Get More Green Beans In

Folks,

Now is the time to get another crop of green beans into the ground. The current long term forecasts for most of the United States will allow another round of green bean planting. However, you need to get it done quick.

When looking for sytles of green beans, look for the varieties with shorter growing times. From my home in the Ozarks, we have approx 12 weeks until the average first frost. That is, then, the time frame we have to get the green beans finished.

As crops come in, try freezing them for a winter treet. Pick your green beans, remove the tip ends, and snap your beans into 2 or 3 segments. If you have any blemishes, take them out. Blanch your green beans for 2 minutes in boiling water, then drop them into an ice bath. This stops the "cooking" process.

Once your green beans have cooled, place them in freezer style baggies. I use an 8 cup measuring device, so I can divide my beans into 2 bags. You want to use quart bags. One bag will be equivalent to putting 2 cans of green beans on your table.

For those who plan ahead, plan on 52 bags for a family of 4 to have green beans once a week all year. You can thank my dad for that handy bit of info. I can still remember canning green beans to this level every summer.

slainte,
Ray Province
Celtic Ozark Garden

Ray Province is a retired minister and owner of The Celtic Ozarkian, a website dedicated to life in the Ozarks. Ray is also a freelance writer on religion, gardening, and travel. You can reach him at contactus@celticozarkian.com, or @celticozarkian on Twitter.

How To Grow Turnips

I wanted to share a video on growing my personal favorite vegetable. Turnips will grow almost anywhere, which is probably why Ozarkians grow them. It is a strong tasting vegetable, that has many of the same basic uses as potatoes or colliflower. Hope you enjoy the vdeo.

How To Grow Beets.

I wanted to share another video on one of my favorite Celtic Ozark Garden veggies: the beet. They are easy to grow, and are packed with vitamins. Hope you enjoy the video.

Gafdening Careers

If you have ever enjoyed a lush garden, fresh vegetables, a nice park, or a grassy golf course, you may have thought of a career in gardening and landscaping. There are a lot of different kinds of opportunities in this field, from actually digging in the dirt outside to planning, buying, and selling in an office or store. There are also many places to learn the trade.
Digging In The Dirt
Working outside in a natural environment is an absolute job requirement for some people. Enjoying both the sun and the rain seems better than a desk any day. Many of these people get into the gardening and landscaping fields.
The easiest job to get, but also the most backbreaking, is planting and maintenance for a landscaping company. These are the folks who are outside every season planting new flowers around office parks, stores, and parks. This work does not pay as much as more specialize work, but it is a good way to get acquainted with this kind of gardening and landscaping task.
With some training in botany and plant care, it's possible to get a job with a little more independence and pay. Places like botanical gardens, city parks, and college campuses need managers for their grounds departments that plan, grow, and plant each season's display. Part of the year you may be running a greenhouse, and part you may spend mostly outside.
Perhaps the most demanding job for an individual gardener is raising a truck garden growing food to sell to individual customers and restaurants. You must have great skills in all aspects of gardening and landscaping, and management too, to keep a garden producing enough food in every season to supply regular customers. High-end restaurants often like to serve fresh, local, organic food. But they will not buy from a gardener that has an erratic harvest schedule or that produces poor vegetables.
Places To Learn
There are many places to learn the gardening and landscaping trade. The first is just to take an entry-level job with a company or city and just learn on the job. But it is hard to move up to a position of more responsibility without some education and not just in how to grow plants.
Many community and vocational colleges give gardening and landscaping degrees. Expect to study for two to four years, but also expect to learn all about planting, and how to run a business too. Gardening and landscaping is a great field for people who want to be self-employed.
Jerry Cahill Gardening website designer featuring items of interest to gardeners.
http://gardenlandscapedesigns.com/
http://gardenlandscapedesigns.com/gardening-tools-starter-kit/
Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Jerry_Cahill

How To Know When to Pick Green Beans

My first batch of green beans for the year are almost ready to pick. It is one of my favorite vegetables to plant in the Celtic Ozark Garden. My family loves them also. It also happens to be very easy to grow green beans.

One of the questions I am frequently asked is, "how do you know when to start expecting green beans to pick?" So, I decided to shoot a video this month of the subject. Enjoy!

Don't Forget the Birds

The Ozarks has been blessed with some great weather this February. It will be time to start the Celtic Ozark Garden again soon. So, it is easy to start to get into that “Spring is almost here’ mentality. While that may be good for our attitudes and moods, it could be bad for our feathered friends.

It is always easy to remember to throw some seed for the birds when we have snow on the ground. It is much more difficult to remember to do that when our outside temperature is 60 degrees. Even though it is warm, the food supply for birds is still low, and you may wish to consider helping them a bit.

One of the simple ways to help the birds is to put out left over baked goods, or stale bread. It provides a good source of carbs, as well as a little fat, which the birds need to help maintain body temperature. Let over fruit, that may be getting a bit old for you, is also a great treat to the birds. This is a win/win deal. You get to feed birds, and throw away trash in an ecological manner. Plus, that old doughnut may look better on the birds!

