- Author: Denise Seghesio Levine
I was surprised to learn on the USDA website that the earliest references to carrots were to purple and yellow types found in Afghanistan between 900 AD and 1000 AD. By the 1300s, these varieties had made their way to Europe and China. And by the 1700s, white carrots were being grown in Europe. Orange carrots finally made an appearance around this time.
Oil paintings from the Netherlands during this period depict orange and white carrots in still lifes of kitchen scenes. I'll be looking for them on my next museum visit.
Today Turkey, India and China grow purple, yellow and red carrots, while in the Middle East people prefer mostly purple and yellow types. White carrots are largely used for livestock feed in Europe, with orange carrots now the norm in most of the rest of the world.
Many of us have been told to “eat your carrots” at least once, and it seems to be good advice.
Carrots provide 30 percent of the vitamin A in the American diet, and they are a low-calorie source of fiber and potassium. According to the USDA, Americans eat an average of 11 pounds per year, so some of us must be paying attention.
With such colorful choices, knowing the subtle differences between them will add to your carrot sophistication.
White carrots like ‘Snow White contribute valuable fiber, but their lack of color signals fewer micronutrients. The ubiquitous orange carrot provides beta and alpha carotenes that protect our eyes and immune systems.
The striking ‘Cosmic Purple' carrot with its heart of gold provides the nutritional benefit of anthocyanin. According to the USDA, this micronutrient helps prevent heart disease and stroke with an antioxidant effect that protects against harmful free radicals.
Sunny yellow carrots like ‘Solar Yellow' and ‘Yellow Sun' boast xanthophylls, the same pigments responsible for the color in fall leaves. These pigments are beneficial in the fight against macular degeneration and cancer prevention. Red carrots like ‘Atomic Red' contain lycopene, the same pigment that makes tomatoes red.
Carrots are a $300 million crop in the U.S., with half of all production in California. Clearly we can grow carrots in this state.
According to the USDA, it takes just over one square yard to produce enough carotene-rich carrots to supply all the vitamin A an adult needs for a year. That's a good reason to sow some carrots.
Find a sunny spot in your garden for carrots, and prepare the soil well. Most carrot varieties are long and straight;if you are digging beds, aim for at least 18 inches of loose soil. Round carrots are a good choice if your beds can't be deep.
Some carrot varieties do better in clay soil than others, but all prefer a soil pH of 5.5 to 6.5. Carrot seed germinates best in warm soil. Carrots can tolerate some light shade, which means you can interplant with other crops. Read the seed packet for more detail.
Scatter carrot seed on the surface of the prepared bed and rake it in gently. Some seed packets recommend surface sowing with no soil cover, while others recommend covering the tiny seeds with no more than a quarter-inch of soil. Some gardeners prefer to grow in rows, sowing a few seeds every inch with rows 16 to 18 inches apart; others prefer to broadcast seeds in blocks.
Toss a few radish seeds in the same row or block to see green pop up a little faster. Radishes can help mark the row for slower-germinating carrots. Keep the bed moist until the carrot seeds germinate.
Thinning carrots is essential. Most seed packets recommend sowing more seeds than you need so you have adequate germination, but the more seeds that sprout, the fiercer the competition. As difficult as it may be to pull up and toss seedlings, thin to seed packet recommendations for best results.
Split carrots? Uneven watering. Twisted? Heavy soil.Hairy and rooty? Too much nitrogen.
The other tough lesson about carrots is, don't pull them up to see if they are growing. But if you accidentally do so, toss the tiny carrots in your salad. They are good for you, too.
Garden Tour: The UC Master Gardeners of Napa County invite you to attend their sixth garden tour, “Down the Garden Path,” on Sunday, September 13. On this self-guided educational tour, you will see seven gardens owned by Master Gardeners in and around the City of Napa. These gardens illustrate how Napa County Master Gardeners use University of California research-based horticultural information to develop and maintain their own gardens. Tickets: $30 advance / $35 day of event. Purchase tickets here: http://bit.ly/1fqLJZe. Or you can purchase tickets at the Master Gardener office (address below). For more information, call 707-253-4143.
