garden news-harvesting my leeks

GARDEN NEWS-HARVESTING MY LEEKS

the following pictures are all from my garden plot 
these are a pile of about leeks i harvested this week
i got the seedlings from dixondale farms in texas last january
i planted them about 8 inches deep and about 6 inches apart in my 3 ft x 8 ft bed
as they grew this winter and early spring i would harvest some as i needed them for cooking
knowing i would plant tomatoes in the areas where i harvested the leeks early

this week this is my bed with about 40 leeks left and two tomatoes spaced about 3 ft apart
they are black krim a heirloom tomato and a big boy which is disease resistant
its time to remove the leeks and prep the soil to allow the tomatoes to take off


here is the space between the tomatoes after i harvested a few leeks


here is the bed with all the leeks removed
removing the deep rooted leeks also loosened up the soil fairly deep
i spread a layer of worm compost described below across the bed
i also added a recommended sprinkling of an organic fertilizer
i raked this in with my hands
i added a good soaking of a fish emulsion seaweed molasses mixture
the fish emulsion as a liquid fertilizer seaweed for minerals and hormones and the molasses to feed the microorganisms in the soil
these will be real happy tomatoes
they will explode in growth over the next few weeks

those black landscape pots are 3 gallon and are buried to the edge of the soil
in the pots i added some of the worm compost and a sprinkling of organic fertilizer
i water the pots full once a week
this drives the roots of the tomatoes deep into the soil looking for moisture and food
at the end of the season those pots will be surrounded with roots from the tomatoes


this is my worm compost bucket thats buried in my walkways to the top of the bucket
my walkways are actually trenches dug the depth of the bucket 

the trench is filled with mulch 
this mulch over the year becomes a foot deep compost walkway
i also have the overflow line from our two rainwater tanks empty into my walkways so that water goes into my garden instead down into the creek

the bucket has 3/8 inch holes around the bucket in a circle
there are 3 circles of these
plus the bottom of the buckets have these holes drilled in them
i then fill the buckets with vegetable scraps from our kitchen or trimmings from our garden
i dont add worms they just find the stuff by crawling back and forth through those 3/8 inch holes

this time i harvested about 5 gallons of worm compost from the bucket which is what i spread over this bed
i have 7 of these buckets in the garden that produces close to 70 gallons of worm compost a year
no wonder my tomatoes do so well huh


this is my finished bed
i cover it with a thick layer of pine straw which acts as a mulch
it easily allows water through
it prevents splash up onto my tomato leaves
it is acidic and will eventually breakdown into the soil
our soils is alkaline
it helps keep the soil from drying out

i trimmed the lower leaves off the tomatoes to allow for air circulation

i have a dripper system a foot apart with drippers every 6 inches
i run it usually every 3 days for thirty minutes but i use a moisture meter to determine if need more or less water
in the summer when the tomato is well established i cut off my drippers and only use my two black landscape pots to water my tomatoes
this also saves water


the leeks are trimmed up so only whats left is the white part
the green part is put into our large compost pile
the leeks are chopped like you would a carrot so you have this row of leek circles
these are placed into a quart sized freezer bag for use during the year
my 40 leeks made 6 quarts of leeks which will last us until this time next year


i also harvested my onions i planted after thanksgiving
i also got them from dixondale farms
i have been harvesting them for several weeks as we needed fresh onions
now they are ready to harvest 
if i was going to store them i would let them dry in the sun for a couple of weeks and store them in the garage by hanging them in old pantyhose in the garage
here though we have so much fog in the next two months that they tend to rotten
so
i chop them up and freeze them
these 50 that are left will last me until almost next year at this time


this is my tatume squash
early on as in the picture below it is green when small and looks and tastes like a zucchini squash
later it gets greenish orange them later it gets even larger and is orange
at the large stage its like a winter squash
we will eat a lot of them for fresh squash
as they get bigger i will chop and freeze them
any excess squash will be donated


this is one of my baby tatumes that is a few days away from being in a salad

i now have harvested most of my winter garden and am now growing all my summer crops
tomatoes x 6 bell pepper sweet banana pepper tam mild jalapeno basil kale zucchini squash christmas lima beans french green beans egg plant chicory/dandelion  lettuce in the shade swiss chard in the shade and malabar spinach   

we eat fresh veggies all year round from our garden

the organicgreen doctor