Kim's Miniature Farming

Mystery Object

2012-09-21T11:38:00.001-07:00

Went shopping today and picked this up. Anyone know what it is? I'm thinking I'll get some more pegs and use it like a loom, but I was curious about what it actually was. Is it a loom? Anyone know where I could get directions for it to use properly?

Regular update to the blog soon!

Finally Something to Do!

2012-08-05T05:50:00.001-07:00

It's been a while since I've written, but there hadn't been much going on in the garden. August is finally here, so it's time to start working on the fall garden.

A couple of days ago, I picked my peanuts. It wasn't quite as much as I was expecting, but I have about 4lbs to roast and eat, yum!

This morning I pulled my okra plants, they're about done producing and i'm going to need the space. I got a good bit from them but not enough to can, so most of the okra went to my neighbors.

I also moved the dirt in 3 of the beds, placed down some newspaper, and replaced the dirt. That should help control weeds by killing all the seeds, and then the newspaper will compost right into the garden bed. And not to worry about the ink, almost all newspapers have switched to soy based inks.

Next up is going through my seeds and deciding what to plant. Celery is going in one of the smaller beds, and I can stay a couple tomato plants as well. Most planting has to wait until later (lettuce and such), but there are a few things to start now.

The chickens came out into the yard today and wandered into the garden where they "helped" weed. They had a blast looking for worms when I watered.

Now if only it want so hot and I could work in the garden all day!

Update

2012-07-17T20:08:00.001-07:00

Well, the garden is having mixed success right now.

The last couple of weeks i've picked a ton of green beans, munching in them raw or adding to my salads. I didn't get enough to can, but that's probably because I couldn't get enough of eating them fresh! I also have okra starting to grow and picked 4 today. More are growing and flowering, so I should have plenty to can soon (I only like them pickled, so I should be able to get enough to can). My peanuts should be ready in about 5 weeks.

The sunflowers, however, have attracted stink bugs which have decimated the sunflowers, squash, and pumpkin plants. All had to be pulled today, and i'm starting to prepare the beds for the fall plantings.

To prepare, I'm going to weed the beds, then place some newspaper under a small later of dirt. That should kill any weed seeds before it's time for fall planting.

I may also retry the pumpkins if I can figure out how to get rid of the stink bugs. Since sunflowers attract them, I may not retry them until next year.

Storm Weather

2012-06-26T07:07:00.001-07:00

If you haven't heard, we're having a tropical storm pass a little north of me right now. Rain has been off and on the last few days and is expected as of this morning to last through Thursday. Winds have been high, yesterday sustained winds were 30mph, with gusts up to 43mph.

I have an armoire on my porch right now, solid wood, given to me by a friend, that I can't get into the house by myself. Yesterday I was talking to my neighbor and a gust of wind came through the porch, through the chicken coop, and knocked the armoire onto my shoulder. I'm fine, but it gave me and my neighbor quite a fright!

The chickens are not happy campers. The coop has gotten thoroughly soaked and while they're fine, I did have to take their food out and just toss some in when it's not raining so it wouldn't get soaked and ruined (they eat out of a recycled coffee container, usually works great until yesterday when it filled with mushy food/water). Gotta look for worms for them before the rain picks up again.

The plants are taking a beating. In the pictures below, you can see how the winds have gotten to the plants. My sunflowers are ok and all still standing, but I had to go out yesterday in a short break from the rain and tie them up. Note too self: always keep extra stakes on hand in case! I didn't think the sunflowers would need them, so I didn't buy them. By yesterday the poor sunflowers were leaning badly, some of them the tips almost touching the ground! Having only 2 stakes on hand (I wasn't driving in that weather!), I staked the two worst sunflowers up. Then I tied the other sunflowers to those sunflowers, and created a chain of sunflowers all tied together. Surprisingly, it's all hanging in there!

In another pic, you can see the tall bamboo across the street from me. It's about 30 feet tall, and if you look you can see one piece that goes to the left, that's where the wind snapped it.

