% compost, 10% manure.
Pinch off the first few sets of blossoms to encourage better rooting, growth, and, ultimately, yields.
Fertilize every two weeks with a relatively low-nitrogen, high-phosphorous fertilizer. Water with 1 tablespoon Epsom salts/1 gallon water every two weeks. Liquid iron and Super Thrive are also good ideas.
The more often you pick, the better your plants will yield.
Always water at the base of your plants in the morning. Soaking the entire plant increases potential for disease later on.
Posted in Fertilizer and Compost, Tomatoes, Vegetables |
Monday, May 11th, 2009
Tomatoes: 45 to 120 days. Grown from starts planted around Memorial Day. Few plants engender such passion as tomatoes. They’ve traveled the world from their origin in northern South America. And the best thing that ever happened to tomato lovers was the collapse of the Soviet Union. When the Wall came down dozens of terrific tasting varieties came running out. Tomatoes are classified as either determinate or indeterminate. Determinate tomatoes produce all their fruit at once. Indeterminate tomatoes produce their fruit over an entire season, with clusters of fruit ripening sequentially. Indeterminate plants tend to produce more fruit.
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Posted in Avant Gardening Series, Tomatoes, Vegetables |
Friday, May 8th, 2009
 Every Friday on select cut flowers, get two stems for the price of one.
Posted in Uncategorized |
Friday, May 8th, 2009
Lettuce: 40-90 days. From seed in April and every two weeks thereafter until mid May. Start a fall crop in mid-late August. Plant 1″ apart and harvest every other immature plant for microgreens. Finish with plants 6″-8″ apart. Or simply designate an area, sprinkle seeds evenly and use a rake to integrate seed into soil. Few vegetables vary as much as lettuce. From the almost inedible iceberg to the tiny butter crunch to a delicious red romaine, lettuce’s looks, tastes and textures are all over the map. It thrives in cool weather.
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Posted in Avant Gardening Series, Gardening, Vegetables |
Wednesday, May 6th, 2009
Cabbage: 60-180 days. Grown from seed or starts. Cultivation is similar to broccoli. Plant 12″-18″ apart. Heavy rains may cause heads to crack, especially in late summer. Growing a large cabbage insures that you’re going to be eating cabbage for a long, long time. It’s better to harvest the head when it’s the size of softball by pressing the leaves down, cutting the head free but carefully leaving the stalk and leaves intact. Anywhere from 2 to 6 mini-cabbage heads will grow from the edges of the stump, which can be harvested as needed. In terms of dollar value per acre, cabbage brings financial returns second only to marijuana. Try growing savoy varieties, which have delightfully crinkled leaves and tight heads. Or plant a variety called January King-it features gloriously colored leaves, green with red veins, all flecked with white.
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Posted in Avant Gardening Series, Vegetables |
Tuesday, May 5th, 2009
Cool Weather Vegetables-March 1 to April 15
Asparagus: Grown from roots planted 18″ apart. Won’t reliably produce spears until the third year, but can produce for twenty years or more. Asparagus plants take up a lot of room in a garden and may better suited for your perennial beds. The ferny plant makes a great accent to rose bushes and other tall perennials. To plant, dig a trench 15 inches deep and line with two inches of manure and compost, topped with an inch of topsoil. Lay the root, crown side up, and cover with two inches of soil. As the plant grows, backfill with soil until level with the rest of the garden. For the first three years do not harvest spears. First up will be male spears, about as thick as you index finger. Later in the season will come the female spears, the diameter of your little finger. Never pick the female spears. All-male cultivars have been developed. One good old-time variety is Jersey Giant. There’s also a purple variety, which reverts to green when cooked. Europeans also heavily mulch asparagus, to blanch it, producing white spears.
Beets: 50-80 days. Grown from seed, planted as soon as the soil can be worked. Sow seeds 2″ apart, thin to 6″ by eating the smaller, slower plants fresh or boiled. Harvest when roots reach 2″ diameter. Repeat sowing every two weeks for summer-long harvest. Of the many varieties, golden beets are among the tastiest.
Broccoli: 55 to 100 days. Grown from seeds or starts. Plant 18″-24″ apart. Can be planted as soon as ground can be worked and again in late summer. Heat is the great enemy of broccoli, causing the heads to bolt-turning from a tight green head to a cluster of flowers. Some types are grown for heads and, once harvested, side shoots. Some are grown for side shoots alone. Broccoli raab is a member of another plant family, can tolerate more heat, has a sharp, distinct flavor and is usually sautéed. Plants grown from seed offer some advantages. They tend to have better root systems and can tolerate heat waves and water shortages better. The two most common problems are aphids and cabbage loopers. Aphids can be hosed off followed by an insecticidal soap spray. Cabbage loopers-small green caterpillars-can devour leaves but can be treated with the bacterial powder Bt. Just for fun try growing Romanesco broccoli, which looks like a plant designed by M.C. Escher. The head is a cluster of tiny, spiraling minarets, it’s flavor somewhere between broccoli and cauliflower.
Brussels Sprouts
80-90 days. Grown from seeds or starts. Plant12″-18″ apart. Care is much the same a broccoli. Sprouts form from the bottom up and harvests can last up to 8 weeks, if you pinch the topmost growth the sprouts will develop all at once. Tolerates heat better then broccoli.
To read all of Todd’s Avant Gardening posts, see the Avant Gardening Series category.
Posted in Avant Gardening Series, Gardening, Vegetables |
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