Planning next years vegetable garden

I’m ordering a few items to plant next spring. My first order is for a pound each of Sarpo Mira and Charlotte potatoes from Wood Prairie Farm. I’ll purchase 10 pounds Kennebec potatoes locally. I have some stored seed potatoes in the refrigerator to plant a total of about 400 hills.

My usual garden is about half an acre in size and sometimes twice that. Vegetables I normally grow are: Tomatoes, Peppers, Eggplant, Potatoes, Sweet Potatoes, Okra, Beans, Butter Beans, Lima Beans, Peanuts, Watermelons, Cantaloupes, Cabbage, Broccoli, Cauliflower, Summer Squash, Winter Squash, Onions, Radishes, Carrots, Cucumbers, Feed Corn, Sweet Corn, Flour Corn, Lettuce, Peas, Cowpeas, Soy Beans, Brussels Sprouts, Gourds, and some herbs and spices. (Garlic anyone?)

Almost all of the seed I plant is heirloom varieties which I have saved seed for quite a few years.

11 Likes

Wow, half an acre. Or two?

What do you do with all those veggies? Do you can/freeze a lot and give away the rest?

We probably won’t be growing a lot of tomatoes next year. We harvested about 250lb out of maybe 30 plants this year. Canned most of them (45qt?) and made about 13 pints of salsa. Lots of beans, maybe 35qt. Lots of pureed pumpkins, too.

I think next year, we’ll concentrate on sweet corn, cukes, peppers, and a small amount of beans, 'maters, and watermelons.

This year I put down a lot of mulch (mostly grass clippings) on the tomatoes and pumpkins, and they went bonkers. It was also very dry this summer, so that probably helped keep the disease pressure down.

4 Likes

I have 400 canning lids in the cabinet ready to use and my deepfreeze is over half empty. :slight_smile:

I’m down to about a dozen jars of canned tomatoes and about the same of beans.

3 Likes

I’m planting just the usual-onions, potatoes, snap beans, squashes, watermelons, cantaloupes, lettuces, radishes, turnips, and such. Tomatoes for selling purposes only.
I’ve been harvesting cauliflower, brussel sprouts, broccoli and “Orbit”, as well as some carrots.
Next year I’m trying corn though. I’ve got the electric fence to do it, though my corn always seems to be stunted.
My garlic is already in the ground and is beautiful.

1 Like

Corn that is stunted is either lack of nitrogen or lack of copper. It can also be too high ph.

1 Like

I think this is the first time in a while that I haven’t gotten next year’s garden all planned out! Last season I was dealing with a medical issue and then we had terrible drought. I find myself looking at the catalogues and feeling a bit lost about what I want to do. I’ll for sure do tomatoes and herbs, but this might be one of those years that I end up with more flowers until I get back into a veggie groove.

2 Likes

My pH is 8…probably too high. I guess I need to dump more fertilizer on it as well.

Turnips are easy to grow and tasty. :woman_shrugging:

Oh, I know! I just have been feeling a little “out of it”. Sometimes it’s hard getting back into a hobby after a bad spell like that.

I gave it some thought over the weekend - I’ve been wanting to get some experience growing different kinds of Asian veg. So I think my community garden plot will be hot peppers, Asian veg, radishes, turnips ( :wink: ), beans, melons, flowers. My co-gardener might have a few ideas, too.

At home - probably just going to be herbs, tomatoes, sweet peppers, squash, carrots, flax, and chickpeas. Hopefully we’ll get a pergola and patio set up this summer, so I might be putting in some grapes or hops, too.

I’m trying to run some numbers on peanuts. I’ve got a short season, so I’d have to start them indoors and transplant. I’m also wanting to read up on how folks are getting ginger and galangal harvested up here. I’m thinking I’ll have to do a container but might be able to experiment with other methods. Not sure if I’ll fit them into 2023 or not.

2 Likes

There are a few peanuts selected for short season production. Sandhill Preservation has one called “Black” that matures peanuts in 100 days. Most peanuts are between 120 and 150 days. I’m not sure how much seed Glenn has this year so if you order, early bird probably gets the worm.

1 Like

That or raccoons.

Nah, corn is never stunted by Raccoons. They wait until the night before you plan to harvest and take care of the job for you. I hate raccoons perhaps even more than opossums. Both kill chickens, but raccoons add insult to injury by raiding my corn too.

1 Like

For Asian vegetables I highly recommend baby bok choy/pac choi. It’s pretty easy with regular watering and reasonable fertility (occasionally some flea beetle damage). Harvested at ~6" tall it’s amazingly tender and delicately flavored. The full-size heads are only for kimchi and similar pickles, IMO. I also recommend Shungiku/edible chrysanthemum if you want something different. Very strong, distinctive flavor (not hot, but strong), very easy to grow. And I much prefer the Japanese type eggplants.

1 Like

Cant do high carb stuff anymore…

Green beans, Okra, cucumbers, leaf lettuce and spinach… possibly watermelon or cantaloupe.

And in smaller qty… tomatoes (super sweet 100) and carrots.

1 Like

Oh I have plans for those raccoons this year. I managed to keep them out of my melons this past season so it can be done, plus I’m upgrading to an electric net fence. So I should be good unless they figure out how to drop from the trees down into the garden. Which seriously could happen…
Both the melons and corn are going to be enclosed in that fence, which could end very poorly.

They got the cobs even before they were done ripening last time.

2 Likes

I grew shungiku one year and it was a bit too strong for me! Maybe I should give it another try. Is it better cooked…?

Definitely gonna do some baby bok choy, tatsoi, Chinese cabbages, and gai lan. Still putting some carts together. @jcguarneri know any good catalogues? Kitazawa is on my radar, not sure what others are out there.

1 Like

I don’t have any catalogues th at all surprise in Asian veggies, unfortunately. But yes, I recommend coming shungiko. A little bit goes a long way. Just a few sprigs in a bowl of soup or ramen is plenty!

I only have Kitazawa as an Asian veggie supplier, but there are a few others that sell a few seed. Sandhill has Sakata Sweet melon and a few brassicas under Chinese Cabbage. https://www.sandhillpreservation.com/vegetables

I have several seed companies listed on this webpage, caution that I have not updated it for this year so some of the links will be dead.

1 Like

If you can‘t do high carbs anymore.
Momordica charantia or bitterlemon it lowers the blood sugar lever. And is considered as “vegetable“

After long hours of preparation they taste nice.
But generally they are very disgusting bitter.
But they have many health benefits, you can look it up. It is not a superfood hoax

I don’t really need anything that helps lower my blood sugar levels…

I only eat carbs once a day and limit them to around 30-35 grams (my max to maintain ketosis).
I do eat breakfast and lunch, but Zero carbs.

Beef is my main superfood…

Okra is a good veggie superfood for me :wink:

1 cup of okra… 4 net carbs.
green beans are very similar in net carbs (especially pod heavy flat Italian types)
leaf lettuce… 2 cups … 1.1 g net carbs
1 cup of strawberries… 9 g of net carbs.
1 cup of raspberries… 7 g net carbs.

There are lots of very good fruits and veggies that are very low carb… and I just have to eat those (and avoid the high carb stuff, potatoes, corn, rice, etc) to stay healthy.

1 Like