One Year Old

Today is the "hatchday" of our three chickens, Rosie, Daisy and Dot. Last year we went out to Canby on Sunday August 10th to pick up our two-day-old chickens. They were still egg shaped they were so young. We kept them in a cardboard box with a heating bulb in the basement directly below our basement and went to sleep listening to them peep, peep, peep.



And now they are one year old and producing an egg each a day. And boy do they let us know when they have laid their egg. They proudly announce every morning after they lay. Well Rosie and Dot do. Daisy typically lays in the afternoon.

So happy hatchday chickens!!!

Eating More Bounty and Some Extreme Gardening

One of our Hungarian Hot Wax Chilis that first appeared back in May finally turned a beautiful red color. It almost didn't even feel real when I held it in my hand. Maybe that is the "wax" part of its name.



April chopped up half of it and added the tasty, spicy little bits to some mac & cheese. That little red bundle of joy added so much depth of flavor and spiciness to that bowl of mac-n-cheese. It was a "wow" moment.

I harvested the rest of the garlic this last weekend and again got some close-to-fist-sized bulbs.



They joined the rest of the bulbs on our back porch trellis to dry, which shouldn't take too long in the weather we are having now. It was officially 103 at the Portland airport last night and I'm sure it was a few degrees warmer in our neighborhood in the inner city where there are numerous heat-sink concrete buildings.

We harvested the last of our Romaine on Sunday because I knew they were going to completely bolt in this heat. I gave two big heads away to two different neighbors. In continuing to eat our bounty, I sliced our last head of Romaine lengthwise, added some olive oil and parmesan, and tossed it on the grill after grilling some beef flanken ribs from New Seasons. The grilled Romaine was so tasty. This shot is the last of the heads just before harvesting them on Sunday.



And what did I do last night when the temps were still sitting in the triple digit range? I weeded. It wasn't too bad. I was in shorts with no shirt and I sat on my little garden stool. The chickens, who seem to be surviving this hot spell quite well, gathered around me as I dug up morning glory, dandelions and grass. After about 30-45 minutes, I was dripping sweat into my glasses as I bent over. So I had to call it a day at around 7 pm. It's supposed to maybe even push our all-time record high of 107 today. It was officially an all-time record high low temperature this morning of 75 degrees (the previous record for Portland was 74). I learned the hard way this morning that I need to do my finishing hand watering in my shorts the next couple of days. I pretty much sweated through my dress shirt just walking around with the hose. So no biking to work for me until the end of the week when the temps moderate substantially.

More Late July Garden Pics

First, the shot of the main garden beds taken this morning. The skies are cloudy this morning but we are supposed to be heading into some possibly triple digit weather next week.



Our chili peppers are full of fruit. Now we just have to let them ripen.



The corn is varying from waist to almost chest high at this point. This variety is supposed to get up to 8 to 10 feet tall. That will be cool.



And finally for today, a shot of one of the squash blossoms that open up wide in the morning.

Late July Update

So it has been almost a whole month since I last updated and stuff has really, really grown in the garden. First, here is a shot of the main garden beds from almost three weeks ago.



Back then, I was impressed with what I called the green explosion of the three types of winter squash. This is a shot of that from a few weeks ago.



But that was nothing. I have since taken down the chicken wire around this bed and the squash is spilling out across the lawn. I don't have a picture handy to show that right now. I'll try to post one tonight or tomorrow. There are a lot of green squashes on the various vines. This is a shot of what I think is our small pumpkins located diagonally across from their planted hill right in the middle of the garlic.



And I do have a recent shot showing just how big the squash leaves are. Talk about dinosaur food.



Specking of dinosaur food, we also recently harvested and ate some of our volunteer mustard greens. They were a yummy addition to a beet salad that April made.



And that beet salad used our Italian beets from our garden.



The sunflower in the middle of the picture above of the main garden is a volunteer. It continued to grow unabated into July and finally began blossoming a few weeks ago. This is a shot of it from a few weeks ago when its first blossom began to unfold.



Now the plant is just downright ridiculous. It has numerous large blossoms that usually have at least one or two bees on each head (yeah bees!). And it continued to grow taller. The stalk is so thick I may need an axe come Fall to be able to take it down. In the mean time it is performing its bee attracting duty which is helping greatly with the pollination of my squash, peppers and tomatoes. We got out a yard stick to give some perspective on its height.



And previously I believe that I mentioned that I was worried that my garlic may be failing. The garlic sprouted all right and looked super healthy into June. But they never flowered and then they began to go brown and finally began to topple over. Well, I got onto an Oregon State University agricultural extension service website and quickly figured out that the reason my garlic did not flower is that I most likely planted a non-bolting variety. And then when I read the section on harvesting I found out that garlic is ready to harvest when its leaves turn brown and then topple over. Woo hoo! I immediately went out to the garden with a small spade and dug up a brown, toppled over garlic plant and found a beautifully, fully developed bulb. April and I then dug up the rest of the plants that had toppled over. We still have about seven or so more that had not quite toppled over yet which we'll probably harvest this weekend. But we got some beauties.



We currently have them hanging on our trellis up on our back porch drying. They should be ready in about another week. It is so exciting to try something new and have it work and especially something that we will use time and again. Soon as they are dry April will put them into a braid and then we will make our first batch of pesto using our own home grown basil and garlic.

Taking a Break

April and I are headed down to Sunriver with the extended family for a week's worth of vacation. April's Mom, Liz, is going to take care of the watering, cat feeding and chicken feeding duties. She gets three eggs a day as partial payment.

I mowed and weeded the corn last night after work in preparation of being gone a week. The corn is a mixed bag right now, but in retrospect it does look like it's going to be "knee high by July." I did add some organic plant food in hopes of kicking it in the butt a little to urge it on.

Something doesn't need urging is our volunteer sunflower in the middle of the front middle bed. I swear the thing grew three to four feet more just since last Sunday. Here's a parting shot of me standing next to it with my kitty, Bo.

First 'Mato of the Summer

Way earlier than last summer, as I stripped four of the six tomatoes, I found two green tomatoes on two separate plants. This has to be the earliest green 'matos I've ever had.


Isn't she pretty?

A Respite From Watering

I was awakened by an unusual noise early this morning: water dripping. A nice band of showers swept through late last night/early this morning. It was a healthy does of rain, enough that I did not have to get up and water this morning before going to work. However, it also rained enough that I decided to not ride my bike into work. I thought I may have wussed out a little bit as I drove in on a dry freeway, but my bike does not have fenders and my latest look at the weather radar shows that more showers are on their way. The Channel 8 weatherman blew that forecast. He stated that the first band of clouds would not have any rain and if we got any at all it would come early this evening.

Oh well, it all added up to my being able to sleep in a bit longer this morning and that was welcome. I did get some good hoeing and hand weeding in last night, working until after 8 pm. That left us pondering what to do about dinner at such a late time. So we punted and went over to a wonderful little restaurant on SE Belmont, Wild Abandon. We picked that particular place because they were participating in Bites for Rights, a benefit for Basic Rights of Oregon ("BRO"). We each had an appetizer and some wine and some of that money went to BRO. The food was fantastic and their prices are very reasonable. I strongly recommend this place.