In My San Diego Garden and Kitchen

The best and the only harvest of the week were these two red bell peppers. We’ve been eating them cut in strips and they’re so sweet and crisp. More are coming if I can delay planting the cauliflower which would like to go in the ground in the next ten days.

Last year I was overrun with cauliflower, having sown seeds for all three varieties at the same time. Romanesco is well on it’s way, transplanted ten days ago. ‘Amazing’ is the slowest and I’m trialing ‘DePurple’ against ‘Graffiti.’

Most days I take some time to plant more cool season crops. This week it was beets, radishes, bunching onions, spinach, celery and four kinds of lettuce.

I’m desperate for some garden lettuce so I purchased a six-pack of ‘Little Gem.’ I’m trying a new lettuce, ‘Outredgeous’ from Territorial Seed. As the name indicates it is a red romaine that may prove more reliable than ‘Sea of Red.’ I grew the lettuce in smaller cells this year and the dibble is perfect for setting them in with little root disturbance. Pieces of wooden skewers protect them from the moles.

The moles have already found the mesclun lettuce bed. Almost everything in the garden is protected with screening, impromptu arrangements, pea brush or bird netting to keep out the intruders—opossums, raccoons, birds and cabbage moths. It’s not lovely and offends my garden aesthetic but it’s necessary until the plants are established.

I direct sow my beets and plant them quite closely. There are about 120 seeds in this area 48 inches x 18 inches. Mine is a small urban garden with well-amended soil in two foot raised beds. I harvest the beets at various sizes, from baby beets to monster beets that get away from me and it works out well.

There’s not much to see where I’ve planted ‘Easter Egg II’ radishes but until they emerge the inverted nursery tray provides protection and a little shade to the soil. It also disperses the water when I gently spray the area.

I’m not rushing the holiday season but these three caught my fancy for the church bouquet: leucadendron, ‘Hot Cocoa’ rose and ‘Robyn Gordon’ grevillea.

Check the What I’m Planting Now and Garden Tasks This Week pages. Then head over to see what other garden bloggers around the world harvested last week at Harvest Monday hosted by Dave at Happy Acres blog.

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