PlanterTomato Vegetable Gardening

A Rave Review for Zucchino Rampicante Squash

Here's a "zucchini" for those that hate the taste of traditional zucchini.

I have to admit that traditional green zucchini is not my favorite vegetable;  it's not that I won't eat zucchini when it's presented to me on a plate, but given the choice, I go for other fare.  For this reason, we generally forgo planting traditional zucchini in favor of a hybrid patty pan variety called Sunburst. (available from Burpee Seed Company)

However, this year, I decided to try a new type of summer squash called Zucchino Rampicante.  It's a crookneck variety so it is visually very interesting --  a very long, slender neck with a bulbous end.

I planted Zucchino Rampicante in late April, and we harvested our first batch this last weekend.  After tasting this variety, I have to say it is now high on my "recommended" list.  Despite its name, this squash does not taste like "zucchini."  To my palate, the flavor is much closer to acorn or butternut squash.  

When harvested, the fruit is quite firm to the touch and I was convinced it would take a long time to cook.  But we decided to try grilling it on the barbecue and the squash was cooked perfectly after just 10 minutes.

Zucchino Rampicante has a few other characteristics that are worth mentioning:

• Like other summer squash, it's easy to grow and very prolific.
• Unlike other summer squash, it's both a summer and a winter variety.  That's right -- You can harvest the squash in about 65 days and eat it like a summer variety, or let it mature for another 35 days and harvest it as a winter variety.    As a winter vegetable, the color changes from a variegated green to an orange brown that is similar to the color of a butternut squash.  So far, I've only tasted it as a summer veggie, but I anticipate enjoying it as a winter crop based on this first test.  Even if I decide other winter varieties are better, zucchino rampicante will stay on my grow list because it produces a winter squash flavor in a summer variety.
• Zucchino Rampicante is almost seedless (at least as a summer veggie), with no seeds in the neck, and only delicate seeds in the body which do not require removal prior to eating.
• Finally, it's an open pollinated variety, so you can save the seeds if that floats your boat

If you decide to try this variety, there's probably still enough time in the growing season to get both summer and winter fruit.  Seeds can be purchased from Baker Creek or other online merchants.

A Delicious Recipe For Cucumber Salad

A refreshing summer salad that takes just minutes to make.

With the weather heating up and cucumbers becoming available for harvest, I thought I'd share a simple recipe with you for a refreshing cucumber salad.  It takes only a couple minutes to prepare and is a real change of pace from your normal lettuce and tomato type salads.  On a hot summer day, this hits the mark.

This year, I'm growing a variety of cukes, but the first into harvest is a variety called Beit Alpha.  What makes this cucumber so nice is that its' skin is so delicate that you do not need to peel it.  Just slice it. Trust me, you won't be disappointed;  the flesh is crunchy and sweet with not a bit of bitterness.  If you live in a hot area or if you would like to grow your cucumbers in a greenhouse, this variety will work for you. 

I've got mine growing hydroponically on the roof.  For information on that mad experiment, check out my prior posting, A Fiddler on the Roof.

Recipe:

This recipe was developed by my wife and is a summer favorite.  To make the salad, you want to slice the cucumbers as thin as possible -- paper thin is best.  A mandolin slicer is the perfect tool if you have one.

Ingredients:

• 1 thinly sliced cucumber
  
• 3 tablespoons of rice wine vinegar
• 1 tablespoon of water
• 1 pinch of salt
• 1 tablespoon of sugar
• 1 teaspoon of fresh or dried dill, chopped up
• A grind or two of pepper

Recipe:

1. Peel, if not using a thin skinned variety of cucumber.  Then thinly slice.
   
2. Mix all of vinegar, water and other seasoning in a bowl.  Taste the seasoning using one of the cucumber slices and adjust to your taste.  If you like it sweeter, add a little more sugar etc.
   
3. Gently toss the sliced cucumber into the seasoning mixture.
4. Refrigerate for at least 15 minutes to allow the cucumber to marinate.

Odds of Being Pooped On By Bees: 1 To 352 Million

What are the odds of being pooped repeatedly by a swarm of bees?  Another great piece of party trivia from PlanterTomato.com.

