Poor Farnsworth, I know how he feels - I’ve got a bad case of weeds too! Some are by my own hand, which, when they present themselves, make the light bulb go on (sometimes.)
I won’t take the blame for these weedy garlic rows. Overwintering alliums are hard to keep weed free, since they span two growing seasons. My daughter had kept these weed free through April, then we had two months of rain. We won’t spend any more time weeding these, since it is almost time to harvest. The soil is compacted and I can till these weeds under, after the garlic is pulled and before the weeds set seed.
I will take credit the blame for these lambsquarters. This bountiful crop is where I’m going to plant some over-wintering brassicas. How did I get such a uniform stand of weeds? By bringing wheel barrow loads of these from the garden, to our replacement pullet flocks, year after year! A high protein snack, but if you think chickens eat every seed, well you guessed wrong. I have watered this to germinate some of the seed bank, and hoed. Then I repeated those tasks. I have a feeling I will be weeding in here for some time. But, they pull easily and I have to plant… . This greenhouse is going to be my deer-proof winter garden.
Arrrghhh - Quack Grass. I’ll take some blame here too, in my single minded quest to get rid of a vole problem, I had quit planting winter rye cover crop. Cereal rye can help alleviate quack, but the voles love the cover of the cover crop. Hmmmmm. Tough decision, carrots or quack?? I had this beat in this section of the garden. Now it looks like it did when I first started this garden up again. I also committed the sin of tilling this area in May. But I did this part last, so I wasn’t spreading it to clean areas, but boy, tilling sure invigorates this plant :O I know better, my brother used to send me out on garden tilling jobs, so he wouldn’t have to make small talk. We always cleaned the tiller thoroughly afterwards. Quack likes a good hard pan, and on this section you can feel it when you go over it with the equipment. For some reason the hard pan is harder in these areas and the disc will tell you before the grass does. I’ve got a spot of this too, in the potato rows. In Biodynamics, this is considered a dynamic plant for its soil holding properties, and it relished by cattle, but… . If I weed this soon while the soil is loose and dry, it won’t be too bad. I won’t leave this weed to lay and “fertilize” the soil, I will haul the roots to the burn pile. We have contests to see who can find the “Champion” - which is the longest rhizome. We ARE easily amused.
Quack grass in the potatoes. L - R sweet corn, potatoes, winter squash, parsnips, and peas.
Here are a few pictures of some useful weeds. If they aren’t detrimental to the plant they are growing with, we leave them. We’ll pull the chickweed and lambsquarters, and leave this chard seedling that is growing in the pepper row.
Calendula, and a volunteer tomato. We’ll pull the tomato and leave the calendula, since it probably won’t take any nutrients from the nearby tomato and pepper plants.
Goldgerber purslane with a pepper. We’ll leave this one too.
Cilantro in among the squash. We’ll leave the cilantro because it won’t take away from the squash and will be done before the squash.
Cilantro with broccoli. Same here as with the squash.
Things are growing slow but sure. That’s the quack patch at the top of the hill. The sheep have been keeping the perimeter free of grass. Keeping the grass short in the headlands helps with voles and rabbits. We have a pair of nesting red tail hawks in those fir trees to the right. They help keep some of these garden predators in check. L - R: dry beans, pole beans, carrots, beets, rutabagas, the last row is cauliflower, broccoli, brussels sprouts. In between the beans is my daughters row for her garden. She started out with a 20′ x 30′ garden by the house when she was little. Now she has moved into the main garden. She gets the cleanest row, and grows whatever she wants. This year she has planted a salad bed, broccoli, cauliflower, and carrots for her horse.
The greenhouse is starting to get that jungle like feeling. The weeds are terrible in here because I’m irrigating every week. But, tomatoes and peppers are setting on, although much later than last year, when we dined on our first peppers and tomatoes this very week.
Swiss chard seed.
Lots and lots of weeds, but not too many. We’re working on hay now, so the garden just has to coast, with a minimum of attention. A totally weed free garden would be nice, but just not doable for me. So I have learned to live with it. At this time of year we are hungry for salads, so the garden is fitting the bill. For dinner we may eat a pound of salad and split a steak between the three of us, with sauteed zucchini. Snacking during the day consists of kohlrabi, salad turnips and Daikon radishes. So considering how bleak the gardening scene looked at the first June, we’re pretty happy.
In other news: Our rental bull arrived yesterday, and I need to go check on him and see what he’s up to… ;) Working on a posts about fruit, and hay, with some bull.
MOH, you have such a beautiful place, the garden, the fields and that greenhouse is HUGE ! I love all the pictures you post.
I’ve actually got a pretty good handle on weeds this summer, but nature’s thrown me a new problem…..slime mold (also known as dog vomit mold) which is really a fungus. Ever seen the stuff? Apparently harmless, but it spreads like an alien life form and is really gross for the day or so it is growing. I’m told it feeds on wood mulch and short of getting rid of my mulch there isn’t much I’m going to do about it.
Chris, thank you - my daughter takes most of the photos, so I have to give her the credit. She does a lot of the weeding too!
Stacy, I’m jealous - not of the dog vomit mold, but that you have your weeds under control. I haven’t seen the slime mold, but we have lots of dog vomit… Does the mold go away?
Your gardens look great and I love your greenhouse. There is an old abondoned greenhouse just down the road and I am tempted to approach the owner and see if we can pick one up real cheap.
This is the first year I’m saving chard seed. What’s your process?
Weeding is like laundry as soon as you get it taken care of ….there is MORE…I think your gardens look beautiful!!!
Kim, you won’t be sorry if you get a greenhouse, it’s more work but definitely worth it to extend the growing season.
Danielle, try to leave the seeds on the plant until fully dry. That’s the hard part - it seems like seed production takes forever. When you want something to bolt, it won’t. Mine are in the greenhouse, so I don’t have to worry about rain. Rain or irrigation takes away from the seed vigor. Sometimes it can’t be helped but try to avoid the plants getting wet. If they still aren’t ripe (brown) at the end of your dry season, pull the plant and bring it inside.
Then just strip the seeds and store. If you’re not sure they are fully dry, wait until they are.
All this being said, make sure if you are saving seeds from a biennial, that the plants you are saving seed from are in their second year. If not, you are passing along the early bolting trait, which is undesirable. I think at least 6 plants for seed and variety vigor, is the minimum for chard and beets. Chard and beets will freely cross, so I save seeds on alternate years. I’m finding Fordhook Giant and Five color Silverbeet to be the most productive and vigorous here.
Kristen, you are so right about laundry, every time I turn around there is more. Trace likes to drag out socks, so we are always looking for everything he sneaks off with…
Thanks on the garden - I think the pictures make them look better, I have a bad habit of only seeing the weeds.
I like to come here and learn the names of weeds. I know which are weeds in my garden, but have no clue the names aside from chickweed, Canada thistle and sow thistle. I guess it is a matter of learning them one at a time. My garden is really weedy this year. I am feeling a bit overwhelmed by it, but I have so many other projects I have to get done, my garden weeding is suffering. My garden is looking better than I expected a month ago, but is late also, except the potatoes.
ha! you have no weeds. you should see my ‘garden’. i was excited that we finally got the tomatoes staked and you could actually see them through the 5′ tall weeds!
seriously though, your gardens look great. i can see all the time and effort you put into them.
as for the edible weeds, i too leave a lot of ‘weeds’ in rows. it’s my biggest downfall since i hate to kill anything that is trying to thrive in my presence.
i have lots of volunteers popping up in the middle of rows. but, they all get used so no harm, right?!