Louise Riotte is one of my heroines along with Ruth Stout. Riotte, I was surprised and pleased to find, was not only a sister Libran but a Kentuckian as well. The mage of geocentric astrological planting, or "raising by the moon" as we say in Appalachia, was born on September 25, 1909, in Hawesville (Hancock County), Kentucky.

Moon sign authority Louise Riotte, taking a little breather in a forest of okra growing in her Oklahoma garden.

Weather-Resistant 'Mater Tags: Duct Tape and Ale-8 Cans

After years of making 'mater maps and trying to find or make UV-proof and waterproof plant markers so that I actually KNOW which varieties are which (crucial for seed-savers), I may have figured out one solution.

*I know you can buy beautiful metal marker plates that can be incised with a stylus, but I was trying to avoid spending more on tomato tags than I spent on steel cattle panel!

This tag, which marks a Prue paste tomato, is made by punching letters into cleaned flattened aluminum cans with craft punches, sticking the aluminum strip to a larger strip of bright duct tape, and then binding the tag with narrow strips of duct tape.

The aluminum sheets created by flattening aluminum soda or beer containers can be trimmed and cut easily with scissors. Cutting the aluminum in turn sharpens both scissors and the craft punches.

The craft punches cost about $20 per set, and will last indefinitely. An oddly satisfying and useful craft project for that little streak of Martha that lurks inside every OCD gardener.

Coming August 17, 2013: Tomato Jamboree at the Clark County Public Library Rides Again

Just a few pictures from last year's first Annual Tomato Jamboree at the Library. We had 10 growers showing more than 45 varieties of tomato - and about 70 folks stopped in to taste, vote, and taste some more.

Hope we see y'all on August 17, 2013 for more of the same and better!

 

 Winchester Police Sgt. Donnie Skinner testing out his dad's tomato, the aptly named Butler Skinner, grown out by Leo Shortridge in 2012. 

The elusive but enthusiastic anthropologist and Kentucky food historian Dr. John van Willigen checks out two bi-colors, Russian 117 (the oxheart on the right) and Pineapple (beefsteak  on the left).  Both of these tomatoes were grown and offered by Henkle's Herbs & Heirlooms, Nicholasville KY market growers. Mark Henkle interned with Dr. Bill Best at Sustainable Mountain Agriculture.

It's hard to decide! Every participant got five tickets to place in the voting sacks next to the 'maters. Some folks wanted more tickets, and a few put all their tickets in one bag. 

Nancy and Sally are garden gals from way back - and they are taking their tasting very seriously. Since we had dozens of tomatoes to choose from, we had plenty of unsalted white crackers and water on hand to cleanse tasters' palates in between bites.

(Some bad smart-mouth boy suggested we offer Hellman's, bacon, fresh lettuce and "good white bread" next year, instead of crackers and water.  Michael Burd - was that you? Or was it that Donnie Skinner?...)

Tomato Prairie: Four-Week Check-up

Bless their little hearts. You can just barely see them in those maximum-security farm panel cages. This bed was tilled to expand it from about 16 x 20 feet to 20 x 30 to allow for at least five feet between plants. Ever since reading Steve Solomon's book Gardening When it Counts, I've moved further and further from French-style intensive gardening and raised beds, especially as global climate change now allows me to grow figs in Central Kentucky without packing and waxing them for the winter. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

May 24, 2013: 16 tomatoes after planting in the newly expanded tomato bed in the back behind the Garden Shed Formerly Known as Chicken Coop. I had to follow up with the last two tomatoes a few days later. 

The root balls of these seedlings were soaked in a lukewarm Alaskan kelp solution (1 teaspoon kelp liquid to 1 quart tap water), and transplanted with a mix of 1 teaspoon of Epsom salts, 2 tablespoons of Espoma organic 4-3-3, and a final drench of 1 cup of kelp solution.  

Once they start to bloom they'll be side-dressed  with 3 to 4 tablespoons of a mixture of  2 parts bat guano (yes, I know, it's probably not sustainably harvested and I'll never buy it again but in the meantime I have four bags left), 2 parts bonemeal and 1 part ground kelp.

Four and a half weeks later, on June 25, 2013, at least one of the girls (Costoluto Genovese) had reached the top of her cage, Black Cherry  had outgrown the width of her cage, and many others are on their way there.

(That's not a ghost orb on the screen - it's a dewdrop. We actually have dew in the morning this year, which marks a major difference between 2012 and 2013).

Ain't they purty?

Merry Month of May Mater Sale at the Library

This year there were more than 35 open-pollinated varieties available in the course of about three weeks - the organically-raised seedlings sold for $1.50 each or 4 for $5.00 this year. 