Last week I parked myself in our hammock for the first time this year with the intention of getting some deserved rest from gardening and other chores on the to-do list.

While I sat looking at a magazine, I felt small raindrops hitting me.  This was strange because there wasn't a cloud in the sky.  I went back to reading, but the rain persisted and soon I noticed little yellow droplets appearing on the open page of the magazine.

I looked up and observed a huge tornado of bees circling in the air about 10-15 feet above above my head.  There were thousands and thousands of bees racing about.

The bees were swarming -- the method by which these little critters create new colonies; the old queen leaves with half of the worker bees; they circle in the air for a period of time before settling down on a tree, bush or other convenient location where they will build a new nest.  The bees in this story appear to have been from a wild colony located in a neighbors tree.  They did their flight over my backyard before taking off for parts unknown.

It was an amazing but scary sight. (see below photo of a swarm in flight care of the city of Chesapeake, Virginia). And as I watched them it dawned on me that the yellow rain falling from above sky above was bee poop.  They nailed me pretty good and left lots of little yellow drops on the barbecue grill, my car etc.

I'm no stranger to being in the wrong place at the wrong time, but this was really ridiculous.  I'm sure as individuals we've all gotten hit by an individual bee without knowing it (probably a bird or two as well) but I have never heard anyone complain that they got rained upon by thousands of bees.

I checked the internet and could not find a similar incident reported... plenty of cases of bees swarming, lots of information about colony collapse, even reports of car dealerships complaining about having to wash off the little yellow dots caused by individual bees from nearby hives, but no reports by individuals suffering a Pearl Harbor style bombing.

What are the odds of this happening?  My inner geek was so intrigued that I just had to estimate the odds of being pooped on by a swarm of honey bees.  I'm sure if you are a hobbyist or professional bee keeper, your odds will be much higher; this calculation is the odds of the average Joe taking the hit.

How I did the Calculation:

Broadly speaking, I calculated the probability of a hive swarming in a given location of 100 square yards during a particular 10 minute interval.  I then calculated the probability of a person being outside in a given location of 100 square yards during a 10 minute interval.  The probability of the bees and a person being in the same spot, at the same time, is calculated by multiplying the two simple probabilities.

Here are some of the particulars and assumptions for those interested...

• Locations - I used a space of 100 square yards as the basic unit of measure for figuring out where people and swarms might collide.  I choose 100 square yards because this is the  approximate space that the swarm in my backyard occupied during their flight.  Rather than divide the entire US land mass into 100 square yard blocks, I used only those areas where people tend to be in reasonably dense communities.  This space includes cities, suburbs and rural areas where people live and excludes forests, mountains, desserts and stretches of really unpopulated land.  I used a US Census density map to determine these areas.  As it turns out, this is about 30% of the total landmass of the US.  Breaking this areas into 100 square yard "Locations" results in 36.1 million places where bees and people might intersect. [By the way, I got this estimate by using Photoshop to determine the populated areas (white pixels) and non-populated areas (black pixels)].

• Bee Data - The number of beehives in the US, swarming rates, etc come from various websites which are listed in the attached spreadsheet.
• Time Intervals Used In the Calculation - I did all calculations based on a day-length of 5 hours .  I did this because bees tend to swarm during the hours of 10 am to 3 pm.  Swarms occur during 3 months of the year in spring and early summer, so a 90 day time frame was used.  Finally, bees swarm in the air for only a brief time before settling down.  Based on my observation this is about 10 minutes.  So that apples are compared to apples, I estimated how many people would be out of doors during the same time period of 10 am to 5 pm each day.  I could find no hard data on this, so I assumed 5% of all people have jobs that have them outside all day long (all time intervals), 20% would venture out of work or the home for two 10-minute intervals during the 5 hour period, and 50% would go out one time (I reasoned this was OK since many people venture out of the office to buy lunch or run errands etc.)  While people go outside more during the weekend, they will probably be out less during the winter so I did not make any particular adjustments, assuming that weekends and winters would balance out.
  