Workshop: Napa County Master Gardeners will hold a workshop on “Food Preserving” on Saturday, August 29, from 9 a.m. to noon, at the University of California Cooperative Extension office, 1710 Soscol Avenue, Napa. Conserving your garden's bounty and knowing exactly what's in your food are just two reasons to preserve food at home. If done correctly,canning is a safe way to process fruits and vegetables. Learn the basics of water-bath canning, pressure canning and other easy preservation techniques. Online (credit card only)Mail-in registration (cash or check only).
Master Gardeners are volunteers who help the University of California reach the gardening public with home gardening information. Napa County Master Gardeners ( http://ucanr.org/ucmgnapa/) are available to answer gardening questions in person or by phone, Monday, Wednesday and Friday, 9 a.m. to Noon, at the U. C. Cooperative Extension office, 1710 Soscol Avenue, Suite 4, Napa, 707-253-4143, or from outside City of Napa toll-free at 877-279-3065. Or e-mail your garden questions by following the guidelines on our web site. Click on Napa, then on Have Garden Questions? Find us on Facebook under UC Master Gardeners of Napa County.
In my vegetable patch, kale planted in August is producing plenty of leaves for salad and cooked greens. We've already harvested the first heads of broccoli (transplanted in September) and are now enjoying the secondary side shoots. Lettuce, Asian greens, kohlrabi, beets and carrots sowed in September are also ready to eat. The garlic and shallots that I planted in November have sprouted. I planted some cloves of garlic in a separate patch to use as green garlic while I wait for the rest to form bulbs in the spring. So I'm anticipating harvesting garlic greens much like green onions in the next few weeks.
Because I have a large space for vegetables, I often don't get around to clearing out the summer veggies until winter. Procrastination has its rewards. In early December, with no frost in sight, I picked a sweet pepper and some zucchini from the fading plants. This late harvest is unusual but not unprecedented. Our first frost date historically has varied from mid-November to later in December.
Winter is citrus season, and I'm pleased to see a lot of bright fruit on the ‘Robertson' navel orange tree growing against a south-facing wall of the garage. In the front yard, the ‘Meyer' lemon tree is bearing dozens of small pale-yellow fruit, just in time for holiday host gifts. We also are enjoying kumquats and Rangpur limes (not real limes but a sour mandarin whose zest has a lovely lime aroma). I'm watching for frost, though, as these trees are sensitive to the cold. I've strung inexpensive twinkle lights on them and will cover them when frost is predicted.
Due to the drought, I did not water a lot of my yard this summer and fall. Oregano planted next to a rosemary bush has disappeared, but the rosemary persists and with the recent rains is looking quite healthy. Sprouting up around it is white-blooming alyssum, a volunteer from a previous planting that went to seed. It looks intentional and quite pretty. Elsewhere calendulas are thriving, too. They spread readily in the vegetable patch and look their best in winter. I let them spread, as I rather like their scent when I'm working in the garden, and the petals are a colorful addition to winter salads.
Flowers are not the only thing sprouting. All sorts of annual weeds (those that grow from seed) are emerging now, such as wild oats and other grasses, mustards and wild turnip. Every patch of formerly bare earth seems coated with green, a welcome sight after the dry summer and fall. The weeds in the garden beds are mostly small and easy to pull. Elsewhere, we'll mow the weeds down on some dry day in January, hopefully before they flower and set seeds.
On the north side of the house is an old camellia bush, already mature when we moved in over 30 years ago. It's now taller than the first story of the house and has some nice, fat flower buds. I'm thinking of pruning it down a bit but will wait until after it blooms.
We have a lot of cotoneaster shrubs scattered in the hedges that separate us from neighbors and the road. Just as the Sunset Western Garden Book says, they thrive with little or no maintenance and produce more berries when grown in poor soil. Right now their arching branches are covered with striking, bright-red berries. Some branches find their way into the house for holiday decorations, but most of the berries become bird food. Robins seem to be fond of them, but I hope they leave some for the migrating cedar waxwings when they arrive after the first of the year.
