The "Koi Pond" is Planted!

Let's try to catch up on some of this...

We've fully planted the "koi pond". We still need to put up cages and make dirt moats around the tomatoes, but they have been planted. We're making a concerted effort to get them in the ground as quickly as is reasonably possible.

A week ago last Tuesday (March 25) my wife planted Yellow Perfection, Sunchocola, Adriana's Grande, Janet's Jacinthe Jewel and Orange Paruche in the "koi pond". It's my understanding that last year's delicious Grande tomato is this year's Adriana's Grande. On Friday (after the Descanso Gardens prep work) I dug holes and my wife planted Earl of Edgecombe and German Orange Strawberry. Last Tuesday we planted Earliana, Vorlon and Berkeley Tie Dye. Yesterday we planted Bread and Salt and Hungarian Heart.

So we have 12 tomato plants in the "koi pond". We planted six tomatoes in the back yard today and I think we planted eight yesterday (but several of these plantings replaced existing seedlings).

We're trucking along... 

Catching up -- Summary Version

I'll give a summary of the past couple of weeks and leave the details for later...

I worked the TomatoMania events in Encino and Descanso Gardens. Both were hard work but lots of fun. Gayle Anderson did several drop-ins for the KTLA morning news at Descanso Gardens on Friday. Met several friends at both Encino and Descanso Gardens.

We've been planting! Five tomatoes in the "koi pond" last Tuesday, two more on Friday, three yesterday. The three done today replaced bad or missing seedlings planted in the back yard.

Also, two of the volunteer tomatoes were moved to raised beds.

Everywhere we dig we find cutworms. They're everywhere. Not good.

Time permitting I'll fill in the details later... 

Two Volunteers Found, One Seedling Replaced

The next day after the original planting two tomatoes got hit by cutworms -- Green Grape and Evan's Purple Pear. Green Grape was completely sheared off. Evan's Purple Pear was hit but I decided to keep it.

Yesterday Green Grape was replaced yesterday with another Green Grape.

Here's an image of our tomato seed trays...

My wife informed me of two volunteers -- one tomato plant in the southwest corner of our northwest raised bed (which looks fabulous) and another one in the "South Garden" (which looks okay).

By the way, if the tomato seedlings from seeds look like they are struggling, I have no trouble pulling them out and replacing them. They were old seeds, planted a bit late, and raised without a grow light. I'll give them about a month to show what they got. The two Pineapple Pig seedlings do not look promising so far.  

The 2014 Growing Season Has Started!

Today I planted one purchased seedling and 11 of our seedlings grown from seed.

In the ground are Stupice (purchased), Beauty King, Porkchop, Berkeley Tie Dye, Evan's Purple Pear, Pink Berkeley Tie Dye, Solar Flare, Persimmon (seeds from The Tomato Lady of Beverly Hills, not the more famously named Persimmon), Green Grape and Pineapple Pig.

I also planted two duplicates by mistake: Persimmon and Pineapple Pig. I meant to plant a second Persimmon but in the front yard. There's a good chance I'll still plant one there.

So 12 are in the ground and they look pretty good! All of them were planted in the "Far East" in the back yard.

The 2014 growing season has started! 

Tomato Seeds Sprouted; Tomatoes 101 Class

Most of our tomato seeds have sprouted, though they sprouted late. We're rather excited about a few of them. However, these are not being raised with a grow light so we don't know how effective these seedlings will be. It's my thought that we'd save a seedling of each type and give away the rest.

We've had a medium sized trash can of bark and chicken manure for quite some time. I suggested to my wife that I dump and rake this material into our back yard tomato growing ground and let the rain wash it in. My wife agreed so I did just that. The whole process took only 10 - 15 minutes. I didn't turn it in to the dirt, just laid it on top.

Saturday morning, Stephen Baldonado did the CSUN tomato class ("Tomatoes 101"). Scott Daigre had been doing it for years (10 years?). Scott has done a great job with the class and frankly, I expected Stephen to be a step down from Scott.

I was wrong. Stephen wasn't just good, he was quite good.

Scott would provide a flurry of information and his presentation you couldn't help but not get excited for the tomato growing season. Who needs coffee when you have Scott to amp you up on a Saturday morning?

Stephen isn't Scott, but who is? Stephen came prepared with a computer and Powerpoint slides (Scott knows his stuff but his peripatic style makes it appear as if he just wings it) and had a good, smooth flow. He was working off of an outline (good!) to make sure he hit his points.

The only downside to Stephen's presentation is that he went over his time allotment. He was about 15 minutes over and he still didn't get to how to handle "critters" in your tomato garden. Now I know why Scott is amped during the class -- there's too much information!

