gardennn

we ended up having to pull up 4 rows of tomatoes recently cuz of blight (quick aside on that — we didn’t get hit til the end of august, which was awesome & didn’t mean much loss, but be careful when people freak out about stuff like this & start tossing around “organic solutions,” yeah? master gardener & organic companies were telling us to use copper for the plants, & israel found out that the copper’s not only toxic for aquatic life – so uh, hope yr shit doesn’t sink into ground water – but also KILLS EARTHWORMS. yes hello i’d like to help my garden by KILLING THE EARTHWORMS. ?!??!), which was gross because of our bitchin’ slug problem, cringe, & then israel got a little carried away, pulled up virtually all of the summer crops that were close to done, & decided he needed to build a greenhouse. so um, this is what he did… yesterday. approx 14′ x 28′ x 7′. i did convince him it wasn’t entirely necessary to build the greenhouse on tracks  so that it could be moved to a different bed w/out extra manpower, as was his original plan (so serious), & i think actually we’ll just leave the frame like this in the summer, either tearing down the poles or maybe growing bitter gourd / runner beans / other viney stuff up the poles (obvs during winter there’ll be plastic!).

we’ve got ~35 quart jars of canned tomatoes (mix of 4 heirloom varieties)… not including the ones we gave away. & the corn, omg. vegans shut yr ears, but topping corn on the cob w/ olive oil & grated parmesan cheese is ridiculous. broccoli was pretty spicy, swiss chard was an absolute win for the year (tonight israel made pasta w/ blue cheese & sauteed swiss chard – it can go in ANYTHING), the dozen types of greens (really dug yukina, deertongue lettuce, strawberry spinach, & the second batch of arugula), tiny little artichokes, potatoes (more pictures of those soon), peppers, tomatillos, beets (<3), carrots, pumpkins, squash, way too much zucchini, bitter gourd (indian curry!), leeks, strawberries, scarlet runner beans, snap peas (trellis looked sexy), millions of herbs…

this was probably when things were at their most bangin – early august, right before we left for vacation & things got CRAZY.

backtracking a little for this first post: babyplantstyle! these are from around mar/apr ’09. pretty much everything here will be out of order for the first while, but chronology is WAY overrated.

standard rambling: this is a scattered photoblog of our – israel slick & jessica hallock’s, the former being the brains of the enterprise & the latter more a blunt, mindless instrument serving as the primary internet presence – garden from ’08 til whenever “now” is. the main body of the garden is about 30′ x 35′, basically the entire backyard, alongside a smaller circular herb/flower garden; the front yard has a(n approximately) 3′ x 3′ x 3′ herb spiral, a small bed of assorted fruits/greens, & slightly bigger bed of assorted herbs & wildflowers (read: lots of poppies).

if you want to start gardening, it FREAL IS NOT THAT HARD, we did this while rocking full-time jobs & social lives; if you are local israel will help you w/ the hardest part, namely “deciding what to grow” (i will broadfork some stuff if you want, but odds are you’re already more decisive than i am). we also have some bangin’ gardening books that’re always being lent out, so get in touch. the greatest thing about the recession so far is that people want to save money while simultaneously removing a bit of their dependence on an economy/gov’t that (obviously) isn’t super dependable, but beyond that, dudes, way more delish food, srsly. we are pretty busy kiddos but if you want to have a beer & check stuff out or talk, leave info & we will email/call/whatev.  // XOXO, j