Can you tell that my winter garden is a mix of careful planning and selective neglect? Perhaps yours is, too. The shortest day of the year is a good day to appreciate both approaches to gardening.
Workshop: Napa County Master Gardeners will conduct a workshop on “Rose Pruning and Maintenance” on Saturday, January 17, from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m., at University of California Cooperative Extension, 1710 Soscol Avenue, Napa. This workshop will feature demonstrations on rose bushes to show and explain proper pruning techniques. Master Gardeners will discuss various types of roses, common rose diseases and routine maintenance including watering and fertilizing. Online registration (credit card only) Mail-in registration (cash or check only).
Master Gardeners are volunteers who help the University of California reach the gardening public with home gardening information. Napa County Master Gardeners ( http://ucanr.org/ucmgnapa/) are available to answer gardening questions in person or by phone, Monday, Wednesday and Friday, 9 a.m. to Noon, at the U. C. Cooperative Extension office, 1710 Soscol Avenue, Suite 4, Napa, 707-253-4143, or from outside City of Napa toll-free at 877-279-3065. Or e-mail your garden questions by following the guidelines on our web site. Click on Napa, then on Have Garden Questions? Find us on Facebook under UC Master Gardeners of Napa County.
The European honey bee came to North America with the first settlers. These bees are native to Europe and Turkey. Currently they are suffering from a disease called “colony collapse,” which causes whole hives to die off.
Scientists are still studying this phenomenon. However, long before the settlers arrived, our native bees, known as solitary bees, were fertilizing native plants.
These bees and plants evolved together. The bees do not produce honey, so they have not been domesticated. But they still visit our gardens and, with some help, they can work for us.
In an effort to help solitary bees, I leave areas of my garden bare, with no mulch or other covering. Nor do I turn this soil. The area is full of holes. Many solitary bees and bumblebees use the ground for nests. Most of them nest alone, providing food and a safe nest for the next generation.
Bumblebees are a little different. They also nest in the ground but usually with a queen. On one occasion, I was able to watch a bee making her nest. She drilled into the soil and kept flying back and forth with nectar or insects. Then one morning the nest disappeared. She had covered it up and let nature take its course until the following spring.
About the same time I heard about nesting blocks of wood for the mason bees that also pollinate our gardens. I had several 4 x 6 pieces. I had them cut to about 12 inches and drilled holes in them. I put them on hangers and left them near fruit trees and blooming flowers.
Some bees did make nests in these holes. They put food for their eggs into the cells. The food varies with the species: some use insects, some use cut leaves and others pollen. They then lay their eggs and put more food between each egg. When the eggs hatch, there is food for them immediately. Once they mature, they emerge from the cell as new bees that will then pollinate this year's crops. They seem to emerge when the fruit trees bloom, typically in March or April.
In my wood pile, I found an interesting piece of wood that I took out and saved. The holes drilled into this piece are of varying size—some 3/8 inch, some 5/8 inch. I had a small roof attached just for aesthetics and it is now attached to my garden fence. This spring I saw a beautiful small bee making a nest in one of the holes. Each hole is sealed with mud. When I counted just a few days ago, there were 52 cells, 39 of them are sealed with mud. This is the best usage I have ever seen.
I have many varieties of flowers for these bees, including lavender and salvia. Bumblebees love both. Not long ago I saw a bumblebee so covered in pollen he could hardly take off. Eventually he made it home.
Paper wasps have lived here many years. I leave them alone because they collect insects for their paper cells and help control bad bugs. They probably get some good ones, too, but that is nature. A few summers ago, I was watching a paper wasp nest on my front porch and decided that the six bees sitting there were done with it and maybe I should remove it. Just then, a much larger wasp flew in and fed each of the other wasps, just as birds do with their young. I was so impressed that I did not touch that nest.
You, too, can help our native bees and wasps. Plant lots of blooming plants, avoid using pesticides in your yard, and leave some soil uncovered. Be aware that all the creatures that fly by your nose are not harmful. Be curious, watch nature and follow her lead.
