Spring Planting

A few years ago, we had a visit from gardener and author Willi Galloway (Grow Cook Eat).  She shared with us that in the unpredictable spring weather of the Pacific Northwest, the best way to approach spring planting is through noticing soil temperature.  While daytime temps vary a lot this type of year, the soil temperature is much more consistent.  If you look at the back of your seed envelope, it may tell you the soil germination temperature.

In my experience, the soil temperature here is the average of the nighttime and daytime temperatures.  If the weather warms or cools a great deal, it will take several days for the soil temperature to catch up.  Today for example, the high temp is expected to be 57 degrees, and tomorrow cool to 47.  So take the average of several days.  So our average soil temperature for the next week is somewhere in the range of 45 degrees to 50 degrees.

If you plant seeds before the soil has warmed to their germination temp, they simply won’t germinate, and may just rot.  To combat this, many gardeners start seeds indoors.  Your seed packet will advise if you can start the variety in pots or not.  I have started my tomatoes indoors for quite a few years now.  I use a heat mat (made for germinating seeds) to bring the temperature up to the 70-80 range that tomatoes need, and I start them in the house rather than the garage (and then move them out to the garage under a grow light).  In the house, I don’t have a fancy setup, I just use a desk lamp over the seeds.     One of our gardeners, Jan, wrote this article about growing tomatoes a few years ago:  https://hcllutheran.wordpress.com/tag/growing-tomatoes/

Right now, gardeners are itching to get out and plant, with the warming weather and less rain we are having.  There are a few techniques you can use.

1.  Warm the soil by placing black plastic over a patch for a few weeks.  While we all want to cut down on plastic use, you may have a few black garbage bags at home that you can reuse after they are done with warming duties.
2. Use row cover.  This is widely available at garden stores and online.  It will warm your plants and soil just a few degrees, and also keep out slugs and pests.
3. Use starts, but don’t plant too early.

Here is what you can plant from seed now or soon:

Fennel
Arugula
Broccoli Rabe (45 degrees)
Lettuce
Swiss Chard
Peas
Brussel Sprouts
Kale
Beets
Carrots
Leeks (grow from seedlings)
Potatoes
Radish (45 degrees)
Turnip (45 degrees)

Onions and garlic from sets

 

Summer Campfire Series – In the Orchard

Thanks to Pastors Sara and Drew Yoos, we will be having a fun series of “campfire” events in the orchard.  Sara and Drew have created “Create Bellevue” and have lots of fun things going on.  Here’s an excerpt from their website:

Create Bellevue is proud to present the Summer Campfire Series. Come, gather around the fire and hear some stories. Events happening on the second Saturdays of the month at 7pm in The Orchard at 4315 129th Place SE, Bellevue, WA 98006. (Parking is available at Holy Cross Lutheran Church.)

Free Admission. You bring the blankets and chairs, and we’ll provide the s’mores.

• June 10 – Storytelling and Songs
• July 8 – Moana Movie Night
• August 12 – Open Mic Night (comedy, games, and crafts)

Sara and Drew are also hosting a summer camp July 17-21.  You can find out all the details at createbellevue.com.  The campfire series is free, the camps are very low cost.  Fun stuff!  Our Seattle summers are so short, we need to seize every opportunity to celebrate our out of doors life.

“Orchard Gardens Cooks” – cookbook by our gardeners

Orchard Gardens has published a cookbook!  Thanks to Sharon and Nicole, dedicated gardeners, we have assembled a complete set of recipes from our garden clan.  We have tried to incorporate recipes which include vegetables from the garden.  Kale, beets, squash, and even quince have found a place in our cookbook.  I can’t wait to try the “Basil and Onion Mashed Potato” recipe by Jan.

The books are $10 and 100% of the proceeds go to the Backpack Meals for Kids program here in Bellevue.  Backpack Meals provides a bag of food to kids who would otherwise go hungry on the weekends.  You can look at their website, Backpack Meals for Kids, to get more information.  Backpack Meals was started by one of our gardeners who wanted take action to help kids in Bellevue.  The $10 from the sale of one book will fill a backpack for one student! A student who will surely appreciate it.

