From the category archives:

Basil

Killing frost

by Frank on October 5, 2003

PA040002.jpgA pretty day, but the Marlow Harvest festival and a desperately needed shopping trip kept us out of the garden until very late. The shopping trip did provide us with a decent bulb planter. Damn this fancy Japan/Taiwan engineered bent metal. It’s a cup on a stick, 1/8 inch Penna. steel, welded in Bangor, Maine. It should last as long as I do, and if it doesn’t, I’ll weld it back together myself.

There’s another frost scheduled for tonight. The pepper plants still look ok, but all the immature peppers are thumbnail size. The basil and the tomatoes have gone all scraggly. I’m not sure why or how, but suddenly they’re all stem. So I grabbed one pepper and three tomatoes, and let the rest go.

I also cruised the driveway and the new garden for honey mushrooms. I saw many that died in Thursday’s frost, but I got another meal’s worth, and two random puffballs. The honeys are now parboiled and frozen, the puffballs are in the fridge.

in Basil, Harvesting, Honey Mushrooms, Peppers, Tomatoes

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First Frost

October 2, 2003

The first freeze of the season is promised for tonight, and Lisa is away, so much running around. I put blankets on the tomatoes, peppers and basil. Unfortunately the tomatoes looked like they’d already taken frost damage. I potted up the two coleus that had made it through the spring’s cold weather. They are gorgeous, [...]

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Veg box update

July 7, 2003

I’m pretty pleased with how well the vegetables that I planted on the upper balcony are doing. I’ve never grown peas before, and only planted one window box with them, and they did very well and we are eating peas now, which is neat. My plan to have them drape down didn’t go so well, [...]

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Fending for itself

June 26, 2003

Frank and I spent the week in Philadelphia this week, leaving the garden to fend for itself. While we were gone, summer arrived with a heat-wave, hitting the mid-90s, which is pretty rare for New Hampshire. Of course, because that’s the way things work in our world, Frank had been fiddling with the irrigation before [...]

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Starting Herbs in Boxes

May 1, 2003

I had every intention of starting some herbs from seed in boxes for the upper balcony deck this year. I even bought the seed. I bought some sand to mix with the potting soil. I researched what temps they want to germinate. I kept a shelf clear in the basement for them. Somehow I never [...]

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