Planting

On 4/11 I planted a row of spinach Winter Bloomsdale, Three types of lettuce: Mint Fresh, Really Red Deer Tongue and Buttercrunch alongside two rows of radish: Champion and White Icicle.

I also lined out 24 sets of baby Bok Choy and planted two rows of Chiogga beets. In hopes of deterring the flea beetles I scattered mesclun mix between the Bok Choy.

Our Spring Cleanup was on the 17th. This is where all the gardeners get together to perform chores for the benefit of the garden as a whole, mulching paths, cleaning up the fence line, straightening up the shed, etc. I showed up late and was of little use, because I fractured my ankle earlier in the week. I plopped myself down though and spread some newspapers on an overgrown path, which Tiz brought wheelbarrows of mulch to cover.

Fortunately on the 18th some friends showed up to help me in the garden. I took up a spot on the ground of a long-abandoned plot and Marcus and Sue turned over the earth, while I cleaned out the roots of Jerusalem Artichoke and Road Lily (of which one is not an artichoke and the other has little in common with the true lilies) Actually both plants are edible, but the variety of artichoke wild in our garden has such small roots that its not worth the trouble. Neither of them make nice companions with other vegetables because they are so invasive. I separated out the daylily roots for Sue to take with her, because they do make a great ground cover and she needed them for a tough spot in her garden. Sue and Mark did great work and I will have them to thank when I plant potatoes there in a few weeks. 

Then I hobbled over to my plot and planted out hundreds of onions. I made a cooperative order with friends at work from an onion grower in Texas and we received bundles of little onion plants wrapped up in rubber bands in the mail. By combining our orders, we brought the cost down to about a nickel a plant. A good rain fell on Monday and Tuesday to settle them in so I assume they are doing well. I haven't made it back to the garden since. This is a bad time for a gardener to have a busted up ankle!

I planted two red onions and three yellow. Candy and Red Candy are two large varieties that are sweet summer onions, not meant for storage. Ailsa Craig is a very large onion also, but it is supposed to store alright. This onion is named for an island. After looking it up to check the spelling I can see why. My main storage onions will be Copra and Red Zeppelin. All together I planted about 180 plants. Sue came over to help me finish up and she planted about a pound of Yellow Moon shallot sets in the same section. This whole row of the garden is devoted to onions. I still have two types, maybe three, of leeks to plant out and red Prisma shallots that I have started from seed.

I am interested to compare my success with these tiny plants compared to the much larger sets I used last year, sets planted out about a week later on the 23rd. To make room for the onions Tess and I harvested the overwintered Mache, which she made a beautiful salad with. She included pears and nuts and a mild vinaigrette. Delicious.

Yesterday and today we are having nearly 90 degree temperatures. Much too hot for April. Yesterday was the hottest since 1915.