Let Us Plant Lettuce

Lettuce Starter Plants

Oh boy...

Somewhere, Henny Youngman just groaned. Loudly. The king of the puns and one liners -- Henny's "take my wife, please" jokes had late night king Johnny Carson guffawing loudly on more than one occasion. You knew it was going to be a good show with Henny on the stage -- and he never once disappointed.

Although, he might be a tad disappointed with the title of this blog posting.

My friends -- the season of fall has fallen. It's here. Yes -- the afternoons are still quite warm. But that won't last much longer. There's a kiss of frost in the mornings. It's cold. Summer is just about at an end. And what an interesting summer it has been! But -- it's time to move on.

Garden Beds Ready for Planting

The wife that is Venus and I are expanding upon our fall plantings this year -- and there's a very good reason as to why. Have you purchased any type of green in the grocery store lately? I have. And this ultra spoiled Californian is not happy. Shelling our four bucks for two puny heads of celery is highway robbery in my opinion. Yet -- thanks to our wonderful drought -- this is the cross we are forced to bear.

As I headed unhappily home last week with my prize of two extremely small heads of celery -- the following thought crossed my mind. It went something like this: "You IDIOT! You've turned the Bird Back 40 into a shrine for everything gardening. Why aren't you growing your own lettuce? Why aren't you growing your own greens? Why are you shelling out cash for something you can easily grow in the backyard?"

Fall Greens for the Garden

My inner self is usually right. I shouldn't be running out to the store for lettuce and other greens. I should be running outside to the expansive Bird Back 40. And, in about another month, I will be.

We've never dedicated three 4X8 beds to the fall gardening effort. At most it's two -- but in some years it's just one. I'm usually loathe to tear out the heirloom tomato plants. I hold onto the summer garden for as long as I can -- and usually that's one or two months too long. I won't be making that mistake this year.

Though we could have easily started our plantings of lettuce and other greens indoors -- that tricky thing called the sciatic nerve wasn't really up to the challenge just yet. It's tough to think about future gardening challenges when the sciatic is sending "I love you" jolts into your right leg and testicle (back injuries are such fun!). But, fortunately for me, the pain has subsided to just about nothing other than the occasional ache and, better yet, the strength has returned.

Baby Bok Choi

Hey, I used the handy-dandy Mantis rototiller to churn up two 4X8 beds yesterday AFTER I'd removed a green waste can packed with weeds and heirloom tomato plants still loaded down with green tomatoes. How do I feel today? Not bad actually. Thanks for asking. It's a clear sign that the back has largely returned to normal. But I'm still not going to do anything stupid. I don't want to go through that pain again.

This year we are dedicating one entire bed to nothing but lettuce and spinach. A separate bed will hold other items such as kale, carrots and a healthy amount of pea seeds for the spring pea crop. It's important to get the peas planted during the fall. They don't grow incredibly fast as the weather cools and the days grow shorter, but those root systems sure do get established. By the time spring rolls around? Those pea plants suddenly take off and deliver a bounty of fresh, spring greens.

Planted and Ready for Fall

The wife that is Venus and I have tried a number of varieties -- but we're partial to two of them. The varieties of "Tall Telephone" and "Mister Big Pea" not only deliver the largest peas we've ever harvested, but the tough shells stand up to slugs, snails and other garden pests who are just as interested in peas as we are. Plus -- those tough shells are good in spring stir fry dishes.

But there's going to be far more this fall than just lettuce plants, seed and peas. How about a little broccoli? Cabbage, chard and broccoli rabe? Sure! Dandelion greens? Bring it on!

Fall is here. Bring on the greens! This spoiled Californian is tired of buying what he can easily grow at home.

In the Dead of Winter...

Something Green This Way Comes

Gardening does not take a holiday in the dead of winter. Your body might feel like taking a holiday. Those playoff games inside a warm home and a soft couch sure are a lot more tempting than that frozen piece of mud doubling as your half-landscaped backyard. Not much is moving out there, except for the occasional dive of a humming bird.

