Permaculture Summer Garden Tour & Harvest | Week 5

Well, hello friends. I'm Jen. Welcome to the Sunshine Farm. We are going to do our fifth weekly garden tour today. So without further ado, let's get started. I'm going to start off by showing you guys how the garden is doing. We've got a lot of changes, some frustrations, some new pests, no surprise there. And then I will finish off with a harvest. Oh, I have a beautiful head of broccoli to harvest and I'm going to harvest a head of garlic to show you how those are looking. Okay guys, I just found something that I've been waiting for actually for a couple weeks now. I have these beautiful artichoke plants and I had noticed that we had an aphid problem on the artichokes and I was feeling a little bit unsure of how to handle it because I know the quick solution is spray it with neem oil or some, some hard water spray. I was thinking about coming out with neem oil because I wasn't seeing it resolve itself, but I just found the resolution through the permaculture way and I'm really excited about this. It's just such a demonstration of how, how nature kind of takes care of itself. But let me show you guys what I found. The aphid problem was on this stem right here and it's mostly gone. I noticed it's just almost completely gone and I know why. See if I can show you guys what's on this leaf right here. Look at that. It's a ladybug. Okay, we're going to start with this walkway right here. Show you guys how things are doing. The fava beans are done. I'm just harvesting them now. Um, they're all ready to be harvested and see the big pods down there. The garlic is almost done two weeks and we will be harvesting all of the garlic over here. We've got our cauliflower. I harvested our first big one the other day. I have a video coming out later this week with that. And then I have this little one coming in, just doing pretty well. You want to come over and say hi? Not listening to me. You're handsome. Okay. So I am noticing signs that these potatoes are getting ready to die off. So you can see the plants having some yellowing of the leaves starting to fall over a little bit, probably be a couple more weeks. And then these plants will quickly start to die. And that means we're one step closer to potatoes. So we'll harvest the potatoes once the plants are completely dead. Okay, let's talk for a second about the squash. Oh, the squash. I had my beautiful transplants that I put out in the ground after dealing with all of my direct seeded squash eaten by slugs. And I've been babying them, watering them, making sure they're okay and more pest issues. Lots of pest issues this year. So many pest issues. The other day I was out in the garden and just looking at the squash, giving them some water. And I saw a vine borer flying around the squash. I only saw one, but that one is enough for me to know that we have vine borers and they're going to try to lay eggs on those squash and they're going to try to kill my squash. So I went around and I wrapped the bottom of the squash plants with foil to try to prevent the eggs from being laid right at the base where they're most susceptible to complete crop failure. And so you'll see that. You'll see some foil in the garden and be like, huh, what is she doing there? Then a little bit later in the day I saw squash bugs right at the base there. Little gray guy. So the squash bugs themselves won't do a lot of damage, but what they will do is they'll lay their eggs. The eggs will hatch into larva and um, what do they call them? Nymphs? Squash bug nymphs? It sounds right, but also sounds wrong. And the larva will eat your plants and destroy your plants real fast. So right now we are handpicking the squash bugs, putting them in a little bucket of water and feeding them along with the Japanese beetles, which is another pest issue that came this week to our chickens. First I had the slugs, then I had the vine borers and then I had the squash bugs and then I found cucumber beetles and I've never had cucumber beetles before. So we have vine borers and squash bugs and cucumber beetles and slugs all wreaking havoc on our cucurbits this year. I think it was just because maybe our winter was too mild and with climate change and all that stuff, we are just having some serious pest issues. I had a bug on my neck. On the bright side, on the very, very bright side, my peppers and tomatoes have never looked better. So let's take a look at those guys. So here we've got all the peppers. They're both on this side and they're all on the other side and they're just like big, beautiful, healthy plants. Nice, beautiful bell right there. And I'm just loving these, these leaves. So dark and lush. And behind them we've got tomatoes, which yes, they do need to be pruned. I know it's been a little busy, but they are very lovely. Very, very lovely and lots of fruit coming on them. It's a little baby tomato right there down at the bottom of the plants, which I'm going to come in and prune more of. And our cherries will be first. So you can see all those little cherries down there. Okay. Then we got these Brussels sprouts, which have been completely fine after their close call to being lost by slugs. And you'd see the first little sign of Brussels sprouts right at the base of the stems. There's this little tiny circles. Those will be Brussels sprouts down there. So it's kind of a rule here in New York that you want your