Monday, September 23, 2013

mustard harvest

Processed the mustard seeds. The procedure, according to the internets: pick mostly-dry seed pods/branches (before the birds eat them all); let dry completely; thresh by crushing/mashing/stomping on them in/over something to catch the seeds; sift out the chaff; winnow any remaining chaff (preferably outside), either by gently blowing across it (for small amounts) or by pouring seeds and chaff from one container to another. I did it indoors, and about had a asthma attack from all the dust.

Mashing threshing with a potato masher, in a colander, set over our big stainless steel bowl:



Before winnowing:



Mustard seeds! I ended up with about a 1/4 cup.

Thursday, September 19, 2013

visit to the new Santa Fe Botanical Garden location

The Santa Fe Botanical Garden has been working on their new garden up on Museum Hill, near my office. They had a free public open "house" this afternoon, so I walked over after work to check it out.









It was one of those perfect days.


[click for larger]

Monday, September 2, 2013

what’s blooming

Asters:



Garlic chives:



Maximilian sunflowers:



Roses:

Sunday, September 1, 2013

update

Picked a bunch of tomatoes, they're still going strong.



The late rains we got made a lot of them crack. Robesons:







Sungolds:





Mustard, in the raised bed and picked:







Basil, gone to seed:



Thyme:



Over in the side bed, lots of Kuri squash, unearthed after the cleanup: