Our temperatures here have been hovering between 42 and 52 for a week. The sun, if we see it, is like a phantom. Here and then gone, making you wonder, was that the sun? Definitely not good gardening weather. 
At this point, June 6, I’ve lost my window to plant my Calais Flint corn. I only have so much seed, and I want to plant sweet corn. They cannot be planted at the same time, and I don’t have enough space for isolation. So I won’t waste my seed. Next year… . When you save your own seeds, you become a little more aware of supply issues. It has been so wet and cold, I have done little direct seeding in the garden yet. I have been confined to the greenhouse for my gardening fix.
This is the min/max thermometer in the greenhouse. When I checked it tonight, it hadn’t changed a bit.
Our neighbors who are trying to grow some food this year to offset high prices at the store, called last night looking for some seeds and guidance. It seems they have planted warm weather crops 3 times and the seeds have rotted. I didn’t have to talk to them, DH did and he tried to explain that the dates and harvest projections on the seed packets aren’t necessarily going to pan out. They have went back to the store and couldn’t find certain varieties, and were wondering what we were going to do. At this point, we aren’t really comfortable sharing our seeds with novices, and we did suggest that maybe they should order some by mail. PRONTO! They also were puzzled that we had ordered most of our seeds last December. Why so early, how could you know what the weather was going to do? Trying to explain that the weather has nothing to do with what and how many seeds I order, would not be easy to do. We have extra supplies, and grow extra food for several friends who due to circumstances, need a little help. That is our community outreach. We are only 3 people, we cannot help families who have more manpower available to them, but choose not to use it.
I think the steep learning curve ahead can’t be explained in one quickie phone call. I think that is more the problem, than getting seeds, and canning supplies. People have said to me before, “How hard can gardening be – you just get some seeds and throw them out there and that’s it, right?? After all Gramma did it, and she didn’t even go to college!” I can’t explain my lifetime of vegetable gardening experience in this blog, let alone a phone call. Most gardening books are just repeating the same old information over and over. It may work in your area, it may not. The best books for these gardening times are finally getting better known, but not in the mainstream. My favorite recommendation: Growing Food When it Counts, by Steve Solomon. This book explores gardening to feed your family, and doing so with less water. But, he’s controversial, and puts some people off by what he says. I find his writing refreshing… . When he owned Territorial Seeds it was a good place to buy from, and it has steadily went downhill since.
That’s enough ranting and complaining for one day. I got shocked on the electric fence today, BIG TIME and my daughter left a gate open and the milk cows discovered it. Trace barked the COW OUT alarm and we didn’t listen. They both got shocked while we were trying to get them back in, and then we discovered they had been in the shop and crapped everywhere. I have some cleaning up to do tomorrow! One of those days!
I did measure the straw bale potato corral cellar. Our bales are small square bales, 14″ x 18″ x 3′.
We stacked the bales two high, lengthwise, on edge, four to a side. One bale wide on each end. Put a piece of plywood on the top and cover with more bales. We just pull out the two bales on the end and take out potatoes as needed. This area (3′ x 6′) easily stores 750# of potatoes. You could make it larger or smaller, depending on how much storage you need. If you live in a colder area, you would want to stack the bales flat, which would give you 4″ more of insulation.
Last year I ran out of good boxes, and used a few of these plastic feed sacks, even in the complete darkness, some of the potatoes in the bags turned green from the brightness of the bags. Won’t do that again. Another plus to this quickie root cellar, is that it just looks like a stack of straw in the barn, just in case you’re into resource guarding… . We only use this for our potatoes, we have other storage areas for other foods. If you can source it, try to get organic straw as I mentioned in this post. If you can’t find organic, just make sure you don’t use it for mulch in your vegetable garden. Building a root cellar this way is inexpensive and most people have a spare corner in an outbuilding, or barn that would lend itself to a storage place like this.
Gooollly, those are some cool temps! We’re in the 90s already—too hot for June, but that’s what it did last year too. This year I count myself and the pasture lucky that we have rain along with those high temps. Sure does make it hard to get a successful spring crop in, though. Most of my stuff bolted right out of the gate. Thank goodness for the high tunnel, which let me get the early start I needed for good spring crops.
Heading out to lay the soaker hoses in the tomatoes before they get too big and the day gets too hot to get anything useful done.
Danielle, I wish it was warmer, but we had temps close to 100* several weeks ago. That’s good you are having the rain too. In years like this, I’m always reminded why we wanted those greenhouses so bad. Having those as made all the difference in our personal food supply, not to mention excellent winter housing for various animals. Dry and light, I don’t know if animals experience SAD like we do, but it seems like on cold, sunny winter days they were enjoying themselves!
