Archive for the ‘Planning’ Category

26 Apr

Minneapolis Food Swap & Sunchokes

Posted by rakhi in Gardening, Inspiration, Local Gardening Information. Tagged: , , , , , .

sunchoke tubers

Sunchokes

I had never had sunchokes before a couple months ago.  I had vaguely heard of them before, and so when I saw a large bag up for grabs at the inaugural Minneapolis Food Swap, I gave up a jar of my homemade sauerkraut to give ‘em a go.  They were delicious!  Eaten raw, they were as crisp as a radish, with a much milder flavor, and cooked they reminded me of potatoes, except not as starchy and a lot lighter.  I looked them up on Wikipedia,  and saw them on the Friends School Plant Sale site, and now am contemplating planting a left over rhizome out by the garage, per their suggestion.  An awesome part is that they are 8-10 feet tall flowers, so they’re decorative, too.

Sunchoke Flower

Photo by Paul Fenwick from the Wikimedia Commons

The Minneapolis Food Swappers Blog is here, and the Facebook page is here.  The next food swap is scheduled for May 14th, and I just realized it’s totally booked!  NICE JOB! We might need a Saint Paul version :)

25 Apr

Perennial Edibles & Friends School Plant Sale

Posted by rakhi in Gardening, Inspiration, Local Gardening Information. Tagged: , , , , .

I am really excited for the Friends School Plant Sale.  Honestly, until today I had no idea who “Friends School” was and why they sell plants, but I’ve definitely known of this sale is The Event for gardeners in the Twin Cities.  Over 2,300 different kinds of plants are for sale over 3 days at the state fairgrounds.

Photo from the U.S. Botanic Garden via the Wikimedia Commons

With a little research on Teh Googles, I found out that “Friends School” is an actual place and, notably, one that an Inadvertent-Hippie-Such-as-Myself is happy to support.  As such, in public I’ll probably pretend the reason that I’ve signed up to volunteer at the sale is because of my deep, sincere goodness. However, my five blog readers will know the truth: I want to get into the pre-sale and the deeply discounted closing sale. Who knows, maybe the elusive Corpse Flower will be available for $0.50 and bloom before the next century.  Maybe 10 fruit trees will strike my fancy for a 15′ x 15′ urban garden orchard for my back yard (sorry, honey, we’re going to have to move the new grill…and the garage…).  It’s just too early to say.  All I know is that I’ll be there and ready for action.

This year, the plant sale is well aware of people’s interest in perennial edibles and have a lot of them!!  Score. This is what they say:

Here’s a list of the perennial edibles in our catalog. Some are in vegetables, but ­others can be found in herbs, fruit, perennials or native wild flowers.

Before eating any of these plants, we recommend that you do some research to see which parts are tasty and whether cooking is needed.

Some of the plants we would like to get, but did not have a source for this year:

  • Good King Henry, Chenopodium bonus-henricus
  • Jinenjo Yam, Dioscorea japonica
  • Multiplier onion, Allium cepa aggregatum
  • Ramps*, Allium triccocum
  • Water Celery, Oenanthe javanic
  • Water Lotus, Nelumbo nucifera

Also, Angela Graney- who, now that I’ve discovered her, is a hero of mine – is leading a workshop at the sale to Build a Cold Frame for $26.00.  She converted her lawn in NE Minneapolis to an urban farm!

22 Apr

Urban Apple Tree Coming My Way!

Posted by rakhi in Fruit, Gardening, Inspiration, Planning. Tagged: , , , .

This winter I ordered a Red Colonnade Apple Tree from Spring Hill Nursery.  I was, and still am, amazed that an apple tree can take up so little space, and impulse-bought with immediacy.  The width required of normal trees is just not do-able in our .005 acres of yard space.  This tree, however, only needs a TWO FOOT diameter.  That’s smaller than some of the okra and tomato plants I’m growing!

