Monsoons are here! Last nite we got just under 2 inches of rain at the farm here in Santa Fe! And more to come today and the weekend. I was waiting for the rain to hit us and boy did it! I’m taking off the tomato row covers this weekend!
Yay! Finally we can enjoy looking at them!
Posted in EDUCATION, Growing, GROWING VEGATABLES, summer gardening
Tagged monsoons in Santa Fe
Hello everyone and welcome to a new gardening year! By now hopefully you are receiving you seed catalogs in the mail and deciding on your seeds for your 2017 gardens.
We here at Home Grown New Mexico have woken from our slumber and are now planning this year’s events. January is an exciting month where we are planning many NEW workshop/classes as well as some of the favorites like cheesemaking will be returning.
We can’t let the cat out of the bag yet but as soon as they are firmed up, we will tell you. It’s going to be a great year!
Home Grown New Mexico’s – Main Fundraising Event! Come support us so we can continue to provide all of our great classes! (We are a 501c-3 Non-Profit Corporation run solely by volunteers, so your ticket may be tax-deductible)
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Date: August 7, 2016
Time: 9 am-3 pm
Location: Various locations around Santa Fe, NM (see MAP below)
Fee: FREE to members/ $25 per person for non-members
Prepaid tickets are over but you can still come and pay on day of tour at one of the houses. Check, cash or credit card accepted on day of tour.
See five kitchen gardens in Santa Fe. Pick up ideas that you can use at your place or just enjoy these beautiful, edible and functional landscapes. COME GET INSPIRED FOR YOUR GARDEN!
The properties this year feature many gardening ideas—beautiful vegetable gardens, herb gardens, potagers, fruit and nut trees, backyard chicken coops, goats, beehives, backyard composting, green house, a neighborhood community garden with goats, edible landscapes and rainwater harvesting systems. They range from small properties to large properties in town in Santa Fe. The owners will be at each location with Master Gardeners to answer gardening questions and support the event.
Get Map Here: 2016 Kitchen Garden Tour map-revised (Please note this was revised as of Aug 3)
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Tres Placitas del Rio is a co-housing community established in 1994 on 2.7acres overlooking the Santa FE River. There are currently 17 adults & 7 children/teenagers living in 11 households. The Garden was established in 1998 and has grown and been tending by many different individuals over the years. The soil has been enriched over the last 16 years with compost, primarily derived from the goat yard. This year 6 individuals (some are from Tres Placitas and other are friends of the community) lovingly worked together to create a “community garden” featuring a variety of vegetables and some perennials. The grounds of Tres Placitas boasts many native plants and lots of mature fruit trees.
The 3 resident goats: Itsy, Souflee & Dee are cared for cooperatively by a group of individuals from the greater Santa Fe community who milk them twice every day. This year, Souflee gave birth to 3 healthy baby goats called ‘kids’. They are now in new homes giving joy to their new owners but all 3 adult goats still live there. The Tres Placitas goat co-op are often seeking new members—if interested pick up a flyer at the barn by the garden.
The SCAT (Santa Fe Master Gardeners Compost Action Team) will be on hand to answer your questions about home composting.
**Please be aware that access to this garden requires walking up or down a hill/or stairs (for a total of 660 feet from the nearest parking)**
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Mrs. Bobb is a legend around Santa Fe. Her compound is called La Querencia meaning ‘a place where one feels at home’. She has had tours in the past but not so many now that she is 96, so this is a special treat for us at Home Grown New Mexico and we are honored to display her gardens this year. She is still actively involved in all her gardens!
She and her family have lived in their current compound since 1967 and over that time have created a fantasy landscape on their 4 acres littered with memories of their past and present lives. They have graciously opened their entire compound to the Kitchen Garden & Coop Tour this year.
They have a large enclosed vegetable and fruit garden with traditional and raised beds surrounded by magnificent roses and a small potager – combining vegetables, herbs and flowers in a wonderful design. All the garden and green waste is composted in the corner compost area making the soil incredibly rich.
