Garden Preparation - January

This garden blog has completed  its first full year. So far, so good! As it's the start of a new year and another month, it is also time to start nagging anew about gardening chores. So while you still may be recovering from the holiday stupors, here are a few things  to start thinking about...

Concord grapes waiting to be pruned.

• Firstly, get outside and get some fresh air. Because there is not much snow cover (as I write this post,  start pruning those grape vines and fruit trees while it's easy.  If you are uneasy with pruning, checkout this quick guide for fruits and berries produced by the Chemung County's Extension Service.

• Inventory your  seeds  - Look inside last year's packets.  Are there enough left to use? If your answer is "yes," then maybe  you should think about their  viability.  The viability of  different vegetable seeds varies; but for practical purposes, you should toss seeds that are three or more years old. [Although seeds of the cabbage (cruciferae) family remain viable for more than just a couple of years, the percentage of them that will sprout  does decline steadily each year.] You can do a simple seed viabliltiy test by sprinkling a few seeds onto a wet paper towel, fold the towel over the seeds, keep it moist and then count the number of seeds that eventually sprout.   If the number of sprouting seeds is above 80%, it is probably reasonable to use the seeds this year, but expect to have a few gaps in your rows.     

• Note: If you used pelletized seeds last year, toss them.  Pelletized seeds do not remain viable for long because they are frequently slightly pre-moistened to initiate  growth.  If not used promptly  the seeds  exhaust their stored energy trying to start  the sprout cycle trapped inside surrounding coating.

• To really get a head start on the season, clear off the cellar table, fill your RECENTLY CLEANED pots with starter mix, and plant parsley, thyme, leek, and onion seed now.

• Be frugal...You don't have to blow your budget if you start  thinking about repurposing stuff.  Use egg cartons  for planting plugs, ,yogurt cups for pots, aluminum baking or other  trays from to catch the water seeping from drainage holes. Save  plastic milk jugs to use as  plant tents.  

Vegetable Yields

I have observed that some new gardeners  think about how many different vegetables they can grow but soon scale down their hopes  after recognizing that they don't have room for all their desires.   They  then frequently don't think about how much the vegetables they decide to plant  will actually yield.  Although Mel Bartholomew's All New Square Foot Gardening: The Revolutionary Way to Grow More in Less Space (2013)  effectively covers how many plants can be squeezed into tight spaces, I think it's a little light on actual yields. A carrot produces one carrot, but not many gardeners know the quantity of green beans that a bush bean will yield. This chart from a Washington State University's  Extension Service publication  succinctly covers all the common veggies for backyard growers -- I'll assume that the average bear can scale a 10 ft row to a particular garden situation... The columns on the right side of the table pertaining to adult consumption I think may be somewhat problematical. Of course, many of us don't always know what we're eating -- however, the 50 lbs of corn consumption must, I suppose,  include corn syrup and/or corn flakes...

Vegetable	Plants per 10-ft Row	Production per 10-ft Row	Average Pounds Consumed per Adult per Year
			Fresh	Processed	Total
Asparagus	10	5-8 lbs	10	10	20
Bean, Green	35	6-8 lbs	15	25	40
Beet	50	10-12 lbs	3	4	7
Broccoli	10	10-12 lbs	5	6	11
Brussels Sprout	10	6-8 lbs	3	0	3
Cabbage	8	10-15 lbs	10	10	20
Carrot	60-80	12 lbs	8	8	16
Cauliflower	9	8-10 lbs	6	9	15
Celery	20	15 lbs	5	0	5
Chard, Swiss	20	30 lbs	3	5	8
Corn, Sweet	20	3 doz ears	17	33	50
Cucumber	5	2-3 doz	6	12	18
Eggplant	5	15 eggplants	2	3	5
Kohlrabi	30	7-8 lbs	4	2	6
Lettuce, Head	10	10 lbs	5	0	5
Lettuce, Leaf	30-60	5 lbs	5	0	5
Muskmelon (Cantaloupe)	3	10-15 melons	5	0	5
Onion, Bulb	40	10 lbs	10	0	10
Onion, Green	60-80	2 lbs	2	0	2
Parsnip	40	10-15 lbs	5	0	5
Pea	60-100	10-12 lbs	5	8	13
Pepper	6	20 lbs	3	7	10
Potato	10	20 lbs	70	0	70
Pumpkin	3	10 pumpkins	10	10	20
Radish	100-120	3 lbs	1	0	1
Rhubarb	3-4	15-20 lbs	5	5	10
Spinach	30-40	5 lbs	3	5	8
Squash, Summer	3	25 lbs	7	10	17
Squash, Winter	2	20-30 lbs	20	20	40
Tomato	8	30-50 lbs	35	50	85
Turnip	30-40	20 lbs	3	0	3
Watermelon	3	6-12 melons	10	0	10

Good News For Bees, Bad News For Insects 

Robotic pollen collector   by Eljiro Miyako

During the past couple of weeks I've seen both good news and bad news stories in the New York Times about our insect friends. A few scientists are experimenting with a way to inoculate (or, in this case, expose)  honey bees with antiviral compounds derived from the common wood conk mushroom as a protection against many of the diseases spread by the mite, Varoa destructor.  If these findings hold up, gardeners soon may be setting up bee feeder/innoculation stations in their backyards to help our pollinating partners. 

On the negative side, there is a some research now suggesting that declining insect populations might   reflect the effects of rising global temperatures on male insect fertility.  Combined with the toll of insecticides, the engineers and scientists working on these micro-mechanical pollinators should start working double shifts!  If nothing else, the devices may be needed by the first colonists to Mars.