There's not a lot happening in the garden these days. The only things left are the tomatoes, peppers, and sweet potatoes. I may plant some spinach for a late crop in the next week or so, but I'm pretty much at the end of the season.
It may have been hot and dry for the last couple of weeks, but that doesn't mean there's nothing in bloom! Enjoy a few pictures from the last week or two below.

Andrew Trivette

Harvest as of Friday

Finally got around to getting the potatoes dug on Friday. I ended up with 12 lbs. of yellow potatoes, and 5 lbs. of red potatoes. Not a bumper crop, but 17 lbs. of potatoes for one person will be plenty! I'll be eating a lot of potatoes over the next few days since I seem to have a knack for putting the spading fork into practically every potato, no matter how small...
This week looks like hash browns, potato soup, mashed potatoes, baked potatoes, fried potatoes, scalloped potatoes, and maybe even potato chips!

Before

After

Finally got my beans harvested today. Would have got a lot more, but I waited to long to pick them, and the ones that touched the ground molded. Looking forward to cooking up what's left and seeing how they taste! These are Taylor's Dwarf Horticultural Beans

Andrew Trivette

But whoever has the world's goods, and sees his brother in need, and closes his heart of compassion against him, how does the love of God remain in him? - 1 John 3:17

If you're looking for a way to help, I recommend Autumn Hope Ministries. Based right here in Cookeville, TN, Autumn Hope is raising money to take to an area in Kenya that is often forgotten by churches and humanitarian groups.

Andrew Trivette

It's been awhile since I've posted anything, mostly because I haven't had time to do anything with the garden since I planted it! In spite of my neglect, the garden isn't doing to bad. I've been dreading all the weeding that needs to be done, but as loose as the soil is in the beds, it's actually really easy. I did a a little bit after I took pictures earlier, and it probably didn't take 20 minutes to clear most of a hundred square foot bed.
I haven't harvested anything yet, thanks to the late start this spring, but a lot of stuff is getting close!
On the to-do list is to finish weeding, and stake the tomato plants(they're a complete mess!)
I planted an extra bed of corn, and one of wheat, as well as a bed full of sunflowers, soybeans, and triticale. Unfortunately, the birds got most of the seeds, and only a few plants of wheat and soybeans came up. Hopefully I can save a little seed off of those for next year. Once I get the weeds cleared out of the empty beds, I'll plant some lettuce, spinach, and maybe a few herbs for a late season crop.
On to the pictures! (I tried to take pictures that didn't highlight just how bad the weeds are :)

Corn Tassel

Painted Mountain Corn (Flour Corn)

Spaghetti Squash

One of the few wheat plants that came up

Spaghetti Squash

Squash Flower

Potatoes

Painted Mountain Corn interplanted with Taylor's Dwarf Horticultural Beans

Another pic of Corn and beans. The corn is a short variety that only gets 4-5 ft tall

The whole garden, temporarily empty beds and all!

Andrew Trivette

Well, the garden is finally planted! I'm excited, even if it is about a month late!

Last week I was able to get a truckload of worm castings mixed with some composted horse manure. Worm castings are a great option for the organic gardener! I'm looking into doing some small-scale vermicomposting to create my own 'fertilizer' for next year.

After finally finishing preparing the garden beds, I started planting about 3 weeks ago. I planted one bed of corn and bush beans(interplanted). According to some sources, these plants work well together because the beans fix nitrogen, which the corn needs, and the corn provides shade for the beans.

This past week I planted a bed each of corn, wheat, potatoes, and sweet potatoes. One bed contains blocks of soybeans, triticale, sunflowers, and some winter squash. The next bed contains the remainder of the winter squash, and several plants of watermelon, and cantaloupe. That only fills about half of the bed, so I need to find something else to fill it! I'll probably fill it with some herbs, and perhaps onions. The last bed has about 32 tomato plants, and 16 pepper plants. Peppers include poblano, Caribbean Red habenero, and green and brown sweet peppers. The tomatoes include several heirloom varieties, and a couple of hybrids. I'll have to look up the specific varieties, and post them later. The plants were all purchased from Funk's Greenhouse here in Cookeville, TN. My seed potato was purchased from Walmart this week, and because it is getting late in the season to put potatoes out, they had already started to sprout, and dry out. I'm not getting my hopes up on them.

Both varieties of corn are flour corns, and all of the seeds this year are open-pollinated varieties, meaning I can save seed from them for next year(with the exception of triticale, which is a hybrid of wheat and rye). I purchased my seeds from Bountiful Gardens

I'm still working on spreading the manure/vermicompost. Hopefully I'll get it finished this week. As you can see from the picture on the right, I get a lot of shade in the late afternoon. We'll see how that affects things this year. Hopefully by next year I'll have most of the offending trees removed. (Their pretty ragged trees anyway, and some of them are growing into the power lines). This year is just trying to get back into the swing of things anyway. I'm not expecting a bumper crop(although, I'd be happy to get one!)

All is looking good so far, as long as I can keep my dog out of the garden! Not much luck so far!

Andrew Trivette

Andrew Trivette

The last week or two have been rainy and/or miserably cold. That finally broke today, and I'm out mowing and of course, digging the garden!
Believe it or not, one day soon, I'll have some pictures to show that aren't just overturned soil! Until then, I'll stick with just showing progress.

Also received my new camera this week, so expect better pictures from here on out.

Andrew Trivette

Andrew Trivette

Several years ago, while working at a research center, I was able to accumulate a small collection of trees and shrubs that were leftovers from various genetic and chemical experiments. I planted all these at my parents, and now that I have my own place it's time to move them to their final home! Starting with about 5 plants from my old stash(2 dogwoods, 2 oakleaf hydrangeas, and one gold leaf juniper) as well as my potted christmas tree(leyland cypress), I began transplanting this weekend.

The dogwoods went on either side of the driveway, and are at least 11ft tall. Fun to transplant! I did manage to break another Craftsman fiberglass spading forkin the process(yes, another). Looks like I'll be heading to Sears for a replacement thanks to their lifetime warranty!

Andrew Trivette

Broke ground today on the beginnings of my new garden. A lot of work in store for the next couple of months! Putting in a new garden with only hand tools in sod means this year is going to be a lot harder than future years will be.
I'm planning on 8-10 - 100sq. ft. beds(4 x 25ft).
The first step is just to break through the sod, and for that I'm using a off-brand version of the Garden Weasel Garden Claw. This breaks up the first 3 inches or so very well, and cuts the sod into manageable chunks. Then I'll go back over it with a spading fork to turn the soil at a deeper depth of about 12 in.
Eventually I intend to double-dig the beds to 24 inches, but for the first year, I'm just going to worry about actually getting them in!
Of course I did have a little help raking the leaves before I started digging!

Andrew Trivette