If you are interested in learning more about native bees, take a look at Field Guide to the Common Bees of California by Gretchen LeBuhn and Noel Badges. Websites can also provide lots of information on building mason bee nests.
Workshop: Napa County Master Gardeners will conduct a workshop on “Cool Season Veggies” on Sunday, August 17, from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m., at the Yountville Community Center, 6516 Washington Street, Yountville. Napa County Master Gardeners will conduct a workshop on “Cool Season Veggies” on Saturday, August 23, at U.C. Cooperative Extension, 1710 Soscol, Napa. Grow your own vegetables even when days are short and nights are cold. Learn which vegetables thrive in cooler temperatures, how to protect them from heat when they are getting started, and how to time planting to ensure months of harvest. To register for the Napa workshop: Online registration (credit card only) Mail in registration (cash or check only).
Master Gardeners are volunteers who help the University of California reach the gardening public with home gardening information. Napa County Master Gardeners ( http://ucanr.org/ucmgnapa/) are available to answer gardening questions in person or by phone, Monday, Wednesday and Friday, 9 a.m. to Noon, at the U. C. Cooperative Extension office, 1710 Soscol Avenue, Suite 4, Napa, 707-253-4143, or from outside City of Napa toll-free at 877-279-3065. Or e-mail your garden questions by following the guidelines on our web site. Click on Napa, then on Have Garden Questions? Find us on Facebook under UC Master Gardeners of Napa County.
Napa County Master Gardeners welcome the public to visit their demonstration garden at Connolly Ranch on Thursdays, from 10:00 a.m. until noon, except the last Thursday of the month. Connolly Ranch is at 3141 Browns Valley Road at Thompson Avenue in Napa. Enter on Thompson Avenue.
If you have ever noticed that your zucchini plants start to form little squash, only to have the fruit wither and fall off, the culprit could be that some of your garden partners aren't doing their job. Squash and their relatives in the cucurbitaceae family, cucumbers and melons, require a pollinator such as bees to set fruit.
Look closely at the blossoms and you will notice that there are two kinds on these plants. Male or staminate blossoms have simple, straight stems, while female or pistillate flowers have a small, fruit-like receptacle at the base of the flower. To set fruit, pollen from male flowers must be transferred to the female flowers. If your local bees or other insects have not visited your zucchini plant, no squash will form.
You can compensate for this lack by doing the pollinating yourself. Using your finger or a brush, gather some pollen from the male flowers and put it gently onto the female flowers. It's best to do this in the morning when blossoms first open, as they are only viable for the first 24 hours. To encourage bees, avoid using insecticides of all types and consider planting bee-friendly flowering plants near or among your vegetable crops.
I plant my tomatoes together so I can set up a watering system that meets their specific needs: regular deep watering about once a week. So why do all of the plants look healthy and strong except for one, which is wilting?
By poking around into the soil at the base of the plant, I find that the watering system has not failed, but that the roots have been disturbed by gopher activity, drying the plant roots by exposing them to air. Shoving moist soil and compost into the tunnels can usually rescue plants that have been disturbed in this way, especially if they were mature plants with large root systems.
Do your cucumbers taste bitter? Researchers have found that bitterness in cucumbers is due to a chemical compound called cucurbitacin. Production of this compound is controlled mostly by genetics, and appears to vary from year to year and from location to location.
The first line of defense is to plant cucumbers that don't produce the chemical compound. I think one reason lemon cucumbers are a popular heirloom variety is that they are seldom bitter. If you do have a cucumber variety that tastes bitter, note that the cucurbitacin is likely to concentrate in the stem end of the cucumber as well as in and just under the skin. You can cut off those parts and still enjoy the fruit.
If you are growing lettuce in the summer, it too can become bitter as it ages. Lettuce is a cool-season vegetable and prefers temperatures below 80 degrees. When the weather gets warm, lettuce will start to produce a flowering stalk, and at that point the leaves will taste bitter.