You can purchase the book online at Create Space.

All That Cardboard

It’s the most wonderful time of the year!  Merry Christmas from Holy Cross Orchard Gardens.  We hope you have a wonderful holiday season.

Now, on to another topic relevant to the season.  What to do with the myriad of shipping boxes that have crossed your doorstep?  This year, I had surgery during prime shopping season and had to be off my feet so I did a lot of online orders.  I have a pile of boxes outside near my recycling bins.  But I have plans for them.  At Orchard Gardens, we have found that cardboard makes the most excellent weed block.  There is really no downside.  It’s biodegradable and pretty much free.  (I’d say completely free, but I had to buy something to get the box).  Flatten the box, remove any shipping tape or plastic shipping envelope.  Then place in the areas where you want to suppress weeds and place wood chips, bark or compost over it.  Generally, only use compost in the areas where you will be growing something.  If you are suppressing weeds, a thick layer of wood chips works the best.  You can buy chips in bags, or if there is a tree service truck in your neighborhood, you can ask them to dump the pile of chips in your driveway (they chip everything they put in the truck).    In this photo, I placed cardboard all around my compost bins and placed wood chips on top.  I also raked up cedar needles that my cedar tree sheds and put them on top.  Any grass or weeds that do try to grow are easy to pluck out.  Now probably in a year or two I’ll need to add more chips, but it’s pretty low maintenance.

In our orchard, we are in the process of putting cardboard and chips around the base of all the apples trees.  The tree will not have to compete with grass or weeds when growing and the chips will help keep the moisture in.

Join the fun

Apple picking – fun for the whole family

Join the fun in the orchard at Orchard Gardens at Holy Cross Lutheran on Sept. 24 picking apples and making cider! Enjoy the beautiful heirloom orchard and the opportunity to taste fresh cider! Orchard Gardens grows and donates more than one ton of organic produce to HopeLink to benefit local hungry families. Please note: * The quilting group at Holy Cross will have some quilts you can try your hand at tying. * The community gardeners will have fresh herbs and veggies for sale. * Other goodies will be for sale as well. * Please bring a clean pint-sized jar for your fresh apple cider. * Please bring a non-perishable food item for the food bank. Be a part of a learning growing community in South Bellevue that celebrates the autumn in the orchard with the entire community! Children of all ages are welcome with parental oversight. Location: in the orchard at Holy Cross Lutheran Church, 4315 129th Pl. SE, Bellevue, WA 98006 Questions: 425-746-4848 To volunteer: jkftahiti@comcast.net – high school students may earn community service hours Parking: Holy Cross parking lot or, if that is full, park cross the street at St. Margaret’s Episcopal

Orchard Looking for Orchard Stewards

We are partnering with City Fruit (www.cityfruit.org) to bring some substantive training to a select group of people who would like to deepen their knowledge of fruit tree care and become orchard stewards for this heirloom orchard.

We are looking for a dozen people who would coordinate the monthly care of the trees with neighborhood volunteers.  Can you spend 4-8 hours per month, helping to care for this lovely heirloom orchard?

Here is an overview of what the trees generally need over the year:

January – winter pruning
February – winter pruning
March – winter pruning, begin to watch for blossoms, pollinators, insects
April – continue to monitor conditions
May – pest prevention
June – monitor whether trees need water thru the summer, insect prevention, some fruit thinning
July – apple and plum picking, orchard hygiene
August – fruit picking, orchard hygiene, summer pruning
September – cider event, fruit picking, orchard hygiene
October – fruit picking, orchard hygiene
November – final orchard hygiene prior to dormant period
December – rest

To apply, send an email to jkftahiti@comcast.net                                                                         

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Quince

Our ancient orchard (50 – 75 years old) holds a number of quince trees.  Before I was associated with this orchard, I had barely even heard of quince.  I’ve come to know that while they are a different type of fruit, they are quite tasty.  In fact, we have been selling the quince to a number of gourmet restaurants in the Puget Sound area.  My research indicates that quince were well known with the ancient Greeks, in fact Paris awarded Aphrodite with quince in an ancient Greek myth. Quince are grown widely in Europe and were grown in the 18th Century American Colonies.  One quince tree was always in the lower corner of the vegetable garden.  In fact Thomas Jefferson had a quince tree in his orchard at Monticello.

