I don't know about all of you but we've had well over a foot of snow during the past few days. I was lucky enough to get out into the garden yesterday afternoon to do a bit of harvesting before the major storm hit last night. This is officially my first harvest of this year- some carrots, a big bowl of spinach and some of my neighbor's parsley that I'm housing for her. If only I had put off last week's big harvest until this weekend; it would have been nice to start the year off with a bang. Oh well. This week's pickings are a bit meager and aren't expected to get bigger anytime soon. I'll be lucky to even get one next week.
I decided that I would start weighing my weekly harvests this year in part to determine whether or not my home veggie gardening is "paying off" (economically, that is). Not that it really matters since I'd still grow my own food even if it costs me more to do so. The way I see it, there are just some things that you can't place a value on and growing your own food just happens to be one of them. This week, I harvested 1 lb of carrots and 0.55 lbs of spinach. I will keep a running total on my side bar. Since my goal is to garden all year around and to have at least one harvest per month, I will organize the numbers by month. Hopefully, this will be a bountiful year for all of us!
If you'd like to see what other people are harvesting or show off your own, go to Harvest Mondays at Daphne's Dandelions.
That is a beautiful winter harvest. The carrots are well formed and the young spinach is beautiful. The deep green and dark orange hues - tell you these are loaded with dense nutrition that our bodies really need when the sun is largely absent and our meals are typical winter fare of higher carb. I think it is a nice bounty for mid winter! Well done.
ReplyDeleteThose are some nice carrots, Thomas. My past trys at it have yielded pretty pathetic results, but i'm trying it again!
ReplyDeleteThis is great harvest (considering its January and you are covered in snow), spinach looks lovely.
ReplyDeleteI also have decided to weigh my harvests this year. Not to see if I’m saving some money, but I would just like to know...
Beautiful carrots, which variety is it? When did you sow the seeds?
ReplyDeleteGreat pics! I started weighing my harvests this past summer and it is really satisfying to see the totals climb over the season. Except the greens, I never remember to weigh them and they are harvested usually in a hurry before dinner! Plus, it gave me a reason to buy the new Breville scale I had been drooling over, lol! You are right, we would "grow our own" even if it cost more - there isn't many things more satisfying than providing the freshest, most beautiful produce we can for our family & friends! Cant' wait to see your sidebar totals grow!
ReplyDeleteI think it is a great harvest Thomas, any harvest is a good harvest, especially in January in New England!!
ReplyDeleteI am glad you mentioned the cost bit, I made the mistake of tallying up the year's purchases- OUCH!!
Such a beautiful harvest and for January it really is a good sized harvest. I'll love seeing how much you make on the garden. I'm sure it will be positive unless you have some really big expenditures (it is good to amortize the really big things).
ReplyDeleteouch, Kelly - I did that too! Maybe I will post the total spent when I post my seed order so I can look back and try to change that next year!
ReplyDeleteYou are an inspiration. I hope this spring to have enough in savings to start my beds. Because of the conditions of my soil I will be using raised beds. I just have to figure out root depth on the items I want to grow in order to get the right beds for them. I was thinking 1 tall bed 33" and one short bed 11". Both over a deep layer of carboard and mulch.
ReplyDeleteI love to make spinach pizza...could you send me a bit of your nice fresh stuff? I'll bet it's way better than that bagged stuff I use. Glad you (and your garden) survived the storm.
ReplyDeleteSeeing as most of New England is covered in white, or is grey and brown, your brilliantly colored healthy harvest is amazing! Hope it's able to keep producing despite our deep freeze and grey skies.
ReplyDeleteWhat an amazing image, to see your harvest sitting on the snow! I never would of thought it possible to grow such beautiful produce in such weather. Good job!
ReplyDeleteHuzzah!
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