Phenology

My 2019 word of the year is presence. There are a number of reasons why I chose presence but I’m excited to see how it plays out in my life over the next year—including my garden life. I dabbled with using phenology to guide seed starting last year but, honestly, relied on my spreadsheets more than signals from the trees and shrubs in our yard. Presence, phenology, and permaculture…my 2019 motto? Joking, sort of.

Perma-what?

As my garden continues to expand, and I continue to look for ways to make it easy to maintain and kind to Mother Earth, I’ve been learning more about permaculture. I could try to define it but this article does a better job than I would!

Speaking of permaculture, I’m super jazzed, like kid on Christmas morning jazzed, about attending the Cincinnati Biennial Regional Permaculture Convergence on January 12. I’m not always comfortable going to events on my own but I know these are my people. Amy Stross, permaculture gardener, writer, educator, and author of The Suburban Micro-Farm, is giving the keynote about designing for the future by meeting the suburbs where they are, so there will be at least one familiar face in the crowd!

Use Real Stuff

Um, yeah. This disposable world we’re living in makes me want to move off grid somewhere. John isn’t necessarily onboard with that idea, and I don’t know if that’s the life for me either, but I am really trying to reduce and reuse. 

Gardens Are a Safe Place

“In Milwaukee’s poorest ZIP code, fruits and vegetables become powerful weapons for saving young boys.”

Long read but WOW.

Gardens bring communities together and can provide a safe place for younger people who may not have anywhere to go. Sharing tomatoes and stories with Monica is a start on my end. But I know there’s something bigger for me, gardening, and giving back…just waiting for it to manifest.

Let’s Save ALL the Bees

This. This is why I spend so much time and effort planning and planting a large variety of perennial and annual flowers. Most campaigns focus on saving honeybees. What about my favorite leaf cutting bees? Or the lovely black and yellow bumble bees? Or sweat bees, carpenter bees, mason bees…?

Squash bee emerging from a flower

It’s that time of year. We’ve had a few hard frosts. Most of my raised beds are covered in a thick layer of leaves and barley straw. Some hardier vegetables are sticking up here and there – scallions, Brussels sprouts, a few radishes.

It wasn’t the best growing season. Lots and lots and lots of rain helped some plants, hurt others. Tomatoes took their time ripening this year but, man, they were SO good. I had a bumper crop of cucumbers, which is rare due to cucumber beetles. And the peppers – they grew and grew and grew until the first hard frost hit. My favorite ‘Trombetta di Albenga’ squash grew like a champ as usual.

On the other hand, beans broke my heart this year; harvests were paltry and none of the plants produced like last year.Greens, in general, were not happy with all the rain. Flea beetles got to the bok choy seedlings. I had a great spring beet harvest but some animal – rabbit? – came through and ate the fall beet seedlings.

Each year, I try to convince myself I need a break from the garden in late fall and through the winter. In reality, I would be happy if I lived somewhere that allowed me to garden outside throughout the year. The garden is my place of solace, it’s my therapy, it’s where I learn about – and even challenge – myself, it’s my stress reliever, it’s my happy place, it’s so many things to me. You’ll still find me wandering about in the yard and garden this time of year, even with snow on the ground. But my heart and thoughts are already longing for spring 2019.

I always plant “sacrificial” tomatoes in our backyard for deer. This year, I decided to plant them in the rental house backyard (which is next door to ours). Deer and other critters have nibbled on the plants off and on, but the plants have grown and grown and grown. In fact, they’re taller than the lovely barbed wire fence that separates the yard from the park.

Tomato plants are taller than the fence!

A month or so ago, I was back there harvesting the tomatoes I could reach. A woman walking by with her dog stopped to ask if I wanted her to hand me the ones I couldn’t reach through the fence. I laughed and told her to take them if she likes tomatoes. “Really?,” she asked. “Yes, please please please help yourself!,” I begged.

We realized we were talking through the really tall tomato plants, so we took a few steps to the side so we could see each other and introduced ourselves. Monica used to live on a farm with her husband and kids. After he died a few years back, she sold the farm and moved into the city to be closer to her children and grandchildren. She told me how much she loves her daily walks in the park and, in particular, how much she admires the flowers, plants, and trees in both our yard and the rental yard. Monica also told me how much she misses eating her own homegrown tomatoes. We both agreed that there’s almost nothing better to eat.

It took a bit of persuading, but she eventually filled her pockets with tomatoes. A few days later, I was out back again at the same time as Monica and her dog. She waved and told me how happy the tomatoes made her and how delicious they were.

I don’t see her every day. But, on the days I do see her, her pockets are full of tomatoes. And she makes sure to tell me how happy she is to have access to them.

Gardening, and specifically vegetable gardening, takes a certain amount of work (understatement of the year!) and passion. I put a lot of both—and a HUGE amount of love—into everything I grow. I love sharing with family and friends. But sharing with a stranger, who is now no longer a stranger…that’s the power of gardening!

It was another scorching hot weekend in Cincinnati. I decided to head out to garden early Sunday morning, around 7:30. It didn’t help, I was dripping sweat (that paints a lovely picture, right?) by 7:45.

But it’s amazing how time flies when there’s so much to do and so much going on in the garden. And, while I was happy to wrap up my garden work and head to the pool with my husband right after lunch, here’s some of what caught my attention in the garden.

Our resident bunny is super cute, even when spotted nibbling asparagus ferns!

The clover seems pretty tasty, too. Reminds me of picking clover for my pet rabbit when I was young!

The wildflowers finally took off. So much pollinator action in my backyard retreat – it’s generally my first and last stop in the garden each morning and evening.

The coneflowers were getting lots of action from the bees. I also spotted this eight-spotted forrester moth. The spots are super cute, aren’t they? And check out the Latin name: Alypia octomaculata. That would be a great alter ego name!

This red admiral butterfly kept me company for a bit, too. I think it’s almost prettier with its wings closed.

I harvested a bunch of vegetables including 27 of these lovely, lovely Detroit Dark Red, Golden, and Chioggia beets! I’ve been super happy with my spring-planted beets and hope the fall-planted ones do just as well.

I also harvested all the shallots. This picture doesn’t do the harvest justice. There are shallots on top of shallots on top of shallots. They need to cure for a week or so but should store well all fall and winter. Yum!

I also harvested and quick-pickled a bunch of hot peppers. Mainly jalapeños but there are a couple Hungarian wax peppers in there, too. Sorry for the terrible picture! I’m planning on sharing better pics and a non-recipe for pickled jalapeños later this week.

What about you? How was your Sunday?