On a scale of 1 - 10, 10 being best, Stephen gets a 9 at least. This is his first time with this material at this event. The time issues will handle themselves. Either he'll cut something out or we'll have the second coming of Scott Daigre. Either way the problem will resolve itself.

Per Stephen's presentation, I'll try to take out as much of the bark I just put in. The chicken manure won't be a problem as these were locally raised chickens grown in a loving environment. You see, I learned something!

There was plenty of rain so I'm sure the chicken manure leeched into the ground. And our backyard tomato growing area has a little bit of the "compost paella" look as explained in the last post. 

Compost Project Finished; Tomato Seeds Planted

Catching up...

I deconstructed our large passive compost bin a few weeks ago. This involved taking out everything within the chicken wire fencing and making three piles. 1) Stuff that shouldn't have been in there in the first place (mostly pine needles) 2) Stuff that still needed to be decomposed and 3) The rest.

"The rest" involved good compost mixed in with decomposing stuff that was too small to filter out. My best description of the remaining compost was "compost paella".

This "paella" filled up at least a dozen cartfuls of material. Four of the cartfuls were put in the "corner office", three in the "South Garden" and the rest were spread among the raised beds. The spread in the "corner office" was so soft that our outdoor cat was leaving paw prints in the dirt!

After we processed all the compost, we stopped using the approximately seven foot in diameter chicken wire fencing and made a two foot in diameter chicken wire fencing for composting. It will be much easier to handle now. The #2 pile was added back to this fencing.

The composting project (for now) is finally done, done, done.

My wife started tomato seeds this year. Most of the seeds planted were from Wild Boar Farms. As of now they haven't germinated. 

Finished Processing the Organic Compost!

I finished hand turning the rest of the back yard tomato growing area!

It took two or three days to hand turn the approximately 10 x 13 area. Because I left this dirt in place I only went down a few inches -- say 4 to 6 inches -- versus the other digging where I made a large dirt pile to the side -- going down 6 to 12 inches or more. There were sprinkler pipes criss-crossing the remaing area so I didn't feel comfortable using the Mantis. I applied a liberal amount of compost over this area on Wednesday night and turned the dirt a second time on Thursday.

Overall I pulled out about two gallons of rock and asphalt and about one gallon of roots...not much at all in the grand scheme of things. As noted previously, I didn't dig as deep as other areas. However, I did find three full bricks about one inch under the ground laid end to end. What's surprising about this is that I didn't find these bricks earlier through the years while planting seedlings.

This still left a significant amount of compost. I put a small cart full of compost into one of the raised beds and another cartful onto the "South Garden". I put out another dozen or so cartfuls of compost all over the back yard growing area. After some point I was able to move the compost pile off of the south side over toward the center of the growing area by pulling the bottom tarp. We have been covering the compost with tarp, but this last time the pile got small enough that we laid down one of the tarps on the ground, placed the compost on top, covered the compost with the rest of the tarps and anchored it with bricks and cinder blocks.

I evened out the compost piles using the bow rake, then watered it down. For all practical purposes, I am done with this project!!

There still are other offshoots planned. My wife wants me to turn the "South Garden" so sooner or later I'll get around to that. I need to move a hay bale and the wood pile sitting on top of it (This pile got moved around just like the compost pile) back to east of the lemon tree.

The other item I have relevant to tomato growing is to process our own passive compost pile. We have a huge pile of decaying organic matter in a roughly seven foot in diameter chicken wire fence. My goal is to pull all of it out and make three piles. The piles are (1) Matter that still needs to decompose (2) Matter that shouldn't be in there (think pine needles from our ponderosa pine) and at the bottom (3) Good self-made compost!

While I'd like this good compost to be on the tomato growing area, I really don't care. I'm more interested in getting it distributed anywhere on our property. Only our ponderosa pine is benefiting from this compost and it doesn't need the help. 

The South Side Area is Done

The south side area of the back yard tomato growing area is now complete.

I had taken out some of the encroaching grass previously (I think it was a week ago Friday) and expected it to be relatively easy to pull out the rest. Wrong. The remaining grass was thicker. It took me parts of three days to get all the grass.

Yesterday (Sunday) I dug out the south area using the shovel. Originally I had the thought of just turning the dirt but I decided there were too many underground roots to simply turn the area. So I dug it out and made a long dirt pile in the "Middle East".