I haven’t decided where to plant it, yet, but I found out this morning that they’re shipping it out today!  I’ve decided I won’t keep it in a container so I don’t have to mess with it in the winter and I won’t have to fertilize it as much.

I noticed Erica over at Northwest Edible Life posted about her backyard orchard, and I have to say I’m really excited about taking some time to read up on this approach to a fruit orchard.  I *might* be able to do one of the “quartets” in my back yard, which would be amazing!

Spring Hill Nursery also shipped my order of Cabot Strawberries, which I will be putting in my raised bed to deter some of the local critters (who, incidentally, ate ALL my strawberries last year), and Heritage Red Raspberries, the location of which I have not decided on.

18 Apr

Local Soil Temperature

Posted by rakhi in Gardening, Local Gardening Information, Planning. Tagged: , , , .

If you’re like me and stressing out about planting at exactly the right time, too impatient to wait until next week to start planting, too anxious to  plant right. now., and too lazy to stick a thermometer in the ground and do math, go to the Soil Temperature and Pan Evaporation Tables by the Minnesota Climatology Working Group.  Other states should have similar data available through an extension office.  Every week they post the new soil temperature average for the past week for a variety of areas.

This table from the UMN Extension Service shows optimum germination temperatures for some veggies. I pulled out the temperatures leading to the shortest germination times for my own interest:

Asparagus 77
Lima Bean 77-86
Snap Bean 86-95
Beet 77-95
Cabbage 86
Carrot 86
Cauliflower 68
Celery 68
Sweet Corn 95
Cucumber 86-95
Eggplant 86
Lettuce 77
Muskmelon 86
Okra 95
Onion 77-86
Parsley 86
Parsnip 68
Pea 77-86
Pepper 77-86
Radish 86
Spinach 77
Tomato 77-86
Turnip 77-95
Watermelon 95

18 Apr

Seeds I’ve started and Dates

Posted by rakhi in Planning, Starting Seeds. Tagged: , .

Starting seeds is largely an experiment for me.  Peppers, eggplant and okra were important to start last month, but as far as the rest of ‘em, I wanted to get a lot of different plants started just to see how they progress and how they compare to seeds I directly sow.  Since that time I’ve learned that sunflowers were a mistake.  They just got too big very quickly, and took up valuable space under my two grow lights.  I did know this to some extent, but I err on the side of not-patient, so I did it anyways.  One of my orders of seeds came in later than expected, so I didn’t get to start the red burgundy okra and the Brazilian orange eggplant as early as I wanted.

I found an article by the University of Florida on Starting the Garden with Transplants, which includes this chart:

Some of the vegetable seedlings in the middle and right columns I’m transferring to peat pots, and some of the seedlings I’m sprouting in peat pots from the beginning so I won’t have to disturb the roots when I plant them outside.  I’ll compare how they do to the seeds I directly sow outside, and how the seedlings compare to other seedlings under my grow light.

14 Apr

Prepared my first Garden Bed Yesterday

Posted by rakhi in Gardening, Planning, The Conversion. Tagged: , , , .

newspaper laid down

This is the spot I want to get ready right away.  It’s where I’m planning on putting my root veggies like beets, turnips, carrots, radishes, and kohlrabi, which I will be starting this weekend.  First I laid down 4-5 layers of newspaper to line the edge of the bed.  As you can see in the picture, it was pretty windy yesterday, so I used some gorgeous paperweights to keep things under control.

prepared soil laid down

For the soil I used compost from a Saint Paul Compost Pile, peat, vermiculite, and sand.  The guy at Eco-Garden Supply recommended vermiculite over perlite, which he said blows around haphazardly when it’s windy.  He also recommended that I apply some lime to the mix, since peat and compost tend to be acidic.  I did add some lime, but will be testing the pH before I add any more to make sure it’s a hospitable place for my root veggies.

mulched and gorgeous

Then I laid down wood mulch over the newpaper, so we have a beautifully mulched lawn instead of a beautifully newpapered lawn.  I’m trying to imagine the whole front yard like this, and I’m not sure what I think about it yet.

