1000 Pound Challenge Update

I have come to the realization that I will not just fail to meet the 1000 pound for produce from my garden within 1 calendar year, but that it will be an epic fail.

As of yesterday, I have harvested 9.555 pounds of produce. While it's true that tomatoes and squash have barely started and that the cabbage will add some weight to my totals, I don't think I'll even make 200 pounds in total this year.

The reason is pretty simple. My garden is more of a traditional kitchen garden. Each day, I go out and pick something for use in the meal that I'm preparing. Since I cook a wide variety of dishes, I have a wide variety of items in the garden. Of the 450-ish square feet of garden space, about 75 square feet is dedicated to herbs, for example. Herbs weigh next to nothing, and although I might make 200 or more harvests of basil, oregano, thyme, dill, and the rest, during the season, they won't weigh-in very heavily compared to planting the same ground with, say, 9 zucchini plants.

We also had bad luck with the strwberries which occupy one complete terrace of my hillside garden this year. The fruits were eaten just before ripening by the animals that live in my yard. Primarily chipmunks, I believe, but quite possibly deer and other nocturnal visitors as well. That cost us a number of pounds of production.

It's true that we are only four months into a 12 month challenge. So there is time, yet. If I were to build cold frames to act as mini-greenhouses and use passive solar heating to keep them warm, I might yet pull out some late season harvests. The difficulty with that is that we are already losing daylight hours as autumn approaches. When the number of available hours of sunlight gets too low, many garden vegetables will stop producing or stop ripening. Others, like lettuce and leafy greens, greatly reduce their rates of growth.

So this year, we will experiment with exending the season as far into the New England autumn as we can, and we'll see how mcuh we can squeak out of the kitchen garden. Next year, though, we will plan for production. We'll plant much larger quantities of vegetables that we can not only eat as they ripen, but which can be effectively preserved.

Shopping in the Backyard

Summer is one of my favorite seasons, because it's that time of year when you can simply walk outside and stroll through the garden with a produce bag and pick your groceries for the evening meal. Row markers become menu entries as I go shopping in the garden for the family dinner.

Most of the time, I pick only what I need for the day, washing and cooking it immediately after picking it. Sometimes, however, a particular plant or group of plants comes due for picking in larger quantities. With the herbs, for example, we'll pick them in large quantity when the plants get big and when they get ready to bolt. Then we'll dry them and crush them to fill our spice jars in the kitchen.

Other types of produce may be frozen, dried, canned, pickled or otherwise prepared and preserved for use during the winter.

It's still early in the season so many of the crops haven't ripened yet. Nevertheless, we have harvested more than 4.5 lbs of miscellaneous produce from our small garden. In a few more weeks, blueberries and blackberries will be ripening on the mountain on which we live and we'll pick pounds of them for both immediate use and freezing.

          Food Preservation Tip: When freezing blueberries, spread them out on flat baking sheets with space between each berry. Place the baking sheets into the freezer until the berries are frozen solid. Then remove them from the freezer, bag them up and put them back in the freezer. When you thaw them for use, they'll retain their shape and firmness much better than if they were initially frozen in a big lump.

Garden Produce Quality Guarantee

When we shop for produce in our backyard, we know that it has not been sprayed with whatever pesticides are legal in its country of origin, we are confident that it has not been exposed to a processing plant contaminated with salmonella or E. coli. With the prevalence of reports of widespread food-borne contagion these days, that's no small benefit.

The other thing we can be sure of when we pick produce from our garden is that it's fresh and packed full of nutrition, without the incredible amounts of sodium added to canned vegetables. With family members in the home on medically necessary low-sodium diets, that's no small benefit either.

One Pound of Produce

Photo by Brad Sylvester. Copyright 2012.

It's May 19th. Our most recent threat of overnight frost passed on May17th with temperatures only getting down to about 34 degrees, here on Blue Job Mountain in New Hampshire. Meanwhile today, temperatures hit the high seventies or low eighties. That's a New England spring for you. Old Man Winter struggles fiercely to maintain control of the territory against the challenge laid down by the adolescent spring as it strengthens into its full adulthood of summer.

That's great for poets, but for gardeners it can take some getting used to. Its largely a question of knowing what to plant when, and how to prepare if things look like they aren't going to go as planned. To take advantage of the early season warmth and rains, very hardy plants like radishes, lettuce, spinach, peas, and broccoli can be planted for an early season harvest.

Even before these frost-tolerant plants will be close to ready to pick, however, I have made several harvests from plants that are able to overwinter through the sub-zero temperatures and snow cover of a New England winter. These include some perennial herbs such as chives and oregano, but also a more substantial perennial vegetable: asparagus.