Since you can't leave lettuce in the summer garden for long, plant small amounts a few weeks apart and harvest the plants regularly before they get too old. Planting lettuce where it will be shaded in the afternoons can help keep it from bolting too soon. Also, if you like crisp lettuce for your salads, pick and refrigerate your lettuce in the morning. If you wait to pick in the afternoon, the leaves will be somewhat limp.
If you planted melons, the big question is, are they ripe yet? Many types of melons, such as cantaloupe, signal their ripeness by “slipping." A slight crack completely circles the stem where it is attached to the fruit. If the fruit comes off easily, leaving a smooth cavity, the fruit is ready to eat.
Some types of melons, such as Crenshaw, casaba, and honeydew, do not slip. Watch fruit for a change in color, usually to yellow, and feel the blossom end to see if it is softening. Some melons give off a wonderful aroma when ripe.
Watermelons are a different genus from other melons, and assessing ripeness is different. Rapping the side of the fruit with your knuckles is a tried and true technique. A light or metallic sound indicates that the fruit is still green. A dull, hollow sound indicates ripeness. Watermelons also will have a white or yellow spot where the fruit rested on the ground, and tendrils close to the fruit will darken and dry up.
Napa County Master Gardeners are ready to answer these and all your garden questions, all summer long. Enjoy your summer produce.
Workshop: Napa County Master Gardeners will conduct a workshop on “Cool Season Veggies” on Sunday, August 17, from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m. at the Yountville Community Center, 6516 Washington Street, Yountville. Grow your own vegetables even when days are short and nights are cold. Learn which vegetables thrive in cooler temperatures, how to protect them from heat when they are getting started, and how to time planting to ensure months of harvest. To register, call the Parks & Recreation Department at 707-944-8712 or visit their web site. Workshop fee is $10 for Yountville residents, $12 for others.
Master Gardeners are volunteers who help the University of California reach the gardening public with home gardening information. Napa County Master Gardeners ( http://ucanr.org/ucmgnapa/) are available to answer gardening questions in person or by phone, Monday, Wednesday and Friday, 9 a.m. to Noon, at the U. C. Cooperative Extension office, 1710 Soscol Avenue, Suite 4, Napa, 707-253-4143, or from outside City of Napa toll-free at 877-279-3065. Or e-mail your garden questions by following the guidelines on our web site. Click on Napa, then on Have Garden Questions? Find us on Facebook under UC Master Gardeners of Napa County.
Napa County Master Gardeners welcome the public to visit their demonstration garden at Connolly Ranch on Thursdays, from 10:00 a.m. until noon, except the last Thursday of the month. Connolly Ranch is at 3141 Browns Valley Road at Thompson Avenue in Napa. Enter on Thompson Avenue.
When we finally have some rainy days, take the opportunity to do some garden “bookkeeping.” Set up a garden calendar or journal. Have a page for seed-starting dates, fertilizer dates, watering schedules, first harvest, and a space for notes on what did and did not work. Include a page for daily temperatures and rainfall.
I have an inexpensive indoor/outdoor thermometer inside on my counter, with an additional sensor outside. I can check inside and outside temperatures from the kitchen by just pushing a button. Rain gauges come in a range of styles and prices, so check your local nursery or home-improvement store. Depending on your organizational style, a computer-based gardening program might work for you. Or perhaps you would prefer a spiral-bound notebook in a waterproof case that you can take into the garden.
If we finally get ample rain and the soil becomes saturated, cover sections of the garden to get a head start on spring crops. Use clear plastic tenting to exclude excess rain and raise the soil temperature. Remove the plastic between rains (I'm obviously an optimist) to evaporate excess moisture.
It might seem early to be thinking about planting, but fruit trees, shrubs, vegetables and flowers can all go in the ground this month. If the soil is not too wet, you can dig up and divide overcrowded clumps of perennials.
Valentine's Day is imminent. Potted red camellias, cerise azaleas or white gardenias make lovely romantic gifts that can transition to long lives in the garden. Even if you're not buying for a Valentine, February is a great month to visit nurseries to view color options on blooming camellias and other winter-flowering shrubs and plants.