This was the first year I made quince jam and was pleased to discover it’s wonderful difference.  The recipe below is a jam made without pectin, so it’s more like an applesauce consistency.  It’s wonderful on toast or crackers and freezes well.  This recipe comes our way via Cyd, a local gardener.

4 cups chopped cored peeled quince (about 1.5 pounds)

1/2 lemon, seeded and coarsely chopped (including peel).

2 cups sugar

2 cups water

1 inch piece of vanilla bean, split lengthwise

Place quince and lemon in a food processor; pulse 10 times or until finely chopped.  Place quince misture, sugar, water and vanilla in a large, heavy saucepan.  Bring to a boil, reduce heat and simmer 55 minutes or until reduced to 3.5 cups.  Cool pour into airtight containers.  Refrigerate for two months or freeze in small containers.

A Ton of Food!

A  Ton of Food…After months of planning, removing sod, plowing and planting in the spring of 2010, Orchard Gardens community garden in South Bellevue was born.  Every year since that first season, we have produced well over 1,000 pounds of fresh organic produce for Bellevue’s Hopelink food bank, in addition to plenty of produce for the 15 or so gardener’s own tables.  We have dreamed of giving one TON.  2015 was the year we did.  During this growing season, we brought 2,310 pounds of fruit and produce to Hopelink where it has been received with “Ooh’s” and “Ahh’s” and ‘Thank You’s.”

Many workers and partners helped make this happen.  Holy Cross Lutheran Church donates part of its land for planting.  A few staunch gardeners and people with passion for growing things work together to move this project forward.  But without our community gardeners, we could not produce all the food.  The fresh produce was donated by gardeners who planted an ‘extra row’ and shared a few extra pounds each week, the produce was packed in the trunk of a Honda sedan every Tuesday morning and delivered to Hopelink for the afternoon shoppers.

Many wonderful people make this happen.   One amazing “Garden Godfather” is committed to growing for the purpose of sharing with local hungry families and he also shares his expertise with fellow gardeners.   A  Master Gardener oversees our composting as well as plants his own garden.  We have gardeners who, together with family members, built a structure for climbing plants.   A local Windermere office staff helped create a rose arbor.  A volunteer group from Stanford wheelbarrowed compost around each of two dozen fruit trees and built a brick edge for the community herb garden. One gardener single handedly took on the project of creating a beautiful clean edge for the garden and was assisted on several Saturdays by local volunteer groups including one sponsored by the City of Bellevue.

We partnered with Lettuce Link of Solid Ground who gave us plant starts and seeds for Giving Gardens.  Cedar Grove contributed 30 yards of compost for free and we have purchased many other yards of great Cedar Grove compost over the years to create healthy and productive soil.  Local landscapers give us chips to make walking paths.  We have a local “Bee Whisperer” who takes care of our Mason bees that pollinate the blossoms on the more than 25 heirloom apple, pear, plum and quince trees.  One gardener cares for worms that create nutritious compost. Another experiments with new ideas such as hugelkultur planting.   The Church of Steadfast Love from the Compass Center in Seattle helps us keep the fruit trees pruned and harvested.  The Pomegranate Center of Issaquah partnered with us to build a shelter from the sun and rain for the gardeners.  The list goes on and on.  Thank you Orchard Gardens Community.

Each year new gardeners become part of this community and invest a nominal amount to rent a plot and support the work of this community garden. If you have an interest in joining a thriving community garden, contact Jan Starr, Orchard Gardens P-Patch Coordinator at 425-221-8544 or jdstarrs@gmail.com.

