Down to Earth

It's harvest season, when most gardeners find that they have too much of something. (I've got a bumper crop of cucumbers this year, and collards.) Meaningful work of any kind leads to a meaningful harvest, and that leads naturally to sharing the riches.

I could write about generosity, and creating a delivery system for the harvest of your soul, but I've been getting pretty heady the last few post, so here's one to bring us all down to earth.

Agenda:

1. My garden progress

2. Study permaculture - prune my plum

3. Make dill pickles

1. My garden progress:

We've been rebuilding our front and back gardens this spring and summer, after removing a 25-year old apple, and opening up our backyard to the sun. Some of our projects are complete and some are still poking along. 

In the newly sunny backyard we sculpted out vegetable beds and paths from piles of soil that were moved from other parts of the backyard. This disruption had an uneven effect - some plants did better than others, and a host of new pests showed up. (Our squash were decimated by squash bugs before we took action, but the pumpkins survived.) 

Right now we have healthy collards, cucumbers, basil, pumpkins, beets, and the beans on the tepee are growing like crazy things.

The grape in the duck yard is full of grapes, and is shading the studio windows as planned.

We completed the small brick patio between our back porch and the duck yard, made entirely from bricks that came out of the old chimney, and it is helping to keep down the amount of straw and mud we track into the house.

The small family lawn area is seeing heavy use for pool time (the lawn is getting more water than usual because of all the water fun), and digging in the pile of leftover dirt is a favorite Grandson activity!

The sanctuary garden in our shady front yards is our final big project. I'm hoping to finish cutting and glueing down the final few toppers on the wall this week.

We will continue to level the patio area before putting in the patio blocks. (I am already using the space for outdoor visits, even thought the patio isn't finished.)

2. Study permaculture - prune my plum:
I have a bunch of questions about fruit trees in my tiny backyard farm. My top question this week is when and how should I prune my baby plum tree.

While I know apples are best pruned in winter (unless you are trying to limit growth), I found out that stone fruits such as plums, cherries, peaches and apricots are best pruned in summer because they are very susceptible to a disease called Cytospora canker, a fungal disease that attacks pruning cuts made in cold weather. So I'll prune my plum now to give the wound sufficient healing time before winter.

Because I have a young tree (planted as a whip a few years ago) I need to start "formative or framework" pruning - new growth is trimmed back every year for 3 years, to produce new branching and train it into the desired shape. In this case, I want a modified fan shape, or kind of a flat vase shape - I want it to grow to the sides, to eventually replace a hedge, along our north property line. 

What I've read about fan pruning is very complicated. What I'm aiming for is something like the diagram to the left.

The permaculture advice on pruning is to "Let all ideas of the perfect shape fade away and hold light at the fore front as you prune." - Ideally, sunlight can get into all the branches.

Another permaculture pruning tip is to keep the branches low, ideally about 3-feet off the ground. This makes it easier to pick and prune. 

To start, this year, I'll choose four strong laterals (two on either side), that grow in the direction I want, and shorten those to 12-inches from the main trunk, pruning to an outward-facing or downward facing bud (a bud facing away from center). These will form the scaffold which my fan will grow from next year.

Then I need to gently bend the branches to the best positions and angles (45-60º from the vertical), and tie them to stakes with soft ties.

3. Make dill pickles:
As I said, I have a bumper crop of cucumbers this year, so I made these easy refrigerator pickles for ourselves and to give away.

Ingredients:

• 2 c. water
• 2 c. distilled white vinegar
• 1/4 c. sugar
• 2 Tbsp. salt
• cucumbers
• 8 garlic cloves
• 4 teaspoons mustard seeds
• 4 teaspoons peppercorns
• 6 sprigs of dill

(Makes 2 quarts)
1. Sterilize 2 quart jars and lids.

2. Heat the water, vinegar, sugar, and salt in a medium saucepan over medium heat. Stir until the sugar and salt dissolves, about 1 minute. Let cool slightly.

3. Wash and slice the cucumbers lengthwise into quarters. Peel and slice the garlic in halves.

4. Fill the jars about halfway with cucumbers, then add garlic cloves, mustard seeds, peppercorns, and dill sprigs to each jar. Finish filling with cucumbers.

5. Pour the vinegar solution over the cucumbers. Set aside to cool to room temperature, then store the pickles in the fridge.

Pickle spears will be lightly pickled in 2 days, but their best flavor will start to develop around day 5 or 6. Store in the fridge for several weeks.