corn to be knee high by the 4th of July. We are the 5th of July. And this year is the first year I've had real corn success. It is waist high. It's all the way up to my belly. I can even get it all the way up to my face. So corn success so far. We'll see how, see how it produces. It looks like the variety that's doing the best is Glass Gem. I've got my one surviving squash from the slug damage of 2020 and this thing is gorgeous. So I'm going to try to get these potatoes pushed back a little bit so that I can get this squash on the trellis so it will start growing up instead of out like it is. We have another Jardale over here and a couple more over here. You can see the foil wrapped bottoms are some cucumber beetles right there. I'm actually going to pull this plant, this one cause it's way too close and um, it's just going to stunt the growth of this larger, healthier one. Chris is working on weeding this front area for me and then we're going to get it mulched with some of that rotted goat manure hay. So, so many of you know we've had issues with the mulch and the slugs, but the slug issue is mostly behind us for now because of our heat and drought that we're in. The nice thing about putting down the hay mulch is it slowly fertilizes the plants and in this front area we had wood chips. We moved most of them aside and then we planted in the ground, but there's not really a covering that's thick anymore and we don't have a fertilizer down and we didn't put compost down and it's going to look a lot better pretty quickly once we get that down. Plus it will decrease the watering needs for this front area as well, which is getting really dry. So, I mean, I've showed you guys this a million times, but here's our beautiful artichoke plant. We've got one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, nine artichokes so far. And I think that's going to be it, but we'll see. We'll see what happens come out. But that's pretty good for one plant. Chris just asked me if I wanted a couple of ground cherries. I think the answer to that question is always yes. They're so good. Especially when they've had a chance to like really dry out and ripen. You can't see it because it's focusing on my face, but it looks gorgeous. So good. It's got a little pineapple explosion. So good. As I'm walking around this garden tour, I just, I just deadhead the flowers as I'm going. Just pulling off any of the ones that are past their prime. Like this one. That'll tell the plant to produce more flowers. So we've got some peppers in here. Some kale. Why? So these five colors are looking really cool. Yeah, they're looking cool. They're not filling out as much as I'd like. I think they need some fertilizer. So hence that guy should do the job. And then we've got the cucumber trellis, which I need to add string on the bottom because these guys should be ready to be trellised pretty soon. Eggplant, so far no fruit. I see blossoms, but the blossoms keep falling off. So I think it's a pollination issue or it's a heat issue. We'll see. I'm just going to give it some time and see what happens. More potatoes. And then in here we have squash. I've showed you guys before. And then some more squash. It's like a marked difference between how these guys look, how these guys look. The only difference, woodchips mulch, hay mulch. If you didn't catch my most recent video, I explained that we are ditching the back to Eden method for annuals in favor of some alternate methods because we have not had success with it and it's been two years and we could wait longer, but we have other methods of work. So we're just going to use those. But let's take a look at these peppers on this side cause they're even more pretty than the ones on the other side. They're hot peppers and I'm like snacking peppers. So they're just getting like taller whereas the bell peppers are getting more bushier. See all these lovely looking peppers, lots of fruit on these bushes. And then my monster tomatoes behind them. I prune these guys, I promise. And they're just, they're, they're just crazy. I can't do anything. Some more squash in here, here as well. I'm having so much success with banana peppers this year. I've already eaten some, I've made pickles with them and they're just continuing to produce. And pole beans, which I think the only success we're going to have is on this portion of the trellis. This guy is not looking so good. See what happened. Hey Justin, you want to come over? No. Bye. Found something else cool. Well, interesting that I want to explain with you guys. I just noticed the tomatoes, like the few straggler tomatoes we planted in the back to eat in bed. They're showing signs of disease. I think septoria leaf spot, whereas these other tomatoes, which I have been horrible at pruning that are way overgrown are not showing any signs of disease. Healthy plants are less susceptible to disease. And it's so obvious here. Let me show you. Obviously there's not very much airflow. I need to improve that. But look at even the bottom leaves are lush, healthy, literally no signs of disease at all. Let's move over here. These guys, lots of airflow cause there's not very many plants and they're not very bushy. Look at this signs of disease. See that discoloration, the spots, not, not good for these plants. But I mean, my hopes were, my hopes are low for these guys. We'll probably get some cherries, some old cherries there. I'm