A Nice Surprise
I had grand plans for a winter vegetable garden. I dug a bit of compost into the soil and planted little seedlings of lettuce, arugula, chard, and radicchio. I sowed baby greens, radishes, and beets. I even tried my hand at growing fall peas.
Then my chickens ate everything.
The little stinkers snuck through our fence and gobbled up all the vegetables except for the raddicchio and arugula. Apparently they don’t have a taste for the more gourmet greens.
After the chickens pillaged the garden, I fortified the fence and planted a cover crop of crimson clover. I figured at least I could feed the soil if not myself. But my garden had other plans.
Yesterday afternoon I slipped outside during a break in the rain to check on the clover and came across something unexpected: a giant red mustard growing between some Johnny Jump Ups.
The mustard is not going to keep us from starving this winter, but it reminded me that just when you think all is lost, your garden can surprise you.
I love these surprises! One year I had a random red chard appear. It actually fed us for almost two years until I finally pulled it out. I was amazed it never went to seed!
Monday I peeked into my zipper greenhouse that needs to be cleaned out and saw that despite my neglect, I had a handful of cherry tomatoes and one medium Early Girl on the whithering vines. Now that was a surprise for the first day of December in Seattle!
I just wish we’d get a cold snap. The darn slugs are still attacking my winter greens…I suppose your chickens could help with that, but I bet they’d snack on the greens at the same time.
December 4th, 2008 at 9:41 amWhat a nice surprise! I’d like to have more little gardening surprises myself. Do you have any recommendations for good, absolute beginner books on gardening and especially veggie gardening? Btw, hearing you guys Tuesday mornings on KUOW absolutely makes my day!
December 6th, 2008 at 10:59 pmThe good news is that your pumpkin bar theory is TRUE. When I made them for my Nebraksan relatives, I heard this twice: “These pumpkin bars must be made with crack.” Nobody could stop eating them. My own mother called me for the recipe last week. I had to tell her to refer to Willie.
Happy holidays,
Kate
December 7th, 2008 at 11:43 pmI, too, got ambitious and planted a lot of winter veggies here in SF. But I have to fess up that I’ve realized I’m much more laissez-faire in the winter than spring and summer! Everything is going pretty well, but I have serious thickets of clover that I have yet to weed!
December 9th, 2008 at 1:17 pmEmily–I definitely have some good beginner gardening book recommendations. The Garden Primer by Barbara Damrosch, Rodale’s All-New Encyclopedia of Organic Gardening, and the Vegetable Gardener’s Primer are all must-haves. I refer to them constantly!
Kelly–I think laissez-faire gardening in winter is a great idea, otherwise we wouldn’t have enough energy come spring!
Robin–How cool you had tomatoes in December! I guess it’s one benefit to our weird warm fall.
December 15th, 2008 at 10:49 pm