But plants are growing. I give you "Exhibit A" to your upper right. Exhibit A made for a tasty snack during the 49er playoff win against Green Bay. Exhibit A is growing like a weed in the Bird Back 40. Exhibit A shouldn't be growing in this particular spot because a one Bill Bird did everything in his power to kill it last summer.

Gardening Exhibit A

But Exhibit A knows far more and is far tougher than a gardening screwup like myself. It is proof positive that "you can grow this," even if you do everything within your power to "not grow this here or now."

By now, you may have recognized that green plant with the parsley-looking top growing in a very brown and frozen over area of the Bird Back 40 is, in fact, celery. It's not just one celery plant -- it's several. And it's some of the tastiest, most tender I might add, celery that we've been lucky enough to enjoy.

You may begin to ask, "what celery is this that grows so well?" Well, you may ask. My answer would be something akin to a shrug. You see, I'm really not too sure what kind of celery this is. So, we'll just call it celery and be done with it. You may also notice from the photo above that this particular patch of celery is growing OUTSIDE of -- and in FRONT of -- a raised bed.

Home Grown Celery: A Crunchy Treat

To add insult to injury, it's also got a piece of concrete covering the top of it. No matter I suppose. The celery known as "Exhibit A" is doing just fine and dandy without the benefit of a raised bed, regular irrigation or anything closely resembling good soil. There's a two-or-three inch spot between the sidewalk and that raised bed. Exhibit A has found that to be a nice home indeed.

Blame the wife that is Venus for this celery that grows so prolifically. She decided to plant celery seeds in this bed one fall several years back, and it did grow. Everything the wife plants grows. But, to be honest? We didn't like it. The celery that sprouted looked nothing like the celery you can purchase for fifty cents to a buck in your local supermarket. It was thin. Worse yet? It was tough and stringy. We ate some and let the rest of it grow until it was time to tear it out and move onto "Crop B."

You have no business here!

But the stringy celery had other plans I guess.

At some point the celery either went to seed, or one of the cats dug out a starter plant -- who knows -- maybe both happened. But, at some point, celery plants started to grow OUTSIDE the raised bed rather than inside (gardening is tough to contain). I didn't think much of it. I would cut it back with the weeds that would spring up outside the bed. A year later? I hired some guys to pour concrete on it so I could have a walkway in front of the bed. "End of Celery" I thought at the time.

The celery had other plans.

It was while I was removing a prolific number of pole beans from this raised bed last September when I suddenly realized this patch of celery that I'd abused through the years was really getting in my way. Worse yet? There were bugs on it. Last year was a particularly buggy year in my gardening world, and not just for celery. Bugs got into everything -- from pole beans to grapes and flowering bushes like roses. I don't really like spraying what I eat with insecticides anymore, even if they are deemed "safe for the garden." So I let the bugs have their share and got what was left.

Hey! This is GOOD!

But Mother Nature has her way of dealing with bugs that infest the garden. It's called cold weather. And while I was dealing with gall bladder issues during November and December, Mother Nature was delivering one frosty blow after another to the Bird Back 40.

End result? Crisp, clean, bug-free celery for our lazy football weekends. It's celery so good, that we can add it to our dinnertime soups at night, or we can just munch on it raw during game time. Does it taste better with onion dip? Of course! Everything tastes better with onion dip! That's a rule, isn't it?

But it's just another reminder that "you can grow that here." No need to buy celery, or carrots, for that matter in the local grocery store. We can dig that up outside, even in the worst of weather.

Chopped Celery for soups and side dishes

Dead of winter? It might be a tad brown outdoors at the moment. But it's not quite dead.

NOTE: The wife that is Venus claims full naming rights for the Sacramento Vegetable Gardening title of "Dead of Winter." She wanted you to know that.