Bare-root asparagus and rhubarb are still available, but not for long. Both are long-lived crops that will produce for years in an area they like.
Potatoes are also in nurseries now and can be planted along with carrots, peas, onions, radishes, lettuce, spinach, parsley and chard. To these familiar vegetables, consider adding Asian greens, cresses, arugula and kales.
If you grow warm-season vegetables from seed, it is time to pull out your warming mat and set up your lights or find your sunniest window. Early in the month, start seeds for cabbage, cauliflower, onions, parsley and lettuce. Later in the month, sow seeds for your favorite tomatoes, peppers, eggplants and basil.
If you have raised beds in your garden or hills with ample compost, winter squash and pumpkin seeds can go directly in the ground now. I began popping in a few pumpkin seeds this early after noting that volunteer squash seedlings always came up much sooner than I felt safe planting them. They ripened and were ready to harvest sooner, too.
If you are craving color, shop now for penstemon, dianthus, coreopsis and sages. Or trade with gardening friends who have an excess.
Shop for dahlias now. These Escher-like flowers, geometrically complex and available in a huge range of sizes and colors, make fanciful additions to the garden and can create whimsical memories for little people. If you buy dahlia tubers, select those with several “eyes” on each stem and plant late in March. Until then, keep them in moist wood shavings so they don't dry out. Prepare their bed according to the planting directions that come with them.
If you see evidence of snails or slugs (slimy trails are one clue), try setting out inverted flower pots, propped up a tad on one side so the pests have a way in to the “snail hotel.” Collect your victims in the morning and throw them away or feed to your chickens. Thisnon-toxic approach keeps chemicals out of your garden and away from pets and children.
Spray peach and nectarine trees to prevent peach-leaf curl just when the buds begin to bulge and show color. Alternatively, you can pick off the crinkled leaves as they appear, put them in a bag and dispose of them. Eventually the tree will replace them with healthy leaves.
Weeds begin to appear now. Tackle them with pre-emergent herbicides, hula hoes or your favorite implement. Try to catch weeds early, before they go to seed. If they have set seed, toss them in the yard-waste bin. Weed seeds often survive home composting.
Drought alert: Yes, you should be watering your plants since nature is not. Water any plants that still have leaves. Many California native plants need water now and should be your top priority, followed by newly planted trees, fruit trees,other large trees and any plants pushing buds. Dormant plants that leaf out early should be watered before those that leaf out later. Make small plants a lower priority as they cost less to replace than trees and large shrubs. Fruit trees that get irregular or insufficient water may drop fruit or produce undersized or malformed fruit.
Workshop: Napa County Master Gardeners will host a workshop on “Fruit Tree Pruning” on Saturday, February 22, from 9:30 a.m. to 11:30 a.m. (indoor lecture) and from 12:30 p.m. to 2:30 p.m. (outdoor hands-on workshop). Lecture location is the University of California Cooperative Extension, 1710 Soscol Avenue, Napa. Outdoor location to be determined.
Now is the best time to prune your fruit trees. Learn techniques to keep them healthy and productive. Please dress for outdoor weather. Online registration (credit card only) Mail in registration (cash or check only)
Napa County Master Gardeners welcome the public to visit their demonstration garden at Connolly Ranch on Thursdays, from 10:00 a.m. until noon, except the last Thursday of the month. Connolly Ranch is at 3141 Browns Valley Road at Thompson Avenue in Napa. Enter on Thompson Avenue.
Master Gardeners are volunteers who help the University of California reach the gardening public with home gardening information. Napa County Master Gardeners ( http://ucanr.org/ucmgnapa/) are available to answer gardening questions in person or by phone, Monday, Wednesday and Friday, 9 a.m. to Noon, at the U. C. Cooperative Extension office, 1710 Soscol Avenue, Suite 4, Napa, 707-253-4143, or from outside City of Napa toll-free at 877-279-3065. Or e-mail your garden questions by following the guidelines on our web site. Click on Napa, then on Have Garden Questions? Find us on Facebook under UC Master Gardeners of Napa County.