The Results:

There are 36 million potential 100 square foot locations where a man-swarm encounter might happen.  But this can happen in any of 2,700 ten minute time intervals during the 3-month swarm season.  So the total number of Location-Time Intervals under consideration is huge -- over 97 trillion (36 million x 2,700).

Bees will swarm in only 1.2 million of these location time-intervals because there are relatively few bee hives in the US (2.3 million) and they only swarm for 10 minutes. The probability of a swarm happening in any given location time-interval is just .0000012%.

Likewise, people are indoors most of the time, venturing outdoors for just an estimated 225 million of the potential 97 trillion location time intervals.  The probability that a person will be outside in any given location time-interval is .0002%.

As you can imagine, the occasions when bees swarm and a non-bee keeper is in the same spot is very, very rare.  I estimate it at .0000000000028%.

Converting this probability to odds, shows that the odds are 1 to 352 million that you will be pooped on by a swarm.

For perspective, here are the odds for a variety of other events, care of Funny2.com:

Audited by the IRS                         1 to 175 (ouch!)

Dating a supermodel                      1 to 88,000

Struck by lighting                            1 to 576,000

Killed by lightning                            1 to 2.3 million

Killed by mountain lion in CA         1 to 32 million

Meteor hitting your house              1 to 182 quadrillion (quadrillion = 1,000 trillion)

So this means that your more likely to be pooped on by bees than hit by a meteorite, but your more likely to be eaten by a mountain lion than being pooped on by bees.  Amazing.  

For those interested, the calculations are attached in an Excel spreadsheet:

Download BeeCalculation

Summer Reading: A Very Small Farm

Yesterday was the first day of summer, so I thought I tell you about a little gem of a book that you might enjoy adding to your summer reading list.

A Very Small Farm by William Paul Winchester is a memoir of his 18 year journey into homesteading.  Having completed a college degree in botany, Winchester buys a 20 acre parcel in Oklahoma and builds a house, barn and garden on his property.

Like a modern Thoreau, Winchester lives a simple life of solitude -- tending his Buff Orpington hens, milking his cow and harvesting fruit from his orchard.  His only source of cash income is the honey he sells from his many bee hives. 

Winchester recalls that during an election campaign he's called by a pollster to ask about his political views.  The author admits to be stumped when he's asked about his income; "There was no place in his questionnaire for my embarrassment of riches, only a dollar figure placing me somewhat near the poverty level."

But it's very clear from the book that Winchester is not poor at all.  And herein lies the appeal of this book; it's a romantic portrayal of a simpler way of life where frugality and self-sufficiency are the the currency that matters most.  These values, and the straightforward writing style of the book, will resonate with homesteaders both real and of the armchair variety....

"I don't consider myself any more sentimental than the next, but in the course of those quiet hours in the garden with my hoe an affinity develops, one that deepens immeasurably in the case of seed I save back for planting next spring. Because of the seeds in those jars and packets in the pantry, winter never seems long.  Brought out on a snowy evening and scattered on the dining table in a pool of lamplight, seeds look like nothing so much as precious stones -- treasure, which in a real sense they are."

The book's chapter are arranged topically but each includes a set of journal entries Winchester recorded in his diary.  They are arranged chronologically, and over the course of the book, provide a glimpse into daily life on Winchester's farm through an entire calendar year.  

Reader be warned, the journal entries all begin with a description of the day's weather.  I suspect that the publishers choice to include this information was a conscious one, and meant to act as a literary device to convey a sense of stability on the farm, because it doesn't make for scintillating reading..."Change to rain and falling rapidly, cirrus fair becoming stratus mostly cloudy, 42 to 67 degrees..."   

That said, I highly recommend A Very Small Farm to gardeners, homesteaders and wannabes.  An elegant little book and a quick read, you can buy a copy at Amazon.com for just $10.

Watermelon Radish: Rare and Unquestionably Beautiful

Earlier this spring, I reviewed several radishes that I was growing and let you know I would provide information about another variety in the future.

