Late Post for Garden 2014

Garden 2014 began in April with some new ideas and some new goals for this season. Our goal this year is to provide food for our kitchen at our main headquarters on 108 St. in Manhattan. Also, we decided our choice of vegetables, fruit and herbs based on our chef's preference and our team's preference. Our team this season is our largest ever with 13 workers. Since we built a greenhouse 2 off seasons ago we decided to start almost every plant in the greenhouse and it was successful with hundreds of seedlings sprouting in the late winter/early spring. In the Greenhouse we planted yellow summer squash, heirloom great white tomato, Greek oregano, butternut squash, German winter thyme, red cabbage, radicchio, violas, summer crisp lettuce, collards, oakleaf lettuce, spicy mustard, brussel sprouts, stevia, early jalapeno, red malabar spinach, celery, lavender, Japanese eggplant, chamomile, golden purslane, dinosaur kale, papalo, pac choi (red) arugula, sweet bell pepper, heirloom purple Cherokee tomato, basil, bright lights Swiss chard, patty pan squash, sungold cherry tomato, sorrel, red Russian kale, mache, diva seedless tomato, cilantro, green tiger tomato, pink bumble bee tomato, lucky tiger tomato, purple bumble bee tomato, blush tomato, pink tiger tomato, honeybear winter squash, black beauty zucchini, marjoram, chile negro, microgreens, sunjewel melon, carmen sweet pepper, biscayne sweet pepper, jambalaya okra, yellow pear tomato, and beefsteak tomato. We direct seeded penelope shelling peas, sugar snap peas, harukei turnips, gold beets, purple haze tomatoes, baby carrots, mustard greens, amethyst radishes, French d'avignon radishes, saltwort, sugar baby watermelon, sunjewel cantaloupes, nasturtium(edible flowers), cabernet red onions, garlic(last fall), spinach, purple potatoes, beauregard sweet potatoes, chamomile, borage(edible), flat leaf parsley, cilantro, sunflowers, snowball pumpkins and v'in d'etampes pumpkins. Early in the season we sprouted mustard, broccoli and mung beans in a germinator and then ate the sprouts. Our peach tree is infested with ants but is growing peaches which the squirrels have been eating. Our concord grape vine at E. 111 St. has grapes but we are waiting for them to turn purple. Our fig tree has not produced figs this year. Once again we did companion planting, pairing plants like tomatoes and basil together in the same general area. Once again we had Goldman Sachs volunteers come and help us in the garden . They worked with us for a day and helped us to install raised beds at E. 111 St. and they also donated tools to us. Finally, we planted flowers to attract beneficial insects.  Both gardens are growing well and soon we will be posting pictures from early in the season onto the blog so you can see the progress we have made. Season 2014 looks like a success already.