It's Officially Spring! An Update for March
Around the Farm, Garden, and Herbary this Month
As I begin writing this update for March, it is the spring equinox, or the halfway point between the winter and summer solstices. Wherever you are in the world, you have likely felt some subtle (or maybe not-so-subtle) shifts in the air. After a brief and overall mild winter, the Oklahoma Ozarks have experienced a range of temperatures from low 30’s to low 80’s over the past few weeks. The hens are laying too many eggs for us to eat, so I’ve been sharing them. Strawberries are blooming, spring ephemerals have fully emerged, and I’ve been able to gather a decent number of dandelions. These occurrences typically happen much later in March when the weather is consistently warm, but this year has been a little different.
I am awestruck each year by spring blooms. Lately, I’ve noticed magnificent eastern redbud trees blooming and have even discovered several around the land that I didn’t realize were there. These are a nice contrast to the invasive bradford pear trees that are rapidly colonizing our area (and many, many other areas… a topic for another time). Hickories are growing their leaves and the mighty oaks are budding. In our yard I’ve found virginia springbeauty flowers, dandelions, purple dead nettle, henbit, and grape hyacinths scattered around. Bees buzz furiously around these spring ephemerals, particularly the dead nettle in our garden beds. Wasps seem to be infatuated with the virginia springbeauty, and there have been lots of moths and butterflies as well. It’s affirming to see all the activity among the pollinators, especially around the gardens. They are indispensable to us in maintaining balance where we grow our food, from taking care of pests to ensuring that flowers will turn to fruit.
It seems like we have nearly as many wild onions and field garlic as we have grass. Have you tried spring wild onions or garlic? They’re such a tasty treat. One Saturday, I gathered a bushel, washed and chopped them up, added them to a simple cracker recipe that was just flour, salt, water, and herbs, and served them with fresh eggs and coffee. Damien’s mother used to always make a recipe like this in the spring when he was growing up. I have come to look forward to this first batch of spring herb crackers as the first sign of springtime and a cherished tradition that we keep.
While we wait for true planting weather, we have been busy preparing for the growing season. Some of February’s chores have moved into March, and of course we’ve added some new to-do’s as well. Daylight savings time has just passed, so we are experiencing sleepier mornings and sunnier evenings. The equinox on March 19th means that our days will continue growing longer until the summer solstice. Given these longer days, plants will grow with more vigor than they would in the fall. It’s a good time to take advantage of starting seeds and planting crops, especially if you have a shorter growing season. To prepare the garden beds for new plants, Damien has added chicken manure and compost to them as amendment, followed by either straw or wood mulch. This will give this year’s crops extra nutrients to thrive over the season. In the beds where we grew cover crops like winter rye or oats, we have chopped those down and laid them over the beds as mulch. Here’s a before and after in one of our beds where we grew winter rye as a cover crop, sown in fall.
After this process, the bed is ready to be planted. In this bed, I sowed some seeds shortly after these photos were taken by pulling back the mulch and tossing them in. As the cover crop mulch dries and decomposes, it provides weed suppression and adds nutrients to the soil. You can learn more about cover crops in my recent post here.
New Seedlings & Returning Perennials
If you’ve read previous blog posts, you’ll know that we started our indoor seedlings (broccoli, tomatoes, peppers, marigolds, herbs, onions, and more) in late February. They’re growing nicely and have been hardening off for a couple of hours during the day. In addition to the indoor seedlings, we’ve planted plenty of seedlings outside as well. Brassicas including swiss chard, kale, radishes, and cabbage as well as calendula, chamomile, sweet peas, beets, carrots, and lettuces have all been directly sown into our garden beds.
Perennials are slowly coming back to life. The strawberries have stretched themselves out in their bed and have even infiltrated the mulched path. They are blooming with delicate white and yellow blooms, waiting to become a treasured sweet and juicy treat. Last year wild birds took advantage of the strawberries before we could, so I’m taking extra measures to keep them to myself this season. Soon, I’ll put hoops covered with netting into place over the strawberry patch. The holes in the netting are large enough to allow pollinators to visit the blooms but small enough that birds can’t snag a bite.