Well that day has come, and I want to let you know about a little known, and little grown radish of extraordinary beauty.  Originally from China, the Shinrimei goes by a variety of names in the West including: Watermelon Radish, Roseheart, Red Meat and Chinese radish.  What makes these radishes unique is their color -- green white on the outside and red on the inside.  They also are much larger than traditional radishes.

I planted these radishes earlier this year and waited to see what would happen.  Unfortunately, the company from which I purchased the seeds, neglected to mention that they are a Winter radish.  Not knowing this, I planted them in the spring and was surprised by their slow maturation.  (Normally, a spring radish takes about 25 days to mature.  But a winter radish takes at least twice that amount of time.)

As fate would have it, we are having a very cool spring this year and our nights are normally cool anyway, so these Shinrimei radishes did well in spite of the fact that they are grown out of season. 

I harvested them when they were 1.5 inches in diameter but they can grow to over 3 inches (Not a typo - these radishes grow so large they look like small beets)

Others that have planted this type of radish have commented that they are quite sweet (particularly as they grow larger) but out of season, I found them to be rather the opposite. In fact, they were too hot for my tastes as a raw vegetable, so I pickled them using the recipe I posted earlier this year.   This tamed their flavor and made them much more palatable. While seasonal issues may also be to blame, I also found this variety of radish to be a very tough, particularly the outer layers of the radish.

I'm going to try Shinrimei radishes again this fall before making a final judgment on them.  For now, what I can say with certainty is that they are unquestionably beautiful to look at.

Fiddler on the Roof: An Experiment In Roof Top Container Gardening (Part 2)

In my last post, I discussed why I decided to experiment with hydroponic gardening on my roof.  In this one, I'll address some of the challenges and benefits I've noticed in the weeks since I began this project.

Challenges:

1. Access - my roof was never build to accommodate a garden and lacks convenient access. (You know, a set of stairs that leads to the roof.) My work-around is to use a painters step ladder; it does the trick, but is far less safe than a built-in set of stairs.  Initially, I thought that trips to the roof would be relatively infrequent, but in practice, I need to check the hydroponic tanks, help trellis the plants etc. and I find myself on the roof every day.  If this experiment proves productive, I will need think about adding an external set of stairs.
2. Water & Nutrient Solution - To get water to the roof, I carry a hose with me when I go up he ladder.  A tad inconvenient since I use the same hose to water other parts of my normal garden. There's a better solution which I will implement in the next few weeks; specifically, I'll add a splitter to the spigot and run a second hose to the roof which can stay up there permanently.  In addition, the hydroponic nutrient solution I use comes in gallon sized containers.  These are too heavy to bring up and down the ladder continuously, so I pre-measure the solutions and carry them up in small plastic bottles.
3. Trellising - The challenge with trellising is that normally you drive stakes into the ground to support the trellis.  This is not an option on the roof for obvious reasons.  To address this logistical issue, I built stands out of 2x4 pressure treated lumber and attached garden stakes to the stands.  Building the stands and carrying them to the roof was a pain in the rump.  Thank goodness it's a one time investment.  

Benefits of Roof Gardening:

1. An Open Frontier - I have plenty of space on the roof which has allowed me to add 20 squash, melon, and cucumber plants that I never would have had space for in my traditional garden. This has allowed me to grow some wonderful veggies: Blue Hubbard, Black Futsu, Galeux D'eysines, and Waltham Butternut squashes, Delikatese, Hmong Red and Beit Alpha cucumbers and Charentais and Ali Baba melons.  Many of these have already fruited and are on their way towards producing.  Moreover, if I decided to expand, I have plenty of room,  I could easily double or triple the containers with no problem.
2. Pests Be Gone - we'll see what happens as the summer progresses, but so far, no nasties on my plants.
3. You Are My Sunshine - Plenty of sunshine on the roof with no trees or other obstructions to cast shadows.  Additionally, the white roofing material reflects the sunlight back towards the plants.  I believe this is resulting in faster growth.

So far, I've been pretty happy with the way this experiment is working out.  Once the harvest is in, I'll do a final post to let you know if this mad experiment was worth the effort.

Fiddler on the Roof: An Experiment In Roof Top Container Gardening (Part 1)

The musical comedy, Fiddler on the Roof, was one of the most successful plays on Broadway; opening in 1964 it ran for over 3,000 performances. 