Asparagus is always one of the first vegetables I harvest here each spring. It is on the strength of an early harvest of asparagus that I have already reach one-tenth of one percent of my goal in the 1000 Pound Challenge (the effort to grow 1000 pounds of food for the table on less than 500 square feet of garden space). That's one pound of food on the table already this year from our garden.

• Click here for our harvest totals for this year

I also have one row of my terraced hillside garden planted with strawberries which are just beginning to shed their flower petals and to produce fruit in earnest. I am removing all the runners as they form so that the plants put more energy into fruiting than vegetative growth.

After another round of planting today, our garden now contains the following plants:

1. Asparagus
2. Garden Peas
3. Mixed Lettuce
4. Spinach
5. Radishes
6. Bok Choy
7. Cucumbers (both full-sized and pickling cukes)
8. Basil
9. Red Cabbage
10. Tomatoes (just a few planted outside as yet with row covers handy)
11. Mustard Greens
12. Garlic Chives
13. Chives
14. Lemon Thyme
15. Thyme
16. Sage
17. Garlic
18. Leeks
19. Strawberries
20. Wax beans (just planted as seeds)
21. Sunflowers
22. Cilantro (Coriander)
23. Summer Squash
24. Peppermint
25. Chocolate Mint

We'll be adding a few more in the next few days as well...

 Outside of the gardens we have many other edible plants (or fungi):

1. three apples trees (7 varieties thanks to the science of grafting),
2. one peach tree (newly planted)
3. one cherry tree (newly planted) (Note: I'm aware that I need another pollinator, but haven't yet gotten around to planting another)
4.  three grape vines (one established, 2 newly planted)
5. rhubarb
6. blackberries (wild)
7. blueberries (wild)
8. wintergreen (wild)
9. occasional edible wild mushrooms
10. maple and birch trees (for sap which can be boiled down into syrup or sugar)
11. and a number of other incidental wild edibles that can be found on our 5.25 acre plot of land.  

 I haven't added these to my garden yield totals page since they do not count toward the 1000 Pound Challenge, but I think I'll make a separate total for food plants harvested outside of the garden as well.

Audubon Society Call to Action to Save Loons

Bald eagles, loons and other aquatic birds are being poisoned
the unnecessary use of lead fishing tackle. Switching to steel
can preserve these birds without changing the fishing
experience.
Photo by Brad Sylvester. Copyright 2012.

I received an email from the NH Audubon Society this mornign and I wanted to repost it here in its entirety (as the text requests that it be redistributed as widely as possible). As you may know, I am an avid bird watcher and I enjoy recreational sport fishing. I have long been an advocate of using steel splitshot instead of lead and avoiding lead tackle of all kinds in order to protect aquatic birds.

Lead tackle ingested by ducks, loons, herons and other aquatic birds poisons and kills them. From a fisherman's viewpoint, I find no difference whatsoever in my ability to fish using steel instead of lead. Steel is roughly 68% of the density of lead. It is more than heavy enough to drag your line down in the water.Adding a tiny amount to the diameter of a steel sinker or heavy-headed jig gets you the same weight without any noticeable difference in size.

A distant loon calling late in the day, herons flying overhead, or a bald eagle sitting high in a tree overhanging the lake, and the other wildlife that can all be poisoned by the use of lead tackle are actually part of what makes fishing enjoyable and relaxing. Insisting on using lead makes no sense. Please take a moment to read the Audubon Society email below and take action to extend the current restrictions on lead tackle in New Hampshire (or your own state).