Potted oregano that I trimmed back in the fall is growing fresh new leaves, as is the mint. The feverfew I grew last year is expanding quite a lot in the garden, but it has been easy to manage its new growth by dividing and composting some sections. Our peach, plum, and pear trees have bloomed and are now leafing out after getting a good pruning during late winter. Other perennials and biennials appearing around the farm are echinacea purpurea (aka purple coneflower), lavender, rosemary, and hollyhocks. I expect that we will have heaps more in the coming weeks, as temperatures stay above fifty degrees, hopefully.
The Sweet Potato Saga
In a previous blog post, I shared a run-down on growing sweet potato slips from store-bought sweet potatoes, yielding free plants that will produce food for you. I mentioned in that blog post that this is my first time growing slips for food. So far, everything has gone pretty smoothly. Over fifteen slips have already emerged, some of which have grown over 5 inches tall and have been removed from the original sweet potato and moved to water to grow roots. As soon as the roots grow a bit longer, I’ll transfer the plants to small pots or soil blocks and wait for warm enough weather to transplant them outside into the garden! Obviously, I’ll bring you all along as things progress.
Collecting Rainwater
Several months ago, we purchased a couple of tanks for collecting rainwater to use to water our garden. Two massive water totes were set up at different collection points by our house and “the shop” which is a massive barn-style building with a concrete base. My grandpa recently replaced the gutters on his home and kindly gave us his old ones. My grandpa hates to waste anything, so this was a win for us and for him. A few weeks ago, on an unseasonably warm and sunny day, Damien installed the guttering on our (very, very tall) shop by himself while I was away. This was probably dangerous, but don’t worry, he survived, and we are now collecting over twice as much water than before. Since the guttering was not custom fitted to our shop’s roof, Damien had to get a little creative with their positioning. Luckily, he’s had a lifetime of building experience and problem-solving projects like this one. What great timing that we had the rainstorm of the year only a few short days after he had finished installing them!
The Herbary & Spring Celebrations
The reemergence of dandelions, dead nettle, and other spring ephemerals, coupled with my ever-growing stash of dried herbs, has inspired me to craft some items in the herbary (I think I made up that word, it’s just how I refer to the place where I make herbal concoctions). I have a long list of herbal recipes I want to try, and calendula salve was at the top of that list. I had beaucoups of dried calendula flowers from garden seasons past that I kept swearing I’d do something with, besides occasionally adding them to pots of herbal tea. Finally, I made some salve with them, which was incredibly simple. The hardest part by far was waiting for the flowers to infuse into the oil for 4-6 weeks. I shared a short video with that recipe that you can find here. The recipe made 4 ounces which is probably more than I’ll use by the time it expires in 2 or 3 years.
I’ve continued making bubbly batches of kombucha over the past months. My current batch, made with blueberries and fresh lemon, is on its second fermentation right now and will be ready for drinking later today. On the subject of fermentation, one of my goals for the rest of this year is to get more practice with canning. I plan to can pickles, tomato sauce, fresh salsa, and blackberry or strawberry jam, which are all within reason since I don’t currently have a pressure canner (used for canning low acidity foods like meat, beans, and more). The possibility of homemade jams and pickles has me looking forward to even the hottest, buggiest days spent in the garden, but I’m reveling in the subtle beauty of spring for now.
The spring equinox was a few days after Damien’s birthday, so we celebrated him along with the first day of spring. We had family and friends over to the farm, took a hike in the woods behind our house all the way to a cliff edge overlooking the hills and a big creek. After that, we returned to the house for a delicious potluck-style meal, including sprigs of fresh mint tea from the garden. Dinner was followed by a great sunset and an evening spent around a fire. It was the perfect day of celebrating someone I love along with one of my most cherished times of the year.
How is your garden growing? Did you celebrate the spring equinox? Let me know in the comments, I’d love to hear from you.
please mail me some allyson pickles