My okra, on the other hand, looks like it could be loving the weather, it's not leaning like the squash or anything.

Green beans look a little bare, but the good news is that the rain has gotten rid of my caterpillar problem, at least until it stops.

And the raised beds? I'm in love, not sure I'll plant things in the ground ever again! My pumpkins and cantelope that aren't in raised beds had sitting water around them and I had to dig a bit to let the water flow out. I'll have to redo that multiple times before the storm is gone. My raised beds have kept the waters drained out and kept the soil just a perfect moist, I'm so happy they work so well. I was afraid with all the rain they'd collect water like a bucket!

All potted plants, herbs, eggplants, a few other plants, are currently in my kitchen begging for some sunlight. It's sunny for the moment do I'd love to take them out for a bit, but the gusts of wind would not be good for them.

Welcome to the somewhat unpredictable rainy season, Florida. Please just keep the hurricanes away.

It's raining, it's pouring...

2012-06-22T13:38:00.001-07:00

Well, I got some stuff to kill the caterpillars. Problem? It's been raining every day since then, and it doesn't show signs of stopping. So what can I do? Well, there's insecticides. I want to save the beans, but I want to stay as close to organic as possible, and that'll just wash off too, so that's out. The next idea is to get some tulle and put that over the green beans, using ground staples to hold it in.

That should keep the butterflies from laying new eggs on them and therefore no more caterpillars. Yay! Just as soon as I find my leftover tulle and have some time without rain to put it up...

In other news, everything else is getting HUGE. I can't see my foot if I put it under the pumpkin leaves! The sunflowers are as tall as me, and the peanuts are going great. I'll get more pics up soon, but for now here's my first sunflower bloom! Oh, and the pumpkin leaf over my foot and my new papaya plant. Enjoy!

Ewww!!!

2012-06-16T17:29:00.000-07:00

Something has been eating at my bean plants. I got an organic pesticide, neem oil, and sprayed away, but had not been able to find the culprit. And I have searched!! Sigh. So this afternoon, doing routine checks on the plants, I notice a spot where the leaves were curled up on one of the plants, and I tried to straighten it out. Low and behold, there was a caterpillar, fat as can be, snoozing away on the plant I had grown! Not going to fly (no pun intended). I grabbed my gloves, pulled him off, and put him in a bucket of soapy neem oil water (soapy water is the recommended treatment for killing them, I added neem oil for a little extra in case). Then I looked again. After about 20 minutes, I figured I had gotten all of them off all the bean plants, and my total was 32! 32 caterpillars munching away as happy as can be on my beans!! At least I know what to look for now, they won't get away with it again.

In other news, I haven't been able to write on here since vacation, sorry about that! Things have been growing like crazy, and my sunflowers had almost tripled in size since before I left for vacation.

That's me standing behind them (I'm 5' tall). That picture was taken about a week ago, and they have grown even more and are starting to flower!

My eggplant finished it's eggplant while I was gone, so I came home and made eggplant salsa, surprisingly tasty! I also found out that you can use the eggplant salsa to marinate steaks with, so I may try that next time. I also have about 6 more buds on that plant, and my white eggplant plant is working on its first eggplant.

I will have to get more pictured tomorrow, everything is growing great (even the green beans despite being chomped), and is getting so big, I can't wait to be able to pick fresh veggies again.

Also, I'm working on a plan to have a continuous harvest this year, starting my fall/winter crops as soon as possible and canning/freezing what I don't eat right away so I can have fresh veggies all year long. I'm planning on trying to make at least *most* of my vegetables in my own garden, and some fruits as well. I'll keep this updated as I finalize my plans on what I want to grow for the "cooler" months.

Jam!

2012-05-26T01:14:00.001-07:00

I took a canning class last week, and I couldn't wait to give it a try. Since I am going out of town for a week Sunday, I figured I'd try my hand at a batch of jam for breakfast Sunday morning. It took a lot longer to do then I thought, but most of that was learning when to start doing what (I don't have to sterilize jars before cooking, I can do it at the same time). It looks great so far, I can't wait to taste it Sunday morning!

