Tag Archives: mustard

Broccoli, Mustard and Elephant Garlic Planted 

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After dinner, I watched a bunch of YouTube videos about how to grow Dragonfruits, I have 3 existing varieties, two recently grown from cutting that I acquired and a bunch that I grew from seeds year ago. I’m. Now contemplating where in our garden I can plant the Dragonfruits so they don’t stay small in their pots.

Afterwards, I did some late night planting in the back yard before I got freaked out by mysterious noises.

Broccoli and Mustard Sown

I planted some Calabrese Broccoli and Yanagawa Tanaka Mustard seeds into 3 inch pots which I will divided later (my new preferred method of growing seeds).

Elephant Garlic

I also broke apart an Elephant Garlic that I bought from the grocery and planted the 9 bulblets into 3 inch pots.

Elephant Garlic Broken Up

I’ll plant these out into the garden when they start sprouting a bit. 

Gardening on the Last Weekend in August

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Saturday, I cleaned up the square where I previously planted the four Fun Jen Bok Choy that was attacked by some digging critter.

Four Red Winter Kale Planted

In its place, I planted four Red Winter Kale plants and placed wire edging around it to try to deter whatever critter did the digging last time.

Bok Choy 'Fun Jen' Potted Up

I then decided not to plant some of the other Fen Jen Bok Choy in the square foot garden bed and planted four in a large Daiso pot.

Hydrangea macrophylla 'Tricolor' Potted

The Tricolor Hydrangea that I recently purchased looked like it need to be potted up, so I did that, placing it in a 3-4 gallon pot. I also moved it over to a more shaded area.

My Aunt and Cousins came over and I gave them some Red Giant Mustard and a cutting from both my Santa Barbara Red Dragonfruit and the Dragonfruit that I grew many years ago.

Dragonfruit Progress

Now that I see my old Dragonfruit plant getting bigger and bigger, I really need to figure out where to plant them. I initially thought of planting it by a pole in the front yard, but I noticed the Santa Barbara Dragonfruit in that area gets too much sun and is getting bleached out, so I need to fine a more shaded location.

Unknown Succulent

As I was cleaning an area under our Bosc Pear tree, I noticed a multi-stem succulent that was growing there, it started rooting but was still able to pull it up. I thought it would look nice if it were properly planted into a pot and given more light. So I planted it into a 3 gallon pot. I didn’t know what it was, so I posted a query with a photo of it to Flickr and Instagram and some responded that it was a Sedum praealtum.

I noticed that the Bromeliads that I purchased back in June (2016) are doing well.

Neoregelia 'Lucky ???'

The Aechmea recurvata of them actually has two pups now.

Aechmea recurvata

I moved the Echeveria ‘Chroma’ from the front yard where I thought I may get attached by slugs and snails to the back to join all my other succulents.

Echeveria 'Chroma' Blooming

I took six cuttings from a broken Iresine branch and also potted up a little Spearmint cutting.

Iresine and Spearmint Cuttings

It was already dark Sunday evening and I ended my gardening by potting up a Masdevallia barlaeana ‘Harold’ that was still in a 2-inch pot into a hanging Orchid basket.

Masdevallia barlaeana 'Harold'

Another Quick Late Night Planting

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I seem to be on a Salad Greens planting kick and I really want to get some Mizuna, so after work I stopped by Orchard Supply Hardware to see if they had any. They didn’t, but I found a jumbo six-pack of Salad Greens that contained Leaf Lettuce, Arugula and Radicchio. After dinner and washing the dishes, I planted it right away into a large Daiso pot, that I generally use for Salad Greens.

Another quick late night planting. I'm on a salad greens kick and stopped by Orchard Supply Hardware after work to see if they had any Mizuna for sale. They didn't have any, but I got a jumbo six-pack of these salad greens which includes Lettuce, Arugula

I also bought a seed packet of Renee’s Garden Mild Mustard Mix, which at least contains Mizuna seeds, along with other Mustards.

Also, we had a bit of rain… well, not hard rain, but a strong sprinkle or drizzle. I’m not sure it’s enough to penetrate inches into the dry soil, but it’ll increase some moisture.

Late Night Salad Planting

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Today’s harvest was a variety of Lettuce and Parsley for a Lettuce/Parsley Salad.

Today's harvest: Various Lettuce and Parsley for a Lettuce/Parsley Salad.

This inspired me to sow various Salad Greens seeds that I want to use up since they are old or getting old (and I can’t just throw them away).

I planted:
– Mustard ‘Crimson Red’ (2012)
– Celtuce (2013)
– Garland Chrysanthemum ‘Maiko’ (?)
– Lettuce ‘Grand Rapids’ (2010)
– Lettuce ‘Simpson Elite’ (2006)
– Lettuce ‘Marvel of Four Season’ (2010)
– Lettuce ‘Mighty Red Oak’ (2006)
– Lettuce ‘Romaine Paris Island Cos’ (2004)
– Corn Salad ‘Bistro’ (2007)

Salad Green seeds planted.

I really not counting on a lot to germinate, but if I get a few plants out of these, that’ll be good.

March 2013 Harvest Day

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Today’s harvest (for March Harvest Day):
– Dinosaur Kale
– Flat Leaf Parsley
– Green Onion
– Red Russian Kale
– Red Giant Mustard
– Blend of Colors Carrots
– Walla Walla Onion

Today's harvest (for March Harvest Day)

It’s been a long time since I harvested Carrots. They took a long time to grow and there wasn’t many, but you don’t find much white and yellow Carrots at the grocery.