One hundred year old fruit trees tower above meandering paths leading to many “themed” gardens including: the Zodiac Garden, the English Cottage Garden, an English Knot Garden and the Espaliered Fruit Garden. Whimsical Sculptures sit among the Dragon Garden, the Wind in the Willows Garden and the Fairy Garden (hidden beneath a weeping crab apple tree). Not to be missed is the “Evolutionary Labyrinth”, the “Fractional Geometry and Poetry Sculpture” and much much more. There are _ gardens on the property. This magnificent Eastside property is located across from the Santa Fe River on the dirt road that parallels East Alameda. (See map for directions)
Members of the Santa Fe Native Plant Project (of Santa Fe Master Gardeners) will be on hand to answer questions about native plantings.
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Bob and Jerry have been gardening at their current home for 8 years. Their garden was on the Home Grown Kitchen Garden & Coop Tour 5 years ago but much has changed since then with the addition of many new gardens and lots of garden art. Bob seeks to share “what can be grown” in Santa Fe with some work and determination.
The landscaping starts at the entrance to his long driveway with a perennial garden w/ many native plantings and continues into his backyard which features more perennials interspersed with vegetables, grapes and berries. Two huge cherry trees shade much of the backyard and other newer fruit trees are in the bee yard area out front. Espaliered pear and apple trees near the house overlook more native plantings. A newly built raised vegetable bed beautifully forms a “natural” fence with the neighboring yard.
Bob’s chickens are Santa Fe famous having their own adobe casita while they preside over the covered raised beds that serve as the “fall and winter garden” with many vegetables. Throughout the property, beautiful art glass sculptures compliment the plantings.
The giant cherry trees over 30 years old produced 55 lbs of cherries this year! Bob will display the fruits of his labor—eggs, honey and jam and veggies that are all harvested off the property. Grapes, Asparagus, tomatoes, peppers and chard and other veggies are all grown on the property and are intregrated with the art. Art is a big part of their lives with Jerry being an avid glass collector and Bob a very artistic Master Gardener. Bob see their yards as different outside exterior rooms of their house. Mrs. Bobb was a great inspiration for Bob when he first visited her compound years ago. This is another inspiring garden on a medium size lot.
The Sangre de Cristo Beekeepers will be on hand to answer your questions about backyard beekeeping.
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Robert and Michelle have been gardening in their current location for 8 years. They “have it all” with extensive multi-leveled vegetable gardens (including heirloom corn and squashes), a greenhouse, a chicken yard, a bee yard and many fruit trees and berries.
They strive on being more sustainable. All their electricity comes from the sun. They passively harvest rainwater into a large strawberry bed and channel grey water from sinks/showers to the landscape as well to a dry creek bed that wanders through the gardens. Vegetable and flower plantings are everywhere. They compost in a “double barreled” tumbler composter.
Michelle’s unique relationship with the plants keeps her tuned into the best time for harvest, drying and canning. Robert is a builder and has utilized his many skills as well as materials “left over” from his projects. Together, in a perfect synergy of effort, they have created a model of sustainability. Come be inspired.
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Cande and Russ Toner are sharing our newest garden. They started working on it only 3 short years ago and have created a lovely and very productive landscape. Cande is a Master Gardener and an artist (in real life) and her aesthetic sense pervades the entire garden. Together they have built 18 small raised beds. They also have numerous decorative pots in the back yard with a variety of vegetables and flowers in them including tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, melons, squashes, beans and many more. Their fruit consists of apple trees, peach trees, raspberries, strawberries and grapes. In addition to to the vegetables and fruit, there is a separate herb garden.
Ask Cande about her seed saving – many of her plants were grown from seeds she saved or collected from friends. They have utilized the front and side yard as well-landscaping w/asparagus and Saskatoon blueberries and more pots with vegetables.
She designed and Russ built copper tubing hoop houses that morphed into tomato cages. You will be inspired by this compact edible landscape on a smaller lot.
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Today I taught the Organic Pesticide class and added Disease Control too as we are or will be dealing with pests and disease soon in the middle of the gardening season. The class was great and we had good comments from some of the attendees. I talked about what’s going on the our gardens now and what insect and disease controls we can implement. Attached is the pdf from the class for anyone who wants to know what I do.