Growing and Canning

2012-05-23T13:08:00.001-07:00

Yesterday was a ton of fun. Other than a flat tire that is! But I took a class on canning jams and tomatoes at home, and I loved it!

If you want to learn to can, I would highly recommend going to your county extension office and inquiring about classes. Turns out a lot of what I had read on the internet is not only wrong, but, if done incorrectly, can lead to bacteria growing in your food that could kill you!

Having said that, after going to a class too learn proper techniques and have a close look at the process, I can't wait to get started! The basics you need to get started are pretty inexpensive and even Walmart carries them. Well, for the boiling water bath method. Canning vegetables in a pressure cooker would have a higher start up cost, but at least for now I'm sticking to the water bath method.

This morning, before heading out to price canning supplies, I checked on and watered my garden. A pumpkin plant sprouted yesterday, and a cantaloupe sprouted this morning!

After my excitement with that I checked over everything else, and I have an eggplant stating on one of my plants! Yay!

Overall, a pretty exciting day in the garden.

Whew!

2012-05-20T17:46:00.000-07:00

I got a lot of work done on the garden today! I planted 4 more kinds of plants, bringing my total to, I think, 19. The large garden bed I worked on yesterday became the spot for tomotillos (purple and green types), sugar cane (25' ones supposedly!), pumpkins, and cantelope.

The back row, behind the bananas, is tomotillos. The front is separated into three sections: (left to right) sugar cane, cantelope, and pumpkin.

I had one more plant I wanted to try so I dug a spot about 4' by 3' and planted 12 okra plants (spaced a foot apart, trying out square foot gardening a bit!). The okra is a burgundy okra, so it should turn out pretty.

The last item on the list today was to turn a half barrel my neighbor gave me into a compost pile. I filled with leaves, dirt, and the plants I had to pull recently, and watered it down. Hopefully it'll work just fine, and I can use the compost in it for planting this winter - it kind of has to work, because I'm hoping to turn it into a lettuce bar this winter!

Later this week I hope to add a sink to my garden. It'll go right next to the spigot I built for my hose (that was a learning experience!), but I don't know if I'll hook up the water just yet. I found it near a dumpster, brand new, one of the outdoor sinks that's plastic, has a separation in it to make 2 sinks, has drains already in it, just needs to be put on the legs (they're next to it) and possibly hook up to water. I figured I could use it for rinsing produce and bathing dogs. They run $150 and up, so, since it was free, I will definitely put it to good use!

For a run down on the plants for this summer, I now have:

Sunflowers, watermelon, yellow peppers, mystery peppers, cabbage, carrots, banana trees, broccoli, dill, peanuts, green beans, strawberries, okra, eggplant, tomatoes, pumpkin, cantelope, sugarcane, and tomotillios. 19!

I think I'm done planting for the summer, unless anyone can think of anything to grow in my hanging planters. Anything?

Grapes! Well, Not Yet...

2012-05-19T19:24:00.000-07:00

The plants are all coming up nicely, and today I got my last garden bed for the moment dug up and ready to plant. It will be planted tomorrow morning, with cantalope, pumpkins, and a few sugar cane.

While weeding my gardens, I noticed that my grape plant has a few more leaves on it. This plant I bought at Lowes before Christmas for $1 off of the clearance rack. It was pathetic, and I had my doubts that it would grow anything, but I figured for a dollar I would try. It only had one leaf and a bunch of sticks, but I planted it anyways.

I've noticed more and more leaves lately, it's got maybe 15 now, and I noticed something new today: what looked to be teeny tiny itsy bitsy grapes.

Ignore the bad nailpolish job, but that's my pointer finger by the "grapes"

After a bit of research, it turns out that these will turn into flowers which will later give way to grapes. Yay! But, apparently the process takes forever and a day - I should have grapes next year. Sigh. But, it's better than never! It was definitely worth a try, for just a dollar.

