Tag: redarling brussel sprout

Happy New Year 2020: A Look Back To 2019

Happy New Year’s from my house to yours!

2019 was in “interesting” year at my house.

The Good

It had lots of excitement, like being picked as one of Burpee Home Gardens 2019 Gardeners of the Year!

I tried a bunch of new plants in the garden.

We took some wonderful vacations.

But, most exciting was proudly watching my twin boys graduate from college–Go Hokies and Go Blue!!

I’ll be playing catch up writing about all these experiences this winter as the garden goes into hibernation for a few months!

The Bad

But all things don’t always go smoothly and aren’t all great. I kept up with the blog as best as I could this year, but as I mentioned earlier, I was diagnosed with stage 1 breast cancer in March. That took much longer to deal with than I expected, but I am looking forward to putting this behind me. I feel really lucky that it was caught early, but I still had to endure a lumpectomy, radiation, physical therapy and now hormone therapy (but no chemo, phew). I also feel really lucky to have had my family and so many friends, near and far, around me. All your help, positive messages and meals were invaluable!

I did panic a bit over how I was going to be the July BHG 2019 Gardener of the Month and undergo cancer treatment. But in reality, that push to keep me in the garden proved to be so helpful. Keeping active despite everything else going on really helped keep me distracted and maintain a positive outlook. That peacefulness and excitement I feel working outside in the garden, gave my mind and body some time to heal from the demands of treatment. Maybe things weren’t ideal this year (or less ideal than usual), but with help from my husband and my very trusted landscaper who listened carefully to all my instructions, I was able to keep up with the gardens and enjoy bloom and harvest time.

There’s a lot of evidence that working in a garden, or just enjoying nature, works wonders for the healing process. I have to agree.

We also sadly said goodbye to our Daisy in October at the very old age of 16. She’s been with us since the boys were in 1st grade, so her absence is greatly felt. Miss you, pretty girl ❤️❤️

So after all that, here’s hoping that 2020 will be a wonderful, healthy and happy one for all of us ❤️❤️

Looking forward to getting back to writing!

One more thing–Here’s my PSA–get your yearly mammograms, they save lives! Also, check out the National Air Quality Assessment map to see if unbeknownst to you, you’re sitting under a toxic cloud from nearby industry. My community fought back and we got the ethylene oxide spewing Sterigenics closed! Visit Stop Sterigenics for more information.

How Are the Burpee 2020 New Varieties Doing Mid-Summer?

Despite the weather and “other issues”, I think it’s turning into a pretty good garden year.

Happy Sweet 16 Daisy! ❤️🐾🐾❤️

I really enjoyed getting the 2020 Burpee New Varieties in May (“Yay, My Burpee Home Garden Plants Have Arrived“), and they are looking fabulous! Definitely loving the summer heat that has finally arrived.

How are they doing?

The sweet peppers have tons of flowers and look healthy and strong. The Yellow Mardi Gras Fun Series F1 Snack Pepper already has a large pepper ready to start changing colors. I can see the first hints of yellow.

The Roulette F1 Sweet Pepper, a “sweet habanero with lots of flavor”, has 2 little peppers and lots of flowers for more to come. I don’t usually use much heat in my food so I’m excited to try these mild, but flavorful peppers. I will definitely find a tasty recipe to use them in! Any suggestions?

The Grand Slam F1 Slicer Tomato, described as a “great slicer tomato, ideal for containers; determinate variety”, is liking the grow bag I planted it in. It’s growing in a nice, tidy compact shape that I would expect from a determinate variety, and has plenty of flowers and green tomatoes. I did put a cage around it for support since it looks like it’ll be a heavy producer.

The days to harvest for this variety is 74 days, so just a little later to ripen than the Early Girl Bush (68 days) that is growing near it. She never disappoints with the first tasty tomatoes of the season. Ready to pick the first one! What should make with it? Maybe it’ll be an ALT (avocado, lettuce and tomato) sandwich so I can savor the freshness.

When I pick what varieties to grow, I do like to stagger the days to maturity a little bit so everything doesn’t arrive at once. But I also like to err on the early side to make the most off the shorter growing season here in the midwest.

I’ve been intrigued by the Redarling F1 Brussel Sprout (reddish purple, flavorful sprouts).

I’ve never grown brussel sprouts before and so far so good. There was a bit of cabbageworm damage on it and the nearby cabbages, but I think it’s ok. I’ve been searching for the little worms to pick off, but haven’t seen them yet. They are sneaky little things. I may have to resort to dusting this year with some Bacillus thuringiensis var. kurstaki, which is one of the safest, natural ways to kill off the caterpillars. I do have this issue every year with the cabbage and kohlrabi, so next year may try some companion planting of thyme and sage to repel the damaging worms.  Who doesn’t like more herbs in their garden?

The only Burpee plant not doing well was the Lemon Drop Squash that the rabbits unfortunately got to. Would love to try it again, but this time behind the safety of a rabbit fence. Who wouldn’t love to have little lemon sized yellow squashes?