ORGANIC PEST and DISEASE CONTROLS
Also attached is the pdf with photos of certain insects that may be attacking our plants now as well. This is in color so it would be a great reference for you to keep when you need to identify a bug you may think is a pest.
I recommended the book, Good Bug, Bad Bug for everyone to get which is a great ID book that will show which ones are good beneficial bugs and which ones we consider pests and what crops they attack. I got mine at Amazon.
Then we walked around the community garden and looked for plants that are being attacked or are sick and I showed everyone the plants so hopefully it will help them go back to their gardens and look at their plants and see what is going on.
Other than the heat, I thought the class was great. Thanks to all 20 of you that attended!
May 15th is around the corner and many of us are chomping at the bit to get growing!
My trusty KRQE weather app on my phone says we are over the freezing nights and I believe we are out of the woods.
wall of waters
However, having said that, I would not plant my tomatoes in the ground without protection. I use wall of waters to protect them from the still chilly nights.
Temperatures in the 40’s at night are still cold (just not freezing). The wall of waters will absorb the heat from the sun in the day and give it back to the plants at night keeping them warm.
Other warm season crops can be started from seed outside especially when we get up into the 50’s at night. If it gets cold again at night, cover the new baby plants with row cover to protect them-think of it as a nice warm blanket on them.
I will still WAIT TO PLANT my PEPPER PLANTS until the FIRST WEEK OF JUNE as they really hate being cold and will usually stall out if you plant those now. Just keep them in your house until then.
Our June’s bustling with 3 classes this year. So you don’t miss them here is the info and sign up on all of them. The first one is next Sunday-Hugelkultur Gardening on June 14
Sun. June 14
Hügelkultur gardening
Learn how to make Hügelkultur raised beds
Time: 12 pm-2 pm
Instructors: Mike Reed & Mike Warren
Location: 747 Old Las Vegas Highway, Santa Fe
Hügelkultur is a composting process employing raised planting beds constructed on top of decaying wood debris and other compostable biomass plant materials. The process helps to improve soil fertility, water retention, and soil warming, thus benefiting plants grown on or near such mounds. Come learn how it works, how you can make one and see one in progress. This class is held past Fina Cafe on Old Last Vegas Hwy around the corner from Eldorado.
Help keep this class free! Become a 2015 Member here for only $35 – includes all classes and tour. TAX DEDUCTIBLE!
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Sun June 21, 12 pm —2 pm
Vermicomposting made easy!
Learn about vermicomposting and how to build a compost tea brewer
Time: 12 pm- 2 pm
Instructor: Duskin Jasper
Location: Milagro Community Garden (Off Rodeo Road east of Sam’s Club-Turn north onto Legacy Court. Garden is behind the church, ‘Church of the Servant’ on corner) • Santa Fe
Become a worm farmer! Let red wigglers do the work of transforming your household waste into “black gold” vermicompost. This workshop will allow you to discover how simple it is to create an outdoor vermicompost bin from straw bales and salvaged materials. The class will cover what goes in a worm friendly compost bin and how to care for worms and harvest their compost.
Duskin will also demo how to make an inexpensive compost tea brewer. With a brewer, you can make a compost tea for your plants. The use of compost tea has been shown to increase plant growth and suppress disease.
Duskin Jasper is certified by the Santa Fe Master Gardener Association in conjunction with the City of Santa Fe as a public outreach educator to promote residential composting in Santa Fe. Presented in cooperation with Milagro Community Garden (MilagroGarden@yahoo.com)
Help keep this class free! Become a 2015 Member here for only $35 – includes all classes and tour. TAX DEDUCTIBLE!
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Sun. June 28, 12 pm —2 pm
Fruit Trees with Gordon Tooley
Learn what varieties of fruit trees do well in NM and how to grow them.
