Friday, January 28, 2011

Winter Gardening

Oh, I am getting so spoiled. The past 2 days have been in the 70's here in Denver. So I took advantage of the opportunity to go do some winter gardening. It was soooooo wonderful! I dug up another few feet of grass and enlarged my south facing garden plot by another 10 square feet or so. I also pulled out several miles of bindweed roots. I suppose one way to look at is that no matter how badly my expanded garden may do, it couldn't be any worse than a yard full of bindweed!

I also set up my little homemade seed incubator in the garden level south facing window, and hopefully all of the kale, collards, kohlrabi & broccoli will have a fighting chance. (Thanks Melissa for the inspiration: http://hergreenlife.wordpress.com/2011/01/24/sprouting/). I've concluded that the bugs that keeps infesting my cruciferous veggies are aphids. So this year I'm gonna try covering them and spraying with a garlic/soap spray at first sign of the little buggers! I WILL have broccoli this year, I will, I WILL!

And last, but not least, I harvested enough winter spinach for a lovely salad. Yum!


Oh... the gardening bug is going strong already. I fear three below zero is gonna come as a rude awakening next week!

4 comments :

  1. Gardening... WHAT'S THAT!? Oh right, something that I am not going to be able to even remotely start thinking about for another 4 months!!!! So, so happy for you but secretly (okay, not so secretly) jealous!

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  2. Ha! Well, I'm jealous of me too since tomorrow the temperature is gonna dive, and Tuesday they're saying a low of -17 F (-27 C) and a high of -3 F (-19 C). Guess the universe is punishing me for getting all high and mighty about my winter gardening!

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  3. Wow, 70 degrees to below zero -- that's quite the temperature swing. It topped out around 40 degrees here, and while we weren't planning any major gardening, Mr. GreenLife hoped to dig up some soil to take in for a soil test. Looks like we missed our opportunity, as the ground is now covered by a good bit of ice and the temps are dropping!

    We also had aphid issues last year, especially on our kale. The soap spray really works if you keep up with it. We use a few drops of Bronner's or a mild dish soap, a few drops of cooking oil, and a spray bottle full of water.

    Good luck to your little seedlings!

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  4. Ha! Denver is notorious for its temperature swings. There's a saying here that goes, "If you don't like the weather, just wait a few hours." I think it has to do with the mountains... before a storm we get these warm chinook winds (something to do with downslope winds off of the mountains) and then the storm hits and Bam!

    It finally bottomed out at 8 below zero, and at the moment it's a balmy 16 degrees out. At least we don't usually get the ice storms that cause such a mess in other parts of the country.

    Nothing has sprouted yet... I'm hoping they're getting enough sun in the south facing window, and that my crazy little system with bottles of water for thermal mass is providing enough heat. I may have to give in and buy a grow light.

    Thanks for the tip on the aphids. I'll be armed and ready with Dr. Bronner's this year!

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