Many of the new varieties were heat and drought tolerant: Thessaloniki, Legend, Homestead, Royal Chico, Martino's Roma, Livingston's Beauty, Peacevine Cherry, Costoluto Genovese, Floradade, Hazelfield Farm, and Green Zebra were some of the varieties reputedly able to bear fruit in 90+ degree heat. 

Of these, the only two varieties I've grown to maturity and can vouch for are Peacevine Cherry and Livingston's Beauty, or just plain Beauty. The latter I give five gold stars for all-round production, sturdiness, disease- and pest-resistance, cold tolerance and heat tolerance as well as very good canning and fresh eating qualities. It's no surprise that Alexander Livingston was selling 2.5 tons of Beauty seed in the early 1900s.

I did have a gentleman request seedlings of Cherokee Green Pear and Old Virginia, which he reported being well pleased with last year. Unfortunately, I didn't have starts of either one - and I'm very curious about both of them. I'll have to order some seed this year to remind myself to start them for 2014.

Andes and Polish Linguisa seedlings resting in one of the blue rockers overlooking the Front Farm.

Although trusty truck Esmerilla is no more, Burt the Scion is always happy to lend a hand on the Front Farm. Here he is packed with seven trays of maters ready for the Library sale. Burt can carry at least nine trays - almost as many as Esmerilla - and he has the advantage of keeping the mater babies safe from wind and sun damage in transit. 

 

 

 

 

 

Full tables in the Library vestibule. In the last two weeks of May more than a table per day sold out. Lots of folks requesting Cherokee Purple and Black Cherry. We do sell Cherokee and Green Zebra, but we generally don't sell the same varieties our favorite local growers  - like Al's Garden Center, Joe & Debbie Barnes, and other such greenhouse-owning friends.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Seedlings are transplanted into 4" pots for sale. It's more expensive to raise the plants in larger single containers, but the extra space is vital for the productivity of many varieties, especially oxhearts and the elongated paste tomatoes that are so easily subject to blossom-end rot. The extra room  gives the roots a little boost that helps fight off BER and ups overall fruit production. 

Creating The Front Farm at Myristica, or, How We Tore Up the Front Yard to Grow Beans

Straw and sopping wet newspaper was used to create the borders and walkways in the Front Farm. Found this New York Times article about heirloom tomatoes in the process.

Getting there on Memorial Day Weekend. Although the Front Farm was tilled several times, the beds required double-digging and hand-removal of turf clods. Each of the ten beds took approximately two to three hours each to prepare for planting.

Seedlings overlooking the Front Farm progress. Most of these seedlings were bound for the Clark County Public Library Spring Tomato Sale that takes place in the library lobby for most of the month of May each year. 

Why Mow Grass When You Can Grow Beans (and Tomatoes, and Chard, and Sweet Potatoes...)?

The 80-year-old trees in the backyard have grown so large that garden space is at a premium - and tomatoes always take precedence over every other edible now that one of the goals of the AppalSeeds program is self-sustainability. 

But we love beans, greens, peppers, potatoes, turnips, beets, and a whole host of other vegetables in addition to the glorious Lycopersicon esculentum. We had experimented with straw-bale raised beds last year in order to expand garden space. We built these as close to the water spigot as possible, since the 2012 drought made hand-carrying water a venomously hateful chore. 

Still, these three beds didn't allow enough unshaded space for those succulent sprawlers like greasy beans, summer squash, sweet potatoes and cucumbers -

So this year we plowed up the front yard. 

                            

From the porch facing the driveway. The beds are about 22 feet out from the base of the porch.

I stayed home while the plowing was going on. You know, it really doesn't take a man with a small tractor and five linear feet of steel tine to till under a healthy, lush 80-year-old lawn. 

I went on to work after the scalping of the turf and said  to Mr., "Now, when you go home for lunch, bear in mind that there's a lot of bare soil out there."

Mr. came back from lunch with some very wide Oh-Grandma-What-Big-Eyes-You-Have and said, "Well, that's a lot of dirt. A lot of dirt. Gonna be a lot of work. Wow. All that dirt." And that is all he said, bless his heart.

It takes faith and love and a serious big batch of charity to let your spouse (who has a record of starting big messy projects one year and not getting back around to them for oh, say, six or twelve years) plow up your entire front yard in a single morning because she has a dozen varieties of weird bean seeds and a great longing to create a vast prairie of bizarre heirloom tomatoes. 

The Front Farm follows the lines of the porch, creating a 22 x 60 foot garden space.