So far so good, can’t wait to start tasting them! Hopefully they taste as good as they look.

Here’s some more photos of the birthday pup!

 

Giant Rhubarb and a June Veggie Garden Review

Giant rhubarb!

While the spring has been tough on some plants, others have flourished. Rhubarb is one of the things that has flourished. I have two plantings, my original here at home that I got from my mom, and a second I got from one of her friends when I complained that mine wasn’t very red.

My original plants taste great, but the stalks were more green than red. Apparently there’s many varieties of rhubarb that run from green to red, and green ones will never turn red. So now I have a green variety and red variety! Both are mature plants so I can harvest freely, but I never cut more than 1/2 -2/3 of the stalks and stop around late July to let the plant get ready for fall. What did I do today with my harvest? A 4th of July Strawberry Rhubarb Pie for my daughter and boyfriend who are visiting for the weekend!

How’s everything else doing? Fine would be the word I use, and for gardening that’s not a bad thing. I got my first full salad harvest the other day. The lettuce hasn’t bolted yet due to the cooler weather we’ve had, the Sugar Snap Peas are plentiful and I got my first YOLO Wonder green pepper and Summer Stripe squash.

Everything else is blooming beautifully and I’m looking forward to lots of July harvests.

Sweet Success Burpless and Telegraph Cucumbers are looking excellent climbing their trellises…

…All the tomatoes are looking great. Lots of flowers and green tomatoes just teasing me with their abundance.

I’m growing Husky Cherry Red, a bush type cherry tomato, and indeterminate Yellow Cherry and the larger Juliet Grape tomatoes.

Husky Cherry Red Tomato

Yellow Cherry Tomato

Slicer tomato varieties are Burpee Early Girl, and 2 bush types, Grand Slam F1 Slicer Tomato (a Burpee Home Garden 2020 new variety) and Early Girl Bush. From the looks of it, I’m going to be having a great tomato harvest!

Grand Slam F1 Slicer Tomato
Grand Slam F1 Slicer Tomato

I’m really liking the bush varieties I’m growing. In the past, I’ve grown some slicer tomatoes in grow bags, but since they were indeterminate varieties they became really gangly and hard to deal with. These are nice and compact, great for a patio or porch, and seem to be producing equal to their wilder cousins.

Do I grow roma tomatoes? I used to, but I don’t have the space to grow enough to use for sauce etc, so I leave those to buy at the Farmer’s Market.

What else is growing?

My Burpee Home Garden 2020 new variety Redarling F1 Brussel Sprout, is looking awesome. I hope it begins to “sprout” soon.

Best of the rest…

Is your garden doing “fine”?

Yay! My Burpee Home Garden Plants Have Arrived

One of the perks of being named one of Burpee Home Gardens 2019 Gardener’s of the Year is that I was going to receive a box containing some of their 2020 New Varieties. I have been anxiously awaiting its delivery, but glad it didn’t come any sooner than this week. For many of us, spring was really late and they’d be sitting in the house or my mini greenhouse waiting to be planteed.

But yesterday they arrived! I couldn’t have been more excited opening the door to this box of goodies. It’s like Christmas for gardeners 🙂

I’ve never ordered “plant” plants before, so I was curious how they’d arrive. I’ve ordered bare root perennials, but not actual potted plants. They were just fine, healthy and no worse for the wear. Inside the box were 9 plants, each wrapped in their own safe packaging. Again, like Christmas.

My box contained:

These are all some of my favorite vegetables, so very excited and honestly a little nervous, to be gifted this amazing vegetable care package. Can I get them to grow well? What is going to be the year’s garden pest? Can I keep the rabbits and my pup who loves peppers away from the plants (Little White Pepper Thief)? Who knows, that’s the fun!

I put them outside with the rest of the plants last night to get hardened off since for once it wasn’t going to be unseasonably cold overnight. Sooner they’re in the ground, sooner I’ll have my first harvest!

I already had my spots picked out for them and in the ground they went today with my other recent purchases from the local nursery. I actually think it’s going to be the perfect temperature the next few days to allow the plants to get established.

It’s going to be a pepper party in the garden with these colorful Mardi Gras Snack Peppers!

I’m still trying to decide if I need to protect the Lemon Drop Squash from the squash vine borer.

It’s not in the same bed that had the squash vine borer attack last year, but it is kind of close. I have a couple of weeks to think about it, but I think I’ll put some traps out and then use the aluminum foil approach to protect the stem just in case. I have netting, but  squash vine borers spend the winter in the soil near their recently infected plants and that just would trap any adults inside the netting instead of out. I am going to net the squash in the other raised bed where I have the rest of the squash and zucchini plants growing on a trellis.

I’ll keep you posted on the plants progress throughout the summer!

btw, the University of Minnesota Extension is a great resource for SVB infection.

Looking for these plants in your neighborhood? Check out this retailer list from Burpee Home Gardens 

Are you trying anything new this year?

 

(Note: While I received these plants as a gift from Burpee Home Garden, all opinions and reviews are a reflection of my own unbiased experience)