The play takes place in a small village in Russia in 1905 and tells the story of a man's efforts to keep his family and traditions intact as outside forces begin to change their traditional way of life.  The plays title comes from from a symbolic character in the play, the fiddler on the roof, who represents the precarious and fragile nature of life in the village.

I think a lot about the fiddler these days because I too have been trying to play a tune without breaking my neck.  Here's why...

Earlier this year, I decided to experiment with gardening hydroponically on the roof of my house.  The impetus for this was the desire to grow more veggies in the the space I have available in my suburban back yard. By moving some of the crops onto the roof, I was able to add sweet corn to my regular garden.

The sad truth is that housing space is limited in our area and most lots are 5,000 to 7,000 square feet.  In my case, about 1/3 of of our lot is the house itself, then there is the lawn for the kids, a patio, and shaded areas where things can't be grown.  The area available for growing in full sun is just about 250 square feet including the greenhouse. 

However, our ranch-style home has a flat roof andit  is in full sun.  The roof area is 7 times larger than my current garden.  With that much additional space, I decided to test the practicality of growing veggies on the roof.  The limiting factors are -- no easy access to the roof (need to use a ladder), no spigot on the roof from which to draw water, weight restrictions (probably not practical to do raised beds on the roof since they were not designed to hold additional weight).

Since squash, watermelon and cucumbers need lots of space to grow.  I decided they would be my candidate plants for this experiment.  Since bringing soil and compost to the roof on an on going basis seemed impractical, I decided to grow the plants using Auto Pot hydroponic containers.  This is the same system that I've described in a prior posting and is unique in that it does not require pumps or electricity to run -- perfect for a roof top garden.

I'll describe the challenges of implementing this system on the roof in my next posting and provide a final analysis in a few months after I harvest.

Etna Beans: A Premium Shelling Bean That Proves Beauty Isn't Skin Deep

Growing tips for Etna bush beans and a 15 minute 2 ingredient recipe.

Etna beans are one of those veggies that are as beautiful on the inside as they are on the outside.  The pods of these shelling beans are a bright green with red markings and the beans themselves  are a buff color with deep red spots. 

Growing Etna Beans

Etna beans are easy to grow.  I start them in seed-starter containers in the greenhouse and then transplant them to the garden after they have there second set of leaves.  They are a bush variety and require no staking. Just plant in the ground when the soil temperature is above 65 degrees Fahrenheit and you'll harvest your bean crop in about 70 days. 

Tip #1: Don't over-water your beans or they will yellow and drop their leaves.  The soil should be just moist.

Tip #2: All beans fix nitrogen with the aid of special bacteria that form in nodules in their roots.  You can improve your yield by adding this bacteria to the soil.  It's generally sold as "Bean and Pea Inoculant." Burpee sells it as "Burpee Booster."

Cook In Just 15 Minutes

While these beans can be dried and stored for future use, we eat them right after harvest.  Fresh, these bean can be cooked in just 15 minutes by boiling them in water.  We finish them by dousing the beans with extra virgin olive oil and seasoning with salt and pepper.

Cooked, Etna beans are a uniform buff color or buff with hints of purple. Not as pretty as when raw, but still quite smart.  And they deliver where it matters most -- they taste great and they are packed with protein and other nutrients.  The following is nutritional information from the USDA for one cup of cooked beans:

Etna Bean seeds are available from Territorial Seed Company if you want to give them a try.

Great Father's Day Gifts For Your Gardening Dad: Most Less Than $50

If you are looking for a Father's Day gift, here's a selection of gifts to consider for your gardening dad.  Most cost less than $50.

• Coleman 40 Qt Wheeled Cooler - As it gets hot this summer, its nice to have a cooler that can be wheeled into the garden or patio that will hold a supply of drinks and keep them cool for hours.  This one is available from Amazon for $45.  And if you're really want to be good to be good to dad, think about filling it with beer.
  