Our soil is so wet, I’m afraid to set foot in it, even to check for germination. The only thing that hasn’t showed yet, are the parsnips – which I have enough seed to replant, just in case.
Ironically, Ill be watering in the greenhouses today, even while it is raining outside:)
So much for my farmer’s tan!! At least the pasture and hay is growing well.
We’re getting rain here today and they say even into next week and we really need it. Cool wet weather is best for our grass and thankfully most of the garden is up. They call it the June monsoon here (being sarcastic of course because we ALWAYS want more rain). I’m amazed those spuds look so good, they sure wouldn’t here unless I put them in the fridge.
The weather is strange everywhere. We were having frost ten days ago, yesterday it was 90 degrees and high humidity! Nice for the gardens though even though I hate it….makes it hard for folks to grow what they need. We used to be able to somehwhat predict our spring/summer/fall weather. Not anymore.
I’m sorry you had a miserable day – I hate touching that electric fence! And chasing cattle is the pits. I grabbed the fence myself the other day. For some reason I didn’t think I left it plugged in. WRONG! Felt really stupid as the boys were watching and I knew better. That’s what I get for hurrying! Hope things got better as the day went on…..
Thanks very much for describing your straw bale potatoe storage. Our crawlspace has a has a cement floor. Would you recommend putting plywood or something over the cement?
Thanks for your help – I really appreciate it. I’ve been researching this on-line but there’s very little info doing this in a basement.
Linda, I’m glad you’re getting that moisture – this is back to normal for us, although about 10* cooler than average. But, the last 5 or 6 years, were more drought like and some of the trees were starting to show changes, different birds have crept in from lower elevations, so even though this rain makes it hard to garden, I’m loving it for the grass!
That picture of the spuds was in May – in the previous post there is a picture of them sprouting, but they are still very firm and delicious.
Debi, we haven’t had frost, thank heavens. But the soil is wet, but I hadn’t risked my warm crop seed, so it should be fine. I just get impatient… .
I had just read your post about you getting shocked, and then our day here was much the same. It usually happens when I’m distracted – boy did I beller like a cow:o. That battery was fully charged!
When I store something on the cement floor in our basement I usually put down newpapers or a feedsack as a vapor barrier. Even though our basement is dry, the food items still draw dampness, enough that it could cause the bottom layer to spoil. Put a thermometer in there and even better a barometer/thermometer to measure the humidity too. Potatoes like high humidity for storage, like most other root crops. Try to think of how your item is cured and that will tell you what you need for storage. If it needs curing/drying, such as alliums and winter squash, then you need cool,dry storage/low humidity, if it needs no curing then you should store where you have higher humidity and cool temps. We have food stored everywhere! Maybe I should call this blog, Squash Under the Bed!
Darn, I never thought of storing my squash under the bed, LOL! Dark and cool, though, should be perfect. Even though I don’t have the space to grow squash I always buy lots of extra at the farmers market and store it best as I can, as long as I can. I won’t buy it out of season and shipped in.
Never have any luck storing potatoes at all. Luckily there is a great co-op grocery that sells all organic, and this year everything is labeled with it’s origin… California stuff is labeled with the county.
I never seem to get things in at the right time, but just try a few plantings until I catch it. This weekend I’m starting seeds for my July plantings.
Hayden, we had to get creative with the squash this year because of Trace – so we had squash everywhere! I did leave a little in the greenhouse – and it rotted so fast I could barely keep up with it. Squash is definitely something to buy local and organic, if you can’t grow it – cucurbits are the worst for uptake of chemicals, even on some certified ground where other crops are allowed, cucurbits should not be grown. It pays to know your grower and how much they know about their particular piece of ground.
I like the label of origin – down to the county is great. It sounds like you seed like I do, a little, frequently, and then I tend to plant more and am more apt to be eating better quality.
seeding frequently is a tip I picked up from Coleman’s 4 Season Harvest book. it just made way too much sense and took most of the angst out of things. Planting a little every couple of weeks is so much easier than trying to make deadlines. Maybe when I get up to Michigan I’ll be able to incorporate chill sensitive plants that have deadlines, but for now this enables me to supplement my diet without going crazy.
thanks for the comment on curcubits – I didn’t know they were esp. bad on chemicals. (sigh) I’m thinking even if grown on inappropriate ground they’re still better than what I find at the supermarket.
Ordered your latest book suggestion (above) and am looking forward to it.
Hayden, we didn’t seed very often either until we started growing mesclun to sell. That certainly took the mystery out of the process. Both of Eliot Coleman’s books are great.
It does make perfect sense, just small amounts of foods that can then be eaten at their best stage. If I have replacements coming on, I’m much more apt to pull something out before it bolts, and then I can quickly fill in that space. Most gets eaten by someone, even if it’s pigs or hens the plants have served their purpose.