14 Apr

Lessons from Last Year’s Garden

Posted by rakhi in a gardening problem, Food, Planning, Starting Seeds. Tagged: , .

Last Years Garden BedI’ve never been an actual, real live gardener before.  Last year was my first attempt as a raised garden bed, and it was definitely a learning opportunity rather than anything else.  I crammed as much stuff in there as possible, which limited food production, and basically had no idea what I was doing in any other respect.  From last year I learned a bunch of things, which I will be adding to this page as I think of them.  Here’s my starting list:

This year after the snow melted, I realized two of my three blueberry bushes had been munched on by the local critters, which brings me to Numero Uno:

1. For the love of God, protect the one remaining blueberry bush!

2. Protect everything else.  Bunnies, squirrels, and mice run rampant in our neighborhood, so I’m going to have to put up fencing around everything. Even if I’m feeling lazy when I plant something.  Last year I didn’t get a single strawberry because the mice would beat me to them.  This year, it’s on, mice, you hear me!? I’m not sure how I will build a fence that they can’t climb over, though.  Suggestions???

2. Cauliflower, Broccoli, or cabbage take up too much valuable space with minimal food production. (This breaks my heart a little, but I only have .005 acres to work with).

3. Keep planting cilantro and dill throughout the summer so they are always available.

4. Do not crowd the plants.  Repeat: DO NOT CROWD THE PLANTS.  Nothing good will come of it.

5. Do not plant fennel.  You hate fennel.

11 Apr

The Hippie’s Arch Nemesis: Nature

Posted by rakhi in Gardening, Planning. Tagged: , , .

As I mentioned in yesterday’s post, the front of the house faces the south, which makes the front lawn a better location for a vegetable garden than the back lawn.  What I don’t have on the drawing are my TWO garden nemeses (nemesi?), and the reasons why I will never be a tree-hugg’in hippie.  To the immediate west of my front yard is nemesis #1: my neighbor’s huge black oak tree (sorry, Adrienne…but would you mind getting rid of that thing?) :

Arch Nemesis #1: The Oak Tree

Don’t get me wrong, it’s huge and old and beautiful and whatnot (blah, blah, blah…), but it casts a huge shadow over my front lawn in the evening.  I’m not exactly sure how much of the day it is causing me problems, so I’m planning to keep track over the next couple days.

To the immediate south of the right side of the lawn is a ginkgo baloboa tree in the boulevard between the sidewalk and the street:

Arch Nemesis #2: Gingko Baloba Tree

Nemesis #2 is pretty thin, so even when it has leaves it doesn’t create quite the annoyance of Arch Nemesis #1.

For the first half of the day, shown in the above photo, we get beautiful, direct sunlight.  In the evening…not so much.  So I guess this means that my taller plants, such as the corn, okra and tomatoes should be 1) towards the house (which is the northern side of the front yard) and 2) on the west side of the lawn.  This way early in the day they will still get good direct sunlight, and later in the day they won’t shadow the plants because of the Big Jerk Oak Tree.

EdibleLandDesign posted this article on the Top 10 Rookie Gardening Mistakes.  I may-or-may-not be guilty of at least half of those from my garden last year.  I am trying really hard to avoid mistake 2 and 8 by making sure that these trees will not prevent my plants from flourishing.  This might mean that the Okra I started from seed a month ago might not be a good plant to include in my vegetable garden, which would definitely hurt my fee-fees.  This article does include a link to some vegetables that do well with some shade, though.  Also, mistake Number 3 was a big problem last year, and I will definitely avoid it this year by planning the locations of the vegetables and sticking to it.  When I’m actually planting it’s so easy to sneak the plants just a little bit closer together…until they end up on top of each other…so it might be a challenge for me.

10 Apr

Let’s Get This Party Started

Posted by rakhi in Gardening, Inspiration, Planning, The Conversion. Tagged: , .