Seeds are always appreciated by the birds. I just try to stay away from mix seeds bags full of milo seed. In my experience, the birds will not eat it, so it goes bad. I like corn, sunflower seeds, and even peanuts busted up.

Suet is also a good treat for the birds. The fatty portions of the suet are good energy for the birds. If you can keep the suet thawed, that helps the birds a lot.

Love the birds now, and they will love us back in the beauty they bring!

Slainte
Ray Province

Ray Province is a retired minister, and owner of The Celtic Ozarkian, a website dedicated to life in the Ozarks, from a Celtic point of view! Ray also works as an IT programmer in the healthcare industry, and freelances in SEO and website development. You can reach Ray by emailing contactus@celticozarkian.com, or @celticozarkian on Twitter.

Liquid Fertilizers for the Spring Garden

Now that spring is 60 days away in the Ozarks, it is time to start gathering some supplies to make some liquid fertilizer. I have written about my dry fertilizer in previous articles. I like a little wet fertilizer around during the growing season, because it tends to interact quickly with plants, and tends not to burn them. Apply many dry fertilizers, either directly under a plant or close to it, and you can kill your plant. Too much goodie all at once spoils the party! A liquid fertilizer is often a product that is mostly water. Hence, the plants tolerate better. The liquid recipe also makes it easier for the plant to get the nutrients, via osmosis.

I like to actually make the fertilizer in 5 gallon buckets! They are easy for me to carry. I have a stainless soup ladle that I use to put a scoop around each plant. I have enough old plastic buckets around, from home brewing, to meet my need. You can usually get a good plastic bucket, however, at any hardware store. I don’t recommend, however, using old buckets that you have used for painting!

So, here are some recipes for the 5 gallon bucket o’ garden love:

Tea Style Recipe No. 1 :
Fill your bucket half full of old grass and plant clippings. Fill bucket with water. Set it in the Sun for 2 days. Then add a cup of Fish emulsion (of some sort) to the batch. You are ready to go. Place 1 cup of the mix around each plant. You accomplish two tasks: fertilizing and watering. For new planting, where your plants are not very old yet, use ½ cup. You do not want to overwhelm the young plants.

Tea Style Recipe No. 2:
Fill your bucket half full of old grass and plant clippings, same as above. Then add one coffee can of well aged manure. (The definition of well aged is at least a year old, especially with cow and horse manure.) Fill bucket with water. Set it in the Sun for 2 days. Then add a cup of Fish emulsion (of some sort) to the batch. You are ready to go. Place 1 cup of the mix around each plant. You accomplish two tasks: fertilizing and watering. For new planting, where your plants are not very old yet, use ½ cup. You do not want to overwhelm the young plants. I like this recipe for plants that need lots of root structure, like carrots and onions! Works good on turnips as well. (What! You don’t eat turnips! Shame on you!)

Liquid Recipe No. 3:
This is a recipe you can use right out of the shoot! You do not have to wait for grass to grow, or animals to get their business done. Mix the following together in a 5 gallon bucket of water. 1 cup of Epsom Salts. 1 bottle of beer. 1 cup of ammonia. ½ cup of dish washing soap like Ivory (no detergent fighting power!) Again put a cup around each plant, and you get your watering done too. Also follow the rule for young plants.

Slainte from the Celtic Ozark Garden,
Ray Province

Ray Province is a retired minister, and owner of The Celtic Ozarkian, a website dedicated to life in the Ozarks, from a Celtic point of view! Ray also works as an IT programmer in the healthcare industry, and freelances in SEO and website development. You can reach Ray by emailing contactus@celticozarkian.com, or @celticozarkian on Twitter.

Master Gardeners Clubs in the Ozarks

I wanted to take a moment and provide folks with a list of the Master Gardener Organizations in the Ozarks. They are worthy of consideration, if you like being part of a group. Master gardeners also provide hours of free help each year to people wanting to know more about gardening. Consider giving them a call.

Area Clubs and Organizations
Moon City Garden Club(located in Springfield's Historic Midtown district)Mary Jo Frazier, PresPh: 353-0982www.mooncitygardenclub.com
Ozarks GardensOzarksGardens.com
Springfield Area Herb Club 2630 S FR 87Republic, MO 65738 732-8391
Cherry Court Garden Club 4231 N FR 129Springfield, MO 65803 883-8278
Springfield Floral Arrangers Guild1505 E SunshineSpringfield, MO 65804881-7284Iris Society of the Ozarks 815 N MainSpringfield, MO 65802831-2548MO Organic Association, Springfield Chapter 9853 N Hwy HPleasant Hope, MO 65725759-2463
SWMO Council of Nationally Accredited Flower Show Judges 2765 E CragmontSpringfield 65804883-6793Springfield Garden Council 1505 E SunshineSpringfield 65804881-7284Botanical Society of SW Missouri 2765 E CragmontSpringfield 65804883-6793Missouri Prairie Foundation 204 E 550thWalnut Grove, MO 65770788-2308Rose Society of the Ozarks 2305 S Hilton AveSpringfield 65807887-2097Greater Ozarks Hosta Society PO Box 2131 Lebanon, MO 65536532-2349Ozark Greenways, Inc PO Box 50733Springfield 65805864-2014MO Community Forestry Council PO Box 14076Springfield 65814890-7776

So What Is Raised Bed Gardening?

