Sunday, October 28, 2018

Odds and Ends. The Last Pawpaws. Planting Egyptian Walking Onions, Garlic Daffodils. More.Saijo 10.28.18

Saijo Persimmon Tree.  10.28.15
This post has odds and ends from a few garden tasks, and walking around.

The Asian type persimmons are closer to ripe.  One of the Nikita's Gift persimmons was ripe.  The Saijo has about a dozen, not as large as last year, but then I didn't water it at all.


Columnar Apple Tree, Golden Sentinel, about 3 weeks after transplanting.  1-.28.18
The columnar apple trees that I dug up, pruned, and transplanted a few weeks ago (10.6.18), are showing the stress.  The larger one (Golden Sentinel) has mosly brown leaves. However, a few remain green.  Since it's fall and the other apple trees are starting to drop leaves, this is not necessarily a death sentence.   There was more browning on The Golden Sentinel, than on the North Pole, which was smaller and younger, so lost less root mass relative to the top.  Next Spring will tell.

Today I planted one last row of garlic, from saved garlic heads.  I don't know which variety, suspect German Red.  I had to quit planting due to a back strain, and today was the soonest that I could.  It's been raining.  I hated to impact the wet soil, but it was either that or don't plant it.  Meanwhile, the previous plantings are growing, some quite vigorously.  The fastest seem to be Spanish Roja.  I planted those Oct 5th, so this frowth is 23 days post planting.  There are some others, not shown, almost as large at 14 days, from saved cloves.
Garlic about 3 weeks after planting.

Sets from Egyptian Walking Onions.  10.28.15

The Last of the Sunflower Pawpaws.  10.28.18
A gardener should listen to his body, and I did not.  While moving minor stuff around 2 weeks ago, my back tweaked.  Before fully better, I mowed and planted some daffodils and more garlic, in heavy soil, and hauled some leaves.  It worsened again.  Now I"m being careful.  No more heavy work until fully better, and I really do need to pay due diligence to back and other orthopedic health.  Today, I planted the last of those garlic - intended and additional row, but wont.  Planted the rest of those daffodils.  And cleared part of raised bed, which was pepper plants, and planted 6 rows of 10 sets each of Egyptian Walking Onions.  These were topsets that fell over during the summer, and are rooting in the rainy weather.  The basal bulbs have about 6 inches of growth already, soon usable as scallions.  Egyptian Walking Onions never fail to perform, even in bad weather and neglected.

The last of the "Sunflower" Pawpaws fell off the tree.  Nice sized fruits.  So that's almost a month of Pawpaws.  Very nice!  The final fruits of the year, will be persimmons.

My conclusion about pawpaws:   They really can be grown, and fruit, in the Pacific Northwest.

Wednesday, October 24, 2018

Home Fermented Pepper Sauces. 10.24.18

Fermented Hot Pepper Sauces.  10.24.18
These fermented for several days, en I poured off the brine and chopped them to almost-puree in the small food processor. I added back enough of the brine to have the consistency that I liked.   A little finer than a typical relish.  There is still some slight crunch in the green Korean pepper sauce.  The Korean is much milder, just slight heat.  The The red/gree Thai is very, very hot.  Both are delicious, but very different from each other.  Now store in fridge until eaten.  Good on eggs, hash browns, and vegetables.

The glass weights for small mouth jars were not good.  They don't have a handle, and are very difficult to remove.  I had to turn the jars upside down to remove the glass weight.  A better system is needed.  The weight for large mouth jars have build in handle that makes it easier to remove the weight. 

Ripe Tomatoes. 10.24.18

Ripe tomatoes in October!  Wow!

PawPaws. 10.24.18

"Sunflower" Pawpaws.  10.24.18
Wow.  These are so good!  Now I'm down to 4 remaining fruits.  This variety is "Sunflower".  I'm saving seeds.  They are washed off, in wet paper towel, in ziplock bag, in the fridge, for the winter.

Deer Resistant Petunias. 10.24.18

Petunias.  10.24.18
Add petunias to the list of deer resistant annuals.  These did great.  Deer didn't touch them.  They are in a major deer super-highway.  They are starting to wear out, due to the season.  They were covered with flowers, all summer long.