I started some new seedlings for the Dirt to Dinner participants to plant in their home gardens, if they are doing them this Fall. I started a mix of three different varieties of Broccoli and had a heck of a time getting any Early Dell Celery or Snowball Cauliflower to come up. But we went through a heat wave right after I planted, so that may have been the problem. It’s worth trying agin.
Tonight I started:
A Japanese spinach called “Oriental Giant,”
“Bloomsdale” spinach,
“Orange Fantasia” chard, which came up beautifully in the Spring and was promptly devoured down to it’s last root by squirrels,
A specialty salad green called “Gala” mache (never tried this one, let me know if it does well for you),
Something the kids would call ‘Dinosaur’ kale that says “Covolo Laciniato Nero Di Toscana Precoce” which I think means “Curly black kale from Tuscany,” but that’s just a guess,
Some more standard looking kale called “True Siberian,”
More Snowball cauliflower,
And the rest of the seed I had for the “Early Dell” celery.
It was luxurious having fresh celery available all Winter long last year and I actually saved seed from the plants we grew. I tried starting some of that along with the Early Dell. I have no idea if it will do well. I found the plant label from last year and it just says “Celery” so no idea if it is a hybrid that might not breed true. Put that one under the category of Experiment! :-)
In the garden we have:
some carrots tucked here and there trying to hide from the creatures that come in the night and dig them up,
some peas just starting,
turnips that could really stand to be thinned,
drying beans for soups this Winter,
sunflowers waiting for us to dry and husk the heads,
onions that still need to be pulled,
blue potatoes that are about ready to come out,
melons, pumpkins and gourds that have been growing all summer
and still more tomatoes!
The garden is quiet now that the last session of the Spring 09 Dirt to Dinner project is done.
Tomorrow we are going to put in several different varieties of gourds on an arbor we’ve constructed over the bench. It’s a tad late for gourds since they like such a long season, but we could still get lucky, and we could always try covering them with season extenders. Could be a good challenge for the new crew starting in September. One of the neighbors gets tomatoes until November, so I’m hopeful.
There are no zucchini plants in the Dirt to Dinner garden, for reasons that will be obvious to you by August, if they aren’t already. ;-) Instead I’ve been trying to learn more about the squash varieties we do have going. For instance, did you know that the ‘pumpkin’ you buy canned to make into pumpkin pie is actually a squash that is most closely related to Butternut? I’m loving all the details available at 
I think I remember that the potato sacks we used each hold fifteen gallons, and they are nearly full of soil at this point as well. Each sack is planted with four or five potatoes, the same amount we used in the much smaller basket of La Rattes. So maybe we’ll find out the consequences of crowding when we compare the harvests, but it will be hard to interpret, since we used different varieties.
From Dirt to Dinner 