OT Blatant Gloat

"George" wrote in news:430112fe snipped-for-privacy@newspeer2.tds.net:

My dinner tonight included a Brandywine tomato that must have weighed in at almost two pounds. As sweet as can be.

Life is good!

Patriarch, who cannot grow potatoes in the clay soil, but will have peppers and tomatoes until mid-October...

Yup, nothin' like home grown. We've been munching on peas and carrots from my kid's garden and fresh halibut and king crab from God's blue sea...

...Kevin

An hour or so with a posthole augur and a generous helping of compost and sand will serve to turn your killing field into a pasture of plenty.

Mix the removed clay with the sand and compost and return to the holes. Plant. Gloat.

Bill (Who has such nice gardens in Detroit year after year that he seldom bothers to gloat any more.)

W Canaday wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@replyonlist.com:

The clay in Contra Costa County laughs at post hole augurs. Not even the pro fence guys will use them. Water and post hole diggers and strong backs really in need of a job, and you have the holes.

I _have_ grown potatoes directly in the compost pile, by accident. Reds thrown in there for compost sprouted nicely.

Patriarch

Sounds like the part of Illinois I lived in; or at least my lot. My subdivision had been built twenty years earlier and this particular lot had never sold. It might have been because all of the topsoil had been scraped off of it. It was all weeds when we saw it and didn't discover there was no topsoil until later. But I digress.

I built a deck. I tried my post hole digger. Got about a foot. I rented a one man auger. I got about 6" more. I rented a two man auger and bought some beer. I (we) didn't get a bit farther. The auger just spun in the hole, shining clay, which laughed at us.

I called a fence company to ask what they did and they sent out a tractor with a hydraulic motor on the side with the appropriate sized auger. It took all of 15 minutes to drill the six holes I needed, but the guy later told me he had to run the pressure up to some number I don't remember, but he wasn't supposed to do that.

I figure that stuff was only a couple of thousand years from being solid rock (geology joke there, guys--a couple of thousand years in rock formation is like a dog year or two).

====> Raised beds are the answer. With a bad back, three or so feet off the ground would be idea! *G* For pots only you could fill them with straw and some topsoil, plant the pots in them and you'll have a bumper crop of pots. Might have to rake some hay to "hill" them, but hay rakes easily!

Leif

Lived in the rice paddies near Marysville myself, and that adobe is proof against anything short of dynamite. When I visited my old home after twenty-five years, the people living there had a garden in the very same place I had lavished so much work with compost and sand. "Only place in the yard where we can even dig."

snip

What part of CC County? I grew up in Richmond and had a great garden there, and had excellent results in Suisun City. Both had your typcial Bay Area clay soil. In Suisun there was a guy who would plow till your yard with a tractor for around $25 (about 10 years ago) and got the soil tilled down to 8 inches. Di dhtat once and put a ton of compost (free for the taking from the horse stables) and never had problems again. The red potatoes loved them. Nothing better than a fresh red potato for breakfast fried up with olive oil and garlic. No with your peppers you have to find some good pickling reciepes

Allyn

"George" wrote in news:431ae4af$1 snipped-for-privacy@newspeer2.tds.net:

We garden in raised beds, with the same sort of care, for the 7 years we've had the place. Elsewhere, adobe clay, except for where we planted roses.

Patriarch, in the Martinez hills...

Allyn Vaughn wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@4ax.com:

We're on a smallish lot in Martinez. Can't get a tractor in, because of the stone walls. We did the first round with a huge walk behind tiller, and till in home made & hauled-in compost in the fall and in the spring with one of the small garden tillers.

In the beds, you can dig easily with your hands. Elsewhere, a mattock is often in order. If you choose the right week of the spring.

All our peppers are eaten fresh here. They are much too popular for drying or pickling. We have a lot of Asian & Latino friends, and friends are the real focus of our gardening efforts.

Patriarch

We soften the red clay of Tallahassee by boiling it in a 50-50 solution of LDD and goodnatured alcohol. Potatoes flourish in this stabilizing broth and the skins are sterile and never split. The EMCs remain steady in sap, heart and pith. Fried, mashed, roasted, boiled, baked, microwaved or just left in brown paper bags for one year per inch, the spuds dry with nary a crack.

Local Chefs turn the tubers with eyes, ripples and burls into delicious works of art and lesser cooks craft the spuds into thin skins and chips that go well with fish. I'll gloat about our grits gardens later.

It's true.

Turn to Safety, Arch Fortiter

====>Now you went and did it, Arch. That was gonna be one of the "special" recipes in "The World-famous LDD Cookbook." Oh, well. I guess we can use it for a teaser to enhance pre-publication orders/sales. Send checks or money orders to Arch and reserve your copy now! Autographing and inscriptions available upon request through Arch.

This is equally true!

Leif

I used to have the tomatoes going strong and then the jalapenos would start to kick in for the fresh salsa. The tomatoes would run out about end of Sept or Oct and I'd be left with goo peppers still. Wound up pickling them with a sweet vinegar sauce. Those are the talk of the party! IN Martinez, you should be able to let some of your pepper winter over. Used to do that with my chili and jalapenos! I too had neighbors that also "borrowed" my garden treats!

Enjoy