going to get, I got to throw this guy away and make sure I don't touch the other tomatoes. So yes, spacing is important. Airflow is important. Variety is important, but I think the most important thing you can do for your plants is grow them in healthy soil and grow healthy plants and they're going to not be as susceptible to disease. This will probably be the first cabbage we harvest. It's pretty good size so far. Not tied at all yet. It needs a little while longer. These guys take a long, a longer time in my experience. That's probably going to be a real little head. I see the first of my Echinacea blooming. So let me show you guys that. Echinacea, aka comb flower. Hello little flower. That lavender bush is so pretty. This is the bee bomb getting ready to bud and flower. The yarrow is just gorgeous. I love it. So pretty. So I've talked about how we'll be quitting the back to Eden method for annuals, but this bed behind me is back to Eden. It's all just wood chips mulched on top of our native soil and that is going to stay the way it is. We're going to continue to use it for perennial beds because of the ease of being able to put wood chips down and not have to worry about weeds coming up. Got some basil growing in this pot. It's coming in nicely. The watermelon are finally sending off their little blossoms. Show you guys some little baby fruit right there. They're looking really good this year. I have some high hopes for the watermelon. It's a little blank spot where my rooster got into my watermelons. Thanks guys. These onions are looking really good. So far. That's a nice, nice bulbs on them. It'll be a little while longer before we harvest. These guys are getting some damage from the cucumber beetles, but I'm pretty sure they have enough foliage where they'll be okay. They do have lots of little blossoms and little fruit forming. See all the little blossoms in there. Got our two beds of sweet potatoes. You could just see how much they're trailing, trailing out of the beds. Now this is going to be such a cool area when we have these all trailing, this trailing, and then the watermelon all trailing over into the walkways. This is my dry bush bean bed, which filled out really well. The berms and swales have been, I would say a big success this year. Everything in them has nice, healthy, dark green leaves. The weeds have been annoying, but the plants are growing really well. So I'm excited to expand the berms and swales where the roosters are. So we'll just expand them over that way. Let's look at these pretty calendula flowers and this awesome head of broccoli. Hi, pretty flowers. You are gorgeous. More onions in here. Babe, this broccoli head got so much bigger. It's really lovely. Actually, I think it's ready to harvest because I'm just seeing the slightest bit of loosening. Oh, there's a cucumber beetle. Got another little head forming there. A smaller one over there. This is one I already harvested and it's sending off side shoots. If you have not had success with broccoli, I encourage you to try changing up your varieties. This is a hybrid variety from Johnny's Seeds called Bell Star. It's an F1 hybrid and broccoli is just really hard to grow because of our short cool weather. We're either really cold or we're warm. Broccoli likes to grow in the cool weather. We don't get a lot of cool weather here. This hugelkultur bed is looking lovely. I always feel like I say that with hugelkultur because it always surprises me with how nice it looks. Such a quick time. I planted tomatoes last year in this bed. I just planted one and it never got any disease. I never pruned it. I just let it go wild. I'm doing the same thing this year, but I have three. I have one here, one there, and then I've got one on the other side of the bed. I have a couple of summer squash over here. Looks like they're getting ready to send off their first set of blossoms. They have a lot of growing to do. Little basil that I actually can harvest from. Yeah, I'll harvest that in a minute cause I don't want it to go to flower. Such a lovely area. Some beautiful calendula. I can pick some of these guys and use them for, I don't know, salve I think it's called. Oh, more cucumber beetles down here. This is a lovely looking tomato. I mean, it's just so full. Got some Thai basil in here. Cape gooseberry. It's just picking off some cucumber beetles off of those cucumbers over there. Now I'm looking at these peppers. They're doing well. Here we've got some lovely peony poppies. So pretty. Cute little zinnias and some dahlias that will bloom not too long from now. We've got lots of raspberries to harvest. I like this one right here. I love the yellow, yellow and raspberries. So sweet and sour at the same time. Just how I like it. The goats are enjoying their hay. Chickens are enjoying the reprieve from the sun. Just got to grab my garden hod. Spotted. A basil. Not the kind that you eat. And a sage. Hi. And my garden hod. First things first, I'm going to harvest some basil. I will grab it right here. This one's most important because it's flowering, which you don't want. Now to harvest the star of the show, this gorgeous broccoli. That is a gorgeous head of broccoli. The size of my face. Look at that lovely basket. Let's go ahead and pull out one of these guys just to show you what we have going on here. It's a nice size clove. This is a soft neck variety. That's a good size. Good size garlic.