"Dear Friends of Loons, Senate Bill 224, which would increase protection [for] aquatic birds, particularly loons, from toxic lead fishing jigs will be heard before the House Committee on Fish and Game and Marine Resources this coming Tuesday, April 24, at 1:00 p.m. in the Legislative Office Building in Concord. Your calls, emails and letters to every member of this committee (contact information below) between now and next Tuesday will be the most important thing you can do this year to assure a future for New Hampshire’s loons. Senate Bill 224 as amended by the Senate would leave existing regulations (restricting the use and sale of lead sinkers 1 ounce or less and lead jigs less than 1 inch in length) in place through 2014, and would ban the use of lead-headed jigs less than 2.5 inches in length beginning in January of 2015. Our loon population remains far below historic levels and the number of loon pairs on New Hampshire’s lakes decreased in 2011, after a record-high number of deaths from ingested lead tackle in 2010. This decrease occurred despite record levels of management and outreach in recent years, and continued declines are projected unless mortality from lead poisoning is addressed. We know the toll lead tackle is taking on New Hampshire’s loons because biologists have been monitoring the State’s loon population very closely for many years. Although no specific numbers are available, biologists across North America have also documented lead fishing tackle ingested by Canada Geese, American Black Ducks, Wood Ducks, Great Blue Herons, and Bald Eagles, among other species. It will not be easy to gain the support of the House Fish and Game and Marine Resources Committee in view of the concerted efforts of certain fishing groups and the lead tackle lobby. We need to work harder than ever to bring this bill out of committee with a convincing vote and then on to the final stage, a vote by the full House. Your help with the following actions will make all the difference in securing these critical protections for our loons and other water birds: 1. Please contact as many of the House Fish and Game and Marine Resources Committee members as you can between now and next Tuesday, April 24th to express your support for loons, waterfowl, and the important protections in SB 224. 2. If you can, please attend the hearing and sign in as supporting the bill, whether or not you choose to testify. 3. Please distribute this email as widely as you can to friends of loons and other wildlife in New Hampshire. Numbers matter in the House; the more people committee members hear from, the more likely they will take our concerns to heart and vote to save loons and other wildlife from this needless cause of death. Next Tuesday will be a critical day for loons in New Hampshire. I hope I will be able to report that loons won out over toxic lead fishing tackle. It’s in our power to make it so. Thank you for your continued support of our loons! Note that the below are home phone numbers as representatives do not have offices. House Fish & Game and Marine Resources Committee Chairman: Clifford Newton- (603) 332-5643 V. Chairman: Dennis Reed- dreed1@msn.com; (603) 934-6607 Clerk: Joe Duarte- joe.duarte@leg.state.nh.us; (603) 483-8454 Betsy McKinney- betsy.mckinney@leg.state.nh.us; (603) 432-5232 Michael McCarthy-michael.mccarthy@leg.state.nh.us; (603) 598-4966 Tyler Simpson- Tsimpson.rep@gmail.com; (603) 968-9285 James Webb- james.webb@leg.state.nh.us; (603) 845-3454 Benjamin Lefebvre- bplefebvre@gmail.com; (603) 677-2722 Lyle Bulis- (603) 444-5024 Leo Pepino- l.pepino@leg.state.nh.us; (603) 624-1476 Norman Tregenza- norman.tregenza@leg.state.nh.us; (603) 733-6736 Daniel Carr- daniel.carr@leg.state.nh.us; (603) 239-6830 Dick Patten- dickpatten17@gmail.com; (603) 228-1803 Elisabeth Sanders- (603) 642-5070 Richard Okerman- rep.rokerman@gmail.com; (603) 893-7705 Marc Tremblay- marc.tremblay@leg.state.nh.us; (603) 752-1995 David Watters- david.watters@leg.state.nh.us; (603) 749-4539 Jenna Roberts- jenna.roberts@leg.state.nh.us; (603) 868-7402"

Fresh meat from the garden?

This pool on the Isinglass River is a great, easy access place to fish for brook trout.

As you know if you're a regular reader of this blog, I am competing with a garden in Georgia in the 1000 Pound Challenge with a goal of putting 1000 pounds of food on the table from a garden of 500 square feet or less in one calendar year. Although the challenge covers only produce grown within the garden plot, there are other ways to put food on the table with the garden.

For example, as a part of my annual spring garden preparation, I turn over the soil in my raised bed gardens to loosen it up and to dislodge and pull out weeds that have infiltrated the garden. Today, I decided that as I turned over a few pitchforks full of dirt, I might as well collect the earthworms that were uncovered (about 4-5 in each turn) and put them to good use. Of course, leaving them in the garden to enrich the soil with worm casings is also good use, but I had another purpose in mind.

I have also written in this blog that fishing is foraging, too, and a great way to put food on the homestead table. While we don't often think of the garden plot as putting meat on the table, it is very effective at propagating earthworms because of all the organic matter worked into the soil to make it fertile for the plants. While earthworms are edible, they're very small and don't particularly appeal to my predilection for haute cuisine...

Earthworms do, however, top the preferred menu for brook trout and brook trout is certainly on my menu. So this morning I threw a handful of earthworms in a biodegradable paper cup with a bit of dirt and headed for the nearby Isinglass River with my father-in-law to do a little fishing. Within our first ten minutes there I caught my first fish of the year, a ten inch brook trout.

The fish I caught was most likely stocked as part of the NH Fish and Game trout stocking program. Game fish populations are closely monitored and catches are limited by the NH F&G so as to maintain sufficient numbers in New Hampshire waters. Plentiful game fish allows New Hampshire to profit from licensing fees and tourism generated by fishing. The benefit for the environment is that the state has a powerful economic incentive to keep its streams and rivers protected from pollution and the encroachment of suburban sprawl. More wild areas mean more wildlife and a healthier environment for all.

Despite the early success, we did not land another fish over the next few hours and we left for home. Within minutes of arriving home, of course, it started to hail even though we had beautiful partly cloudy, warm weather for our mid-day fishing. It is New England, after all.