 

Aphid Control

By Robin Bentley

November 4, 2015

In a garden where the focus is on production I sometimes see the plant’s natural “end stage” as unnecessary.  When the parsley, carrots, mint and cilantro, for example, start flowering and setting seed I yank them up to make way for something else.  And yet those flowers are important, even in a highly productive p-patch like ours.  First of all, there are the bees.  Anything we can do to encourage them and reverse colony collapse is crucial.  Flowers are also important to a host of other beneficial insects.  We hear that term a lot, but what does it mean?  Who are they?  These “insects with benefits”?

Ladybugs, for one.  But you’ve known that since you were three years old.  What you may not know is that the predatory larvae of hover flies and parasitic wasps (I know, yuk!) prey on—you guessed it—aphids.  So do the aptly-named bright orange aphid midges.  With flowers come pollen and nectar—which entices the flying adults of these beneficial insects to stop and raise a family, producing the hungry hordes of predatory larvae which feast on juicy aphids.  Yum!

Last summer a lot of our patches were stressed from drought—weakening our veggies and making them that much more susceptible to infestation.  Some are tempted in an acute attack such as ours to apply insecticidal soap or neem oil.  Proceed with caution, though, as many of the beneficial insects are hidden under the aphids, and they succomb to the soaps and oils as well.   My old trick of blasting the aphids with a strong stream from the hose will make the beneficials disappear as well.  Even pinching the suckers between your fingers risks killing the good larvae.

So feel good instead about letting some of your plants go to seed—plant a row of alyssum, some clumps of calendula among your veggies, or a border of verbena around the edges…in the case of calendula and many other flowers the petals are edible for humans as well.  You can be secure in the knowledge that they’re your best allies in the aphid battle.

As well as eating some of these flowers, the seeds that follow are available for planting next year.  So it’s a win-win-win.

In her book, Backyard Bounty Linda Gilkeson lists the following beneficial herbs, flowers and vegetables useful for planting to keep aphids away.  She also reminds us to have something in bloom from early spring to late summer by growing a variety of plants.  Here are some herbs you probably already have growing somewhere in your patch:

Coriander/Cilantro

Dill

Caraway

Fennel

Parsley

Summer Savory

 

Try letting some of these go to seed, too:

Happy Planting!!

 

Annuals	Perennials	Vegetable Flowers
Calendula	Alyssum	Chinese Greens and Mustards
Coreopsis	Basket of Gold (Aurinia)	Kale
Cosmos	Coneflower	Radishes
Feverfew	Daisies	Leeks and Onions
Heliotrope	Golden marguerite (Anthemis)
Lobelia	Goldenrod
Mignonette	Rudbeckia
Schizanthus	Verbena
Sweet Alyssum	Yarrow

 

From Gilkeson, Backyard Bounty

 

 

Apple Picking and Cider Making – Sept 26 – Please come & Volunteer

We will be having the annual apple picking and cider pressing event at Orchard Gardens at Holy Cross on September 26 from noon to 3 p.m. Everyone is welcome and it is a free event. Reminder that we are at the corner of Newport Way and Factoria Blvd. at 4315 129th Pl. SE, Bellevue, WA 98006

This year, we have a volunteer sign-up if you are able to help with this growing community event. It has been fun in the past years as we have added quilt tying and veggie sales.

If you are able to volunteer follow the instructions below. If you cannot volunteer, but want to attend, that is absolutely fine!

Janet Farness

Orchard Gardens Volunteer and Events Coordinator

425-417-5217

To volunteer and earn community service hours, here’s how it works in 3 easy steps:
1. Click this link to go to our invitation page on VolunteerSpot: http://vols.pt/ucMXeT
2. Enter your email address: (You will NOT need to register an account on VolunteerSpot)
3. Sign up! Choose your spots – VolunteerSpot will send you an automated confirmation and reminders. Easy!  Check in at the information booth at the site on the day of the event before your shift! Thank you!!!