The area was roughly 4 feet by 13 feet. That's a rather large area and took me five or six hours. I pulled out approximately 8 gallons of asphalt, roots and some rock. Our disposable trash can is pretty heavy from these materials. Fortunately, most of this dreck was larger chunks of asphalt -- easier to accumulate and handle. The dreck in the "Middle East" and the "Far East" was mostly smaller rocks.

In spite of the above, this area was much easier to dig than the "Middle East" or the "Far East". My wife speculated that this was because the sprinklers hit this area and not the other two. I believe she's exactly correct.

I was expecting to finally hit a sprinkler pipe while hand digging and I did. It was very near the western border of the roughly 13 foot area, maybe two inches inside the rectangle. I put a board down to mark the location.

I put the dirt pile back on the south area late Sunday afternoon. It was too windy to apply compost.

Today my wife put on amendments. I added compost and used the Mantis over a vast majority of the area. Then I moved the remaining compost onto this south area.

Based on my slowness in taking out the grass in this south area, the 9 x 9 area (which is really more like 6 x 6 with an additional area to the north, making it roughly a 6 x 8 foot area) will take much too long to process for tomato growing. I just don't have this type of time.

The remaining area (around 100 square feet or so? I didn't look closely) may just need hand turning with a shovel. If so I can have it ready in a day or two. But I'll make that judgement when I start digging. After all, I had the same idea with the south area but decided to override that based on roots underneath the ground, as mentioned previously.

In my mind, this remaining area should be the easiest to dig outside of the area underneath and to the east of the lemon tree. That's my perception...but reality could be different. Let's hope for the best.

There will be compost left after this area is complete. 

Finished Preparing the "Middle East"

I made more progress on the back yard, just not the expected progress.

Monday I went out to pull some grass from the 9 x 9 area turned last year. But it was mud. The sprinklers went off that morning and rewatered the whole area. The sprinklers went off on Thursday as well. It rained Thursday and we didn't turn off the sprinklers in time. On Saturday I finally shut off the sprinkler head within this 9 x 9 patch of dirt. Now this area might dry out but it still looks like soup...

So instead of pulling out this grass, I started on a rectangular area just west of the "Far East", an area we've dubbed the "Middle East". I finished turning a roughly 3 x 6 foot area on Wednesday, my wife added soil amendments, I added compost and used the Mantis to turn it in.

Tuesday I did some shovel work for my wife, turning a raised bed and adding holes to "Alongi Row" for some ficus nitidas.

As mentioned, it rained on Thursday. It was too wet to dig on Friday so I pulled out some grass that had started to encroach on our tomato growing area. This is different than the 9 x 9 patch of grass that we hope to clear out for an additional growing area. The patch of grass I removed on Friday is easier to handle. I pulled out about half of the encroaching grass.

On Sunday we completely processed a 3 x 8 area to the south of the area completed on Wednesday. This patch of dirt was relatively easy to turn.

I pulled out four or five gallons of rocks and asphalt over the week in the "Middle East".

I'm happy that the "Middle East" and the "Far East" are completed. I think these are the two hardest growing areas. I had become somewhat disenchanted with my slow progress so far but the relatively fast Sunday work renewed my spirits.

The next patch of dirt to turn will be the southern area of the back yard growing area not previously turned. This was an excellent suggestion from my wife. I was going to move the compost pile somewhere else, but my wife suggested I can do this area without moving much of the compost pile. She's right.

But first I need to complete pulling out the encroached grass in the southwest area of our back yard tomato growing area. 

Finished Prepping the Easy Area In The Back Yard

I finished turning the area underneath and east of our back yard lemon tree. I'd estimate it's about a 20 foot by 6 foot rectangle, plus a jagged area directly under the lemon tree.

It took parts of three days to complete. I turned most of the dirt by hand on Friday. Yesterday I finished turning it by hand. Today my wife laid down gypsum and amendments while I added compost. I used the Mantis to turn the materials into the dirt. Then I put on another layer of our organic compost and used the Mantis again.

I used about a quarter of the remaining compost.

I pulled out a few rocks in this area but it was no big deal at all. Overall the rock pile could fit into a one gallon plant container. For those unfamiliar with that reference, don't think one gallon of water. The one gallon plant container size about the same size as a normal half gallon milk carton. So this is a much cleaner area that what I had first turned.

Also note that a plantable area shouldn't be completely rock free. But just out of force of habit I always take them out. The back yard is too rocky, so I toss 'em if I see 'em.

The trouble was it took five or six days before I started digging. It was rainy, it was quite cold and I had a bad cold during this period. So we lost some time.

Next item to be done: Manually pulling the grass out of the recently turned 9 foot by 9 foot area. This will be tedious.