To make a long story short, The fish I caught with the earthworms grown in my garden weighed in at .266 pounds after being cleaned and dressed (bones in). That's an entree for one person. Unofficially, then you could say that my garden produced this bounty as well, although it doesn't count for the 1000 Pound Challenge. Living with the land, however, means that we take advantage of available food sources that put minimal strain on the environment. Fishing not only meets that goal, but provides some good relaxation therapy and a chance to build memories and strengthen bonds with friends and family.
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Don't forget to like the 1000 Pound Challenge on Facebook!

Extending the growing season with row covers

DIY garden row cover
Phot by Brad Sylvester. Copyright 2012.

If a New Hampshire garden is to compete with a garden in Georgia for total yield over a span of twelve months in the 1000 Pound Challenge, a key factor with be the ability of the northern garden to extend the growing season. One way to do that is with the use of row covers.

Row covers are used both in the early spring and late autumn to protect garden plants from cold and frost damage. They provide a crude greenhouse for an outdoor garden by covering the garden and trapping ground heat to keep the plants warm enough to survive cold early spring or late autumn nights.

They should be made of a material that lets sunlight in, but which keeps frost out and heat in. Generally, that means plastic sheeting. In my case, I had some battered plastic that I recently used to help protect my in-laws' furniture while moving it in an open truck bed during a light rain. Rather than throw out the plastic, I recycled it by making garden row covers.

I used flexible green branches from my backyard as the hoops for the row covers, and longer branches as the framing members. Row covers are actually pretty easy to build. I have prepared a slide show with step by step instructions for building your own garden row covers and a written a detailed account of the specific benefits of row covers.

With the row covers in place, I can plant seeds directly into the garden even though we have another month of frost danger, or I can transplant seedlings that I started indoors out into the garden. This will add weeks of productive harvesting to the garden.

By using row covers again in the fall, I can grow crops like lettuce, spinach and other plants that aren't as sensitive to shortened daylight hours, well into late autumn or even early winter.

Techniques like the use of row covers make a huge difference in the total annual yield of gardens in regions with short growing seasons. In New Hampshire, row covers can increase the effective growing season by 50-100% depending upon the severity of the weather.

If I'm going to have any chance at the 1000 Pound Challenge, I'll need row covers to give my garden a longer harvest time along with a number of other techniques designed to increase the yield per square foot of garden space.

First Token Harvest of 2012

Chives and oregano harvested on April 3, 2012 for
The 1000 Pound Challenge.
Photo by Brad Sylvester. Copyright 2012.

I had vowed to make a harvest and take the lead in the 1000 Pound Challenge on the first day of the competition which was April 1st. Instead I ended up helping my in-laws to move from Connecticut to our house here in New Hampshire and did not have any time to get out to the garden until today. Today, however, I did make a harvest of four separate crops: leeks, chives, garlic, and oregano.

The garlic and leeks were planted in our terraced garden bed last year and overwintered in place. Ordinarily, all the garlic that I let overwinter in the garden would be dug up, separated and replanted rather than harvested for the table. Each clove will grow a new garlic bulb to be harvested in late summer or fall. In fact, I only harvest three small cloves and the rest will be replanted. For those looking to propagate garlic using this technique, I have written up a tutorial on planting and propagating garlic. The slideshow has step by step photos and instructions. Once garlic starts to grow in the spring, the fullness is sapped from the cloves as the stored energy is consumed by the new plant. If intended for the table, therefore, it's best to harvest late in the growing season as the leaves dry up and wither. I did pick out three good cloves weighing in at 0.004 lbs with the tops that I will use in a vegetable soup along with everything else I picked today.

A leek prepared for cooking.
Photo by Brad Sylvester. Copyright 2012.

I trimmed the fibrous green leaves off the top of the leek and the growing roots off the bottom before weighing it up. This is the part that will go into the soup later. It weighed in at a paltry 0.02 lbs. The other leeks that overwintered will be allowed to grow bigger this year.

Finally, from the herb garden, I picked fresh chives and a little oregano that will also go in the soup. The total weight of these two items combined was 0.026 lbs. Both oregano and chives can be used fresh as I will today, or they can be dried and preserved for later use. In the fall, when the plants in the herb garden are as big as they'll get and the threat of early frost is upon us, I'll harvest as much as I can and dry it out for use all winter long.

The young green shoots of spring garlic can be shopped and
used for cooking.
Photo by Brad Sylvester. Copyright 2012.

My total yield for the 1000 Pound Challenge, as of April 3rd, 2012, is 0.05 or one-twentieth of a pound comprised of four varieties of produce. It's not much, but it's enough for the lead over "The Good (& Simple) Life" in Georgia.

If you haven't seen it yet, there is now a Facebook page dedicated to the 1000 Pound Challenge.