Tomorrow is time for planting the latest bed, and trying to figure out where I'm going to plant okra and tomatillos. Any ideas??

Summer Gardening

2012-05-15T10:21:00.002-07:00

Not much grows in the middle of summer in Florida, but that doesn't mean I'm not going to try!

I'm starting off with 5 raised gardening beds and will be adding another plot soon, though this one won't be raised - it'll be around 2 of my 4 banana plants.

The first garden bed is centered on the front of my house. Half of it is a little bit shaded, and the other is full sun. On May 1st of this year, I planted sunflowers (Russian Mamoth), sweet banana peppers, and watermelons (Sugar Baby), So far, the half of sunflowers are getting larger than the other half, I think because they're getting more sun. The sweet banana peppers and watermelons are starting to come up as well, and I can't wait to harvest!

Sunflowers and Sweet Peppers

Sunflowers and Watermelon

Watermelon

Garden bed #2 is small, about 3 feet by 1 1/2 feet. I planted cabbage in it for the spring, and have harvested 3 of the cabbages so far (one for the chickens, one for mom, and one for Pop-Pop. All three have already resprouted and are working on growing more cabbages! In the rest of the bed I planted carrots on May 1, but they have yet to sprout. I may retry them in the fall if they never sprout.

Cabbage New Growth

The 3rd bed is the same size as the second one. In this one, I have some broccoli growing (planted in January, all the rest of the broccoli bolted, I'm hoping these don't bolt too fast!). Also, somehow, I have some dill growing. I have no idea how it got there - I have never bought a dill plant or planted the seeds in the garden! Oh well, I love pickles, so no complaints here!

Broccoli and Dill

Bed number 4 is a new one, and it's growing peanuts, planted May 7th. They just started sprouting, I can't wait to see what comes of them! I have never tried peanuts before, so we'll see. I have about 10 plants coming up now.

Peanuts

The last bed, #5, was built with a trellis for growing pole beans, but then I realized I purchased bush bean seeds! Oops. The beans are only planted in a third of the bed right now, more will be planted in a couple of weeks and then even more about a month after that to stagger the harvest some. The bean plants seem to be growing great so far! I also have some strawberries in there, but they aren't doing so well. I think I'm going to replant them into a separate bed. The last plant in this bed will be an eggplant (Ichiban). I did not have good luck with eggplants last year (plenty of blooms, but no eggplants resulted), but last year I tried growing them upside down. This year, I'm going to plant them the traditional way.

Green Beans and Strawberries

Potted on the porch are 3 tomato plants. I know that tomato plants are not supposed to do well in the heat of summer in Florida, but I hope to combat that by bringing them indoors when it gets too hot. Right now they are on the porch where they get morning sun but not the heat of the afternoon. I also have 2 purple basil plants on the porch, and am trying to figure out if I want to keep them potted or plant them.

Tomato Plants

I also have a pepper plant that I have to find a spot for. I have no idea what kind of pepper it is, but it has beautiful dark purple leaves, purple flowers, and almost black peppers beginning on it.

Any ideas?

Further plans for the summer are to learn canning, build a composter, build a rain barrel, and plant cantelopes and pumpkins. I can't wait to see how this summer turns out will all the plants I have planted, most of which are new to me!

What plans do you have for the summer? Growing anything new to you?

Hello World!

2012-05-15T03:46:00.001-07:00

I'm creating this blog to show off my attempts at gardening. I'm in Florida, so that presents some challenges. Along with that, I have a teeny tiny yard. This means limited space to garden, though I try to use every inch I can. This year I'm trying out raised garden beds and growing a variety of vegetables.

Along with my garden, I have 2 dogs, 3 cats, and some chickens. This completes my mini farm, for now. Eventually I'd like to have more land with more veggies and more animals, but it won't be so miniature then!

Feel free to subscribe to my blog and follow along as I try to garden in a tiny space stuck in the Florida heat.