• Mason Bee Box - If you want to ensure good pollination, putting a honey bee hive in your garden is a good idea.  But honey bees are expensive to install and require ongoing care.  If you want to increase pollination in your garden, with a minimum amount of work for dad, put Mason Bees to work for you.  These solitary bees produce no wax and normally make their homes out of mud which they form into tubes.  However, you can encourage them to live in your garden by giving them a nice place to live.  Wooden mason bee houses are said to be better than plastic.  These hand-crafted ones from Etsy cost about $20. 
• 
  
  
• A Gardening Class - A wide spectrum of organizations offer local gardening classes on topics such as: how to start a vegetable garden, drip irrigation, composting, container gardening, etc. I like the idea of giving a class as a gift because your giving the experience of the class and potentially additional knowledge which will help dad build his garden.  In the San Francisco Bay Area, most of the courses I found were $15-$30 range.  For example, Common Ground in Palo Alto and Garden For the Environment in San Francisco, both offer a full range of very affordable classes. To find gardening classes in your area, just do an internet search for "Gardening Class" plus the name of your location.  You should turn up a variety of options.

• Felco Pruning Shears -a precision made pruner from Switzerland.  The blade is as sharp as a scalpel and the handles are very comfortable.  If you should wear through the blades, they are replaceable.  About $40 at Amazon.com.

• English Gardening Tools - Burgon & Ball has been manufacturing high quality tools in Sheffield, England since 1730.  They manufacture a full line of gardening tools including many hand tools such as trowels, scoops, hand forks and widgers.  Most of the small hand tools can be purchased for about $15.  If you are in Palo Alto, California, Common Ground (559 College Ave) sells them at their retail store.  If you are outside the area, you can purchase tools via Arbor and Vine's online site.

• Hammock - They say that gardening is a matter of your enthusiasm holding up until your back gets used to it.  But when your back can't take it anymore, or when you just want to have a bit of a rest, how about giving dad a place to lie down -- like on this Pawley Island hammock.  This one is available at Wal-Mart for $79.

 

• Gardening Books - There are lots of great gardening books out there.  Here are two to consider for dad.  How to Grow World Record Tomatoes by Charles Wilbur provides tips and trick on how to grow tomatoes successfully.  Wilbur claims to routinely grow tomato plants that are over 20 feet high and to have taken over 1,000 pounds of tomatoes from a single plant.  Mere mortals might not get such yields, but Wilbur does provide a variety of useful tips and tricks.  The writing in the book is clear and there are plenty of B&W photos to illustrate the points he is making, but you'll need to look past the attitude in the book; let's just say he doesn't have any problems with self esteem.  The books worth the $10 that Amazon charges.  How to Grow More Vegetables by John Jeavons is also worth putting on dad's bookshelf if he is an organic gardener or wants to be one.  Jeavons covers pretty much everything you need to know to raise food in your backyard garden from bed preparation, to composting and seed starting.  There are many detailed tables in the book that provide information about each type of veggie - seeds per ounce, yield per acre, plant spacing and depth, days to maturity, nutritional value etc. etc.  The tables alone are more than worth the price of this book -- $14 at Amazon.
  

  

• Tool and Knife Sharpener -  Sharp blades not only make it easier to get the job done, they are also much safer; it's the dull blades that are the dangerous ones.  The Work Sharp 2000 is a grinder and sharpener in one tool.  It will sharpen axe blades, hoes and other garden tools, chisels, scrapers, screw drivers etc.  The Work Sharp is available at Amazon.com, Rockler Tool and other retailers for about $99.  You can also buy an attachment for an additional $40 that allows you to sharpen kitchen and other knives.
  
  

• Tilley Hat - The only hat with a cult following, the original Tilley was designed for adventure travelers who needed a hat that was durable, comfortable, and, if needed, could be washed and dried quickly.  I've had a Tilley hat for years and love it.  The company now offers a much wider line of hats and also clothes for travelers.  If you buy a Tilley hat for gardening, get one with a wide brim to provide sun protection.  You buy Tilley hats directly from the company at Tilley.com.  A hat will set you back about $70.

Happy Father's Day to all from PlanterTomato.

This Spuds for You: Harvesting Potatoes

A quick update on this first potato harvest.