I became an avid fan of raised bed gardening when I moved to the Ozarks in 2000. I grew up in the fertile soil of southern Illinois. Needless to say, the rocky, clay based soil of the Ozarks was quite a disappointment. One need only spend a couple of hours in the yard with a pick, trying to break up rocks, to realize the advantage of growing vegetables in a raised bed.At the most basic level, raised bed gardening involves growing plants above ground. Through the use of special techniques, growing beds, soils, and fertilizers, the raised bed gardener creates the ideal growing environment without ever digging into the actual ground. Raised beds can be built directly on top of the ground, or in some sort of frame placed on legs, sawhorses, etc. A box can even be built into decks, porches, etc. The main idea here is NO DIGGING!Raised beds come in many different shapes and sizes. In my own particular garden, I have raised beds that are 4' x 4", 2' x 8', and 4' x 8'. I am sure there are many other varieties as well. The size of the raised bed is typically dictated by the ability of the gardener to effectively reach across the space. I can comfortably reach across a 4' bed without hurting my back.Raised bed gardening is also a departure from traditional gardening in its use of compact space. Traditional gardens are planted in rows, and can require a lot of space. Raised bed gardens attempt to make better use of space by planting in squares and rectangles.This makes raised bed gardening ideal for small yards. I have even seen great gardens raised on the back porch of apartments. A 4' x 4' bed only takes up 16 sq. ft.Special soils are used in raised bed gardening, in order to maximize the amount of vegetables that can be grown in the small space. Typical ingredients may include potting soil, top soil, compost, leaves, fertilizers, vermiculite, cotton seed hulls, and many other things. The special soil is designed to be very rich in the nutrients needed to grow so many plants in such a small space. In addition, it is designed to be very loose, so plants can root themselves deeply. In small raised beds, the grower typically does not step or stand on the soil. Hence, the soil tends to be less compacted, and easier on root growth.Raised bed gardening also makes it possible for the average gardener to extend the normal growing season. It is very easy to build a simple greenhouse or "cold frame' over the top of the bed. The greenhouse holds in moisture and heat. Special underlining can help to keep the soil warmer. I am writing this article two days before Thanksgiving, and I still have a productive garden in my 4' x 8' greenhouse. Here in the Ozarks, we are consistently dropping below freezing every night!Slainte,Ray ProvinceThe Celtic Ozark Garden

Earth Friendly Cold Frames

For two years in a row, the Ozarks has experienced a late in the season spring frost. The frost was far enough along to cause damage to crops that had been placed out in early spring, as well as some things like fruit tree blossoms. The typical advise you get on the evening news goes something like this: “better cover those plants tonight!”

What if there was an alternative? Indeed, that is the question. Earth friendly cold frames can be one such alternative. There are essentially two items needed to build a good earth friendly cold frame: an old window frame (glass intact) and some straw bales. It does not get much easier than this.

A straw based cold frame has some very distinct advantages over other options: 1) the straw is stacked end to end, and does not have to be “constructed,” 2) straw is one of nature’s best insulators, 3) it is “earth friendly’ in that is will eventually decompose, and can be added back to the soil, or into a composting bin. This also gives you the advantage of not having to store a lot of items in the off season.

Now is the time to plan for spring. A 4’ x 8’ plot will need 6 bales, plus windows to cover. Old windows can often be found in flea markets, garage sales, thrown in trash, etc. Start looking now.

Growing Cabbage From Seed

It's hard to have a "Celtic" garden and not grow cabbage! It is a flavor-rich food. We use it in a corned beef and cabbage meal. We add it to stew. We even cover it in aluminum foil, add some butter and Greek seasoning,and grill it! Now you got yourself somethin'! (That's hillbilly for this tastes good!)There are many varieties of cabbage that can be grown from seed. I grow heirloom seeds to help preserve the variety of plants we have available to eat! Imagine how poor a world we would have if we only had one kind of commercial cabbage to eat! My favorite site for heirloom seeds is www.rareseeds.com! Take a look sometime.I have a small plastic container, 9"x13"x4" that I keep full of a good, quality potting soil medium. The trick here is to use sterile potting soil, so nothing inadvertently kills your seeds. I start cabbage 8-10 weeks before I am ready to plant. Typically, cabbage is a spring/fall crop. They are not real found of Ozark summer heat. I shoot to start my outside spring crop around St. Patrick's Day for my growing area. I also have a greenhouse that protects my young plants against any late year frost. (Can go into April in the Ozarks!) The blog connection below can lead you to an article on my greenhouse, if you want more on how to build a small one.Here is the rest:1. plant 1/2 inch deep.2. water throughly. It's the water that will start things.3. After sprouting, just keep water moist and add some light to the plants. I have a grow light. (Old hippy!)4. Feed the seeds 1/2 strength liquid fertilizer every other week til you plant.I still have cabbage in my winter greenhouse. After writing about it, I think I'll have some for supper!