I spent the first half of yesterday digging up one side of the front lawn with my friend (who will likely own my soul after this growing season – Thanks Mandy!).  It was a challenge, especially since we were using a crate as a wheelbarrow (I need to stop being so cheap).  Below is the rough sketch of my garden plan, which developed as we were digging because it was a lot easier for me to see what things looked like for real and change things on the drawing.  The box on the bottom right is my raised garden bed.  I’m still deciding on the left side of the walkway:

This is how the right side of my lawn looks, now!

Gorgeous, right?!?

As I mentioned in this post, I really like and relate to Fritz Haeg’s Baltimore, Maryland edible front yard design.  One aspect of it that I would love to apply to the left side of my plan is the seating area on the right side of his plan.  I don’t think I have quite enough space, though.

You might be able to see my note in the drawing (top middle of the drawing), the front of the house faces the south, which makes the front lawn a better location for a vegetable garden than the back lawn.  In addition to the back lawn being even smaller than the front, the house casts a shadow the back yard for part of the day.  So I haven’t decided exactly what plants are going where, but I’ll be putting the taller plants towards the north side of the front lawn, such as okra and tomatoes.

9 Apr

Also an Inadvertent Nerd: Gardening Rules and Regs

Posted by rakhi in Gardening, Local Gardening Information, Planning. Tagged: , .

I was leery about exerting effort to contact the state to figure out where the underground utilities are around the house especially since, as a member of the instant-gratification generation, I’m kinda lazy about doing things that don’t instantly gratify me (crazy, huh).  However, I am also a member of the TV generation, and remember seeing a commercial years ago warning me of the dangers of digging without knowing what is under the yard, so I ended up calling the Gopher State Dig Line.  It’s basically no work at all.  You call in, give them the relevant information, and the utility companies have 48 hours to go mark up your lawn to show you where the surprises are.

You might be able to see the yellow flags on the left that are the gas lines.  Thankfully, those are the only underground utilities that I have to worry about, and are basically on the property line.

Yesterday I saw a post by the New York Botanical Garden of a $2,500 fine for a chard plot because of zoning issues, so I figured I should probably check out Saint Paul’s zoning laws.  This page is the list of Saint Paul gardening policies that the city thinks we should know about.  Relevant to my little project: Saint Paul Residential Composting Rules and Saint Paul Boulevard Planting Rules.  Also, the Sustainable Urban Landscaping Information Series (SULIS) of the University of MN has an article relevant to local zoning restrictions for urban gardening.  Notably, if you disrupt more than 500 square feet of topsoil, you need to get a permit.

I’m really excited that Saint Paul allows planting on the city-owned grass between the sidewalk on the street (boulevard).  The major requirement is that the height of the plants can’t be more than 36 inches, but only 12 inches when you’re within:

  • 5 feet of the curb (or within 10 feet of the curb if that portion of the street has any parking restrictions).
  • 5 feet of a public utility
  • 20 feet of an alley or driveway approach
  • 30 feet from an intersection (as measured from the property line- does anyone know what that means?)

There are also a few other requirements:

  • No herbicides, pesticides, and/or fertilizers
  • Documentation that you called the Dig Line
  • No noxious weeds (duh)
  • Your plants can’t interfere with the sidewalk, curb, or street area

In Minneapolis you need to get a permit to grow edibles on the boulevard (Boo!).  I haven’t been able to find such a permit application online, but I could probably Google it for you.

Found this link for boulevard gardening recommendations and this boulevard gardening PDF created by the Sustainable Resources Center.  Also UMN’s SULIS from above has this article on planting under existing trees, and the second half of the article focuses on boulevard planting.  I love that they drew up Figure 1(a), btw.  I think the boulevard will be a perfect place for a melon patch.

For those people not in the Twin Cities (do they even exist?!), Grown in the City has an interactive zoning map you can click on to see your local zoning regs.

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