Harvested Carrots

I want to grow more of the non-orange ones, especially the purple ones.

Chopped Carrots

I made a Pizza (or Tart) using only vegetables that I harvested…

Pizza/Tart

and had so much vegetables left over that I made, so I also made a Veggie Frittata.

Veggie Frittata

April 18, 2012 Gardening…

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I divided more of the Portuguese Kale (from a crowded cell pack) and potted about seven of them into 3″ pots. There are still a bunch in the cell pack. They sure planted a lot of seeds.

Portuguese Kale Potted Up

I didn’t know where to plant the three Asparagus crowns I bought a month or two ago… so I temporarily placed them into a small pot with soil. They started sprouting and are getting tall, so I potted each one into a separate 5 gallon pot with lots of manure, compost, fertilizer and Azomite. I left about two inches at the top of the pot and will fill it in with more compost later.

Asparagus Roots

My Mom says that her Tuberose has never bloomed, so I am going to repot them and give them a good supply for organic fertilizer, compost and Azomite. Hopefully they will bloom for the first time this year!

Tuberose To Be Repotted

There were a bunch of Bloody Dock seedling volunteers in the Tuberose pot. I’ll divide them up and plant them in individual containers. I think I will donate some to the Vallejo Garden Club.

Tuberose Repotted

I didn’t think the Red Potatoes were going to sprout, but today I saw that they are starting.

Red Potato Finally Sprouting

Finally, I harvested more Red Giant Mustard and Swiss Chard. We seem to have a neverending supply of them (pretty good for a 6 cell pack).

Harvested Red Giant Mustard and Swiss Chard

4 Squares Planted + Big Greens Harvest…

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I did a bit of gardening today, since the weather’s finally cleared up. It’s been raining for the past few days and parts of the garden are slightly flooded, but most of the garden got a good dose of water, which is good. I placed out a bunch of empty buckets and plastic storage boxes and collected as much water as I can get. Our rain barrel was filled to capacity and my Mom placed an empty trash can under the rain spout in back for the garage, but we found out today that it had a hole at the bottom. :(

Our Red Giant Mustard are still growing, but they probably just have about 2 more harvests left before bolting… so I want to keep the Mustard as well as some Kale and Mizuna coming. I planted 4 squares (4 plants each) in the Square Foot Garden today:
– Mustard ‘Florida Broadleaf’
– Mizuna (Red Leafed)
– Kale ‘Rainbow’
– Mustard ‘Red Crimson’

I then went around the garden and picked a bunch of greens!!!… Mostly from the front yard, but also got some Kale from the back. The greens include: Collards, Curly Leaf Kale, Dwarf Blue Curled Kale, Red Russian Kale, Redbor (G2) Kale, Kailaan, Broccoli Raab, Bright Lights Swiss Chard and Beet greens.

Lots of harvested Greens: Collards, various Kales, Gailaan, Broccoli Raab, Swiss Chard and Beet Greens

Click the photo above to see the annotations on Flickr.

Harvested Broccoli Raab and Bright Lights Swiss Chard

I chopped then up and sautéed them with Onions, Garlic and olive Oil with a touch of Chicken Stock, Salt and Pepper… and they turned out so good!

Sautéed Homegrown Mixed Greens (and Yellows and Reds)

Garden Maintenance + Salad Harvest + Spinach and Garlic Planting…

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It was a really nice day today and I got to do some gardening and maintenance in my front yard veggie garden.

If you didn’t know yet, I’m concentrating most of my vegetable planting in fabric pots (GeoPots, Dirt Pots, Smart Pots, etc.) in our front yard. I experimented late last year with a few GeoPots and the veggies grew really well… some, a lot better than the ones in the back yard Square Foot Garden. I think it’s because there is full sun in our front yard, whereas our back yard gets a lots of partial sun.

Almost all of the Flowering Kale and some of the Mizuna and Mustard were infested with gray Aphids (yuck), so I pulled those plants out, since they were not doing well. Two pots with the Curly Leaf Kale looks really healthy and are starting to get bigger, but I noticed that the young leaves in the center also had the gray Aphids! So I got a pump sprayer filled with just plain water and blasted the Aphids out. I’ll check the Kale in a few days and repeat if I find more Aphids.

I did some maintenace and took out some of the older dead leaves from the Collards, Bok Choy, Lettuces and Onions. I also put some bark chip mulch in the veggie pots that didn’t have any.

I harvested a bunch of greens for a big salad for the family: Romaine, Red Oakleaf and other Lettuces, Mizuna, Curly Leaf Parsley and a few (spicy) Red Giant Mustard. Yumm! We had so much salad and it was so good. I also harvested a few small Snap Peas.

My Mom saves Green Onion bottoms (with root) from the kitchen and later plants them in the garden. We had a few on the kitchen window sill, so I took those and planted them in the empty spots in one of the 7-gallon GeoPot that has Red Onions. I planted carrot seeds in half of the pot back in the fall, but they either didn’t germinate or died. I also realized that I had some Shallots that I purchased a while back and never planted, so I divided those and planted them in the same pot.

As the sun was setting, I planted two 5-gallon fabric Dirt Pots, each with four Spinach ‘Bonnie’ plants. There seemed to be a bunch more space in the pots, so I planted the young Elephant Garlic in cell-packs that I had left over from last year’s fall planting. It was getting dark, so I’ll much these with compost then bark and place the pots in the front yard.