In early May, I posted about growing potatoes in bags.  Last week, I made the decision to harvest.  Under better circumstances, I would have waited longer before harvesting, but this year we are having an extremely wet summer and this effects potatoes negatively in two ways:

• Too much water causes the potatoes to rot
• Too much moisture causes the potatoes to contract a fungal disease called early blight

In point in fact, my potatoes were suffering from early blight which shows up as small black spots on the leaves and spreads as the disease progresses. Not wanting to risk the whole crop or spread the early blight, I decided to get while the getting was good.

Harvesting Using The Flaps on The Grow Bags

The bags I purchased in which to grow my potatoes, have flaps on the side.  You can open a flap and reach into the bag to harvest a potato.  This feature lets you harvest some fingerling potatoes and leave others to grow to full maturity, or just harvest over time.

I tried this method of harvesting and after several seconds of searching, found and removed a potato.  However, the skin on the Yukon Gold is very soft and I ended up damaging the skin in the process of removing it from the bag.  Since I was going to harvest all the potatoes at once, I decided on a different approach.

The Dump 'em Method

I "harvested" by first cutting off the plant stems and throwing them away (Normally, I compost leaves and stems but I didn't in this case because they were infected with early blight and I want to prevent the spread of this disease.)  I then dumped the contents of the entire bag onto the ground and enlisted my 7 and 8 year old helpers in digging around to find the potatoes.  The kids had a blast doing this, each kid competing to see if they could find the largest one.

The dump 'em method was very easy and we were able to quickly find all the potatoes without damaging any of them.  This is the way to go in my opinion.

Based on the instructions that came with the grow bag, I should have expected about 12 pounds of potatoes but I ended up with 7.  Still, I think this harvest is good enough to call it a win and the potatoes are just beautiful as you can see in the attached photo.

One more t thing.... unless you like having dirt under your finger nails, where gloves when you harvest potatoes.  Same for the kids.

Tomato & Fruit Tree Labels: Keeping Things Organized

Tips for Keeping Your Tomatoes And Fruit Trees Labeled So You Can Remember What's What.

When I start my tomato seeds each year, I label the starter trays with plastic tabs on which I write the name of each tomato variety using a Sharpie brand marker. 

For many veggie varieties, I tend to use this same label when I plant the seedling in its final container, transferring the plant and its label at the same time. 

However, tomato plants tend to create dense branch structures which eventually cover these little plastic labels and I'm left to trying to remember what variety is in each pot.  Not a good idea with my memory.

Labeling Tomato Cages

Here's a tip for creating a label that gets mounted on the top of the tomato cage where it will be above the plant and easily seen.

• Buy some wooden garden labels (generally about $.10 each)
• Drill a small hole into the top
• Label with a Sharpie brand marker
• Affix the label to the top of the cage using a twist tie (see below photo)

   

Labeling Fruit Trees

The wooden labels used above are fine for annuals like tomatoes, but fruit trees are going to be around for many seasons and the elements would destroy these wooden labels over time. 

For more permanent labels, I use metal plant identification stakes.  These are widely available in garden centers and cost about $1 each.  They work by scratching the name of the plant into a metal plate on the stake using a sharp tool or a Dremel tool and an engraving tip.

These metal labels hold up very well under the elements, but I don't like writing the name onto the plate free hand because my handwriting just isn't that good.  This is my approach to making these labels neater:

• I first print the name of the fruit tree variety onto an adhesive backed file folder label using my computer.  (You can buy these labels for ink jet and laser jet printers at office supply stores.  In my case, I have a dedicated Dymo label printer which does the job extremely well.) 
• I then stick the label onto the metal plant stake.
• Using the Dremel tool and the engraving tip, I engrave the name onto the metal stake by tracing over the letters on the label.  The engraving tool cuts through the label and into the metal. This results in a label that is better than what I could do freehand.
• I then remove the label, and clean off any label residue with Goo Gone or WD40 (See below photo of an adhesive label affixed to a metal stake for a Sweetheart Cherry and the final product, a label for a Cox's Orange Pippin Apple)