Time: 12 pm-2 pm
Instructor: Gordon Tooley
Location: PO Box 392 Truchas, NM 87578 info@tooleystrees.com 505-689-2400 (THIS IS A FIELD TRIP) This is a field trip up to his property so you may want to carpool or offer someone a ride. Here is a map to his property: gordon tooley map
We will have a meeting point for those of you wanting to help give rides or pick up a ride up to his property and follow us up there. More info on where to meet coming up by June 20 here.
Come learn from the Master! Focusing on varieties that are drought tolerant and adapted to high pH, Gordon grow species trees, shrubs, and grafted fruits for our area. His stock is grown with organic methods and he practices holistic orchard management.
He has many heirloom and uncommon varieties of grafted apples, apricots(sometimes), plums, pears and cherries. Some of them may be new to you but are an opportunity for you to grow varieties that have all but disappeared from our markets. His grafts are on rootstocks carefully selected to match climate and soil types in this area. His species trees and shrubs are easy to care for and will provide screening, habitat and food for wildlife and yourself.
He believes in selling small caliper trees with well-developed root systems. The fabric root bags we plant in are key factors in building a fibrous root structure. Smaller caliper trees establish more quickly with less transplant shock, and grow more vigorously in difficult sites than large caliper trees.
Help keep this class free! Become a 2015 Member here for only $35 – includes all classes and tour. TAX DEDUCTIBLE!
Chitting Potatoes
by giantveggiegardener.com
What is chitting potatoes? Why do we want to chit potatoes? Basically it is ‘prespouting’ the potato ‘seeds’ to force healthy new sprouts before you plant the them. It will knock off a couple of weeks to harvest time so you’ll get be able to harvest sooner. Potato seeds are not seeds at all but the actual small potatoes. We keep potatoes we want to eat in the dark so they won’t turn green and quite often they start to develop smaller flimsy white sprouts while in the dark but what you want is thicker healthier sprouts that are either green or purple. If you missed the opportunity to chit the potatoes, it’s ok to just plant them when the time is right. This year I’m growing fingerlings-French fingerlings.
Here’s how to ‘chit ‘ them (sounds southern doesn’t it?!)
1. Get a couple of egg cartons so you can stand the potatoes with the pointed side down. The blunt side generally produces more sprouts so keep that side up. The egg cartons make it easy to support them this way. Sometimes there is no pointy side which you should then just look at your potato and put the side with the most ‘eyes’ or sprouts up.
2. Put them in a cool space that gets good indirect light in your house and they will develop thick sprouts in 2-4 weeks instead of those flimsy one that grow in the dark.
3. Plant them outdoors when the soil is 50°F or warmer. Use a compost therometer to see how warm the soil temperature is. There are many ways to plant potatoes which you can research on the net but if you plant in a bed, dig a deep trench about 10 inches deep in heavily amended fluffy soil.
4. Place the presprouted (or chitted) potatoes with the sprouts up-the sprouts become the leaves, not sideways and bury them 4 inches deep depending on the size of the potato. BE CAREFUL NOT TO BREAK OFF THE SPROUTS. Spacing them 12 inches apart and rows 12-24 inches apart.
5. After the leaves come up, start filling more dirt around the plants till they are almost covered. Bury the whole plant-leaves and all except leaving the top 3 inches of plant exposed. Continue doing this every time they get about 6 more inches tall Basically till you run out of soil. The potatoes will grow up above the potato seeds in the dirt above it. Below the potato seed the roots will grow for the plant.
6. You should see sprouts/leaves come up through the dirt in a couple of weeks. If it is still freezing at night, I will cover the plants with row cover.
7. Potatoes will start producing tubers when they flower.
8. Fingerling potatoes should be ready to harvest when the plants die back in about 90 days. Other potatoes may take less time or more. Leave them in the ground 2 weeks to harden off before harvesting. In fact, you can leave them in the ground until just before a hard freeze happens. That way you can harvest a few as you go and the rest in late fall. Don’t leave in over winter.
For more information on growing and buying good potato seed go to: http://www.irisheyesgardenseeds.com/growers10.php
Posted in Growing, GROWING VEGATABLES, POTATOES, Uncategorized
Tagged chitting potatoes, growing potatoes, Growing Vegetables, Vegetables
Home Grown New Mexico 