Vegetable Garden, Part 3: Successes & Failures

The weather's been dryer, and I'm having to water the garden a couple of times a week. We're getting winds with gusts up to 28 miles per hour (less than average for December), combined with spray precipitation. From my bed at night I can hear water trickling in the downspout. This sometimes goes on all night. But in the morning when I check the rain gauge it is usually only damp at the bottom. Sometimes it may show a 10th of an inch or so. This is good for shallow-rooted crops, such as grass, carrots, and vegetable greens, but is not good for deeper-rooted plants like tomatoes, corn, shrubs, and trees.

Last week I transplanted 30 asparagus seedlings into a raised bed. The plants are about four inches tall and resemble little pine trees. I ended up with some extra seedlings, which I'm keeping in the flat just in case any of the transplants don't make it.

Onions, beets, cabbage, broccoli, and lettuce seedlings have also been planted in the garden. Mustard greens are looking good and are almost ready to harvest. We're harvesting radishes and cilantro every several days. In South Carolina I had trouble getting my radishes to form bulbs. I was never sure why. Here, that problem doesn't seem to exist. They're a winner.

Sweet potatoe and squash plants are spreading. Peanut plants are about six weeks old and looking good. Carrots have been thinned, but seem to be growing very slowly.

We finished harvesting the last batch of lettuce, which was a tremendous success. Lettuce heads were given away to neighbors and visitors. The lettuce doesn't seem to bolt here like back in South Carolina, and can be grown year round -- another winner.

Corn, 3rd planting (silver queen) -- Three weeks ago they were beginning to tassel. The plants looked good and were a deep, dark green color. But I noticed they were only about four feet tall, about a foot or two less than normal for this variety. Abruptly the leaves began to turn brown and dry. They are putting out very small ears. Corn is a heavy feeder. I had given them a side dressing of fertilizer. Lesson -- until I can build up more organic nutrients, I'm going to have to use more chemical fertilizer.

Nutrient deficient corn plants

Corn, 4th planting (silver king) -- Had about 60% corn stalk borer infestation; have now been treated with insecticides. The plants are about eight inches high; I gave them a side dressing of fertilizer yesterday.

Sweet peppers -- several plants have died. I think it's been a little too wet for them. The remaining plants are looking okay.

The Irish potatoes were wiped out by some kind of soil disease. They were planted during a rainy spell, in raised beds. I suspect fungus or bacterium, or both. I purchased them in the supermarket, which, in my experience, is usually a mistake. I posted a message on Costa Rica gardening about them. According to one of the responses, potatoes used to be easy to grow in Costa Rica, but now there are nematodes, bacteria, and fungi, and they are marginal at best for the home gardener. One woman said she can buy Yukon golds at the feria (farmer's market) in Grecia. I hope to go there one day with her to get some good seed stock.

Jalapeña peppers -- Bought 2 more plants at EPA. They're beginning to show signs of nitrogen deficiency. I just gave them some fertlizer.

Tomatoes -- All 4 plants are looking healthy and are covered with blossoms. Two of them have been moved out to the garden. I covered the soil around them with black plastic in order to prevent soil-born diseases. I'm worried about the spray precipitation, but it has slacked off in the last few days. The other 2 I'm keeping on the balcony (out of the rain) for a while as a precautionary measure. However, they are beginning to get too big for the pots.

Happy gardening!

The Pond, Part 1

I'd really like to call this our water garden, because that's what it is. A pond with plants and fish in it is an extension of the land garden, just as beautiful, and as enjoyable. But water garden is a bit long and pretentious sounding, so, for the sake of brevity, I'll just call it a pond.

When I was a teenager, living in Alexandria, Virginia, we had a small pond in the middle of our brick patio. It started out with goldfish, and then we added water lilies and water hyacinth, and it became something extra special. A couple of times we drove out to Adamstown, Maryland, to visit the Lily Pons Water Gardens to buy fish and plants ( http://www.lilypons.com/contactus.asp ). We didn't realize it at the time, but Lily Pons is one of the premier pond supply companies in the world. It was a really neat place to visit. Dad loved the goldfish, and learned that he could fatten them up with houseflies. One summer he had a hernia operation and was laid up at home with nothing to do for a month. That's when he got out the flyswatter, swatted and fed the flies to the fish, and tried to see how much he could get those goldfish to grow in one month. He got so into it that he began putting out sugar to attract the flies. He had a clipboard with a tally sheet where he made a hash mark for each fly killed. I think his record for flies killed in a day was over 80. So, here was this high-powered Washington lawyer spending his summer killing flies and feeding them to the goldfish. Go figure.

Many years later when we lived in Clemson, South Carolina, Maria and I installed one of those rigid plastic ponds that we purchased at Lowe's. It held about 150 gallons and was about eight by four feet in size. We quickly fell in love with it, and our only regret was that we didn't get a bigger one.

So when we retired to Costa Rica one of the of the first things we decided to do was to build a much larger pond. It's 30 feet long by 15 wide. It's size and location came about, in part, by accident. Our lot is on an incline, and even before the house was finished we had problems with rainwater runoff. The municipality required us to channel our downspouts into an underground cavern filled with boulders. This has worked pretty well. But until we had trees, shrubs, and grass, there was a lot of runoff from the dirt around the house, and also, we built a large driveway, which channeled water to the lower part of our lot, and then down onto two neighboring lots. Whenever we got a big downpour, it looked like a river running down past our house. So, we hired a backhoe guy to make a rainwater catchment basin as a temporary measure. The basin became an eyesore, and one day when we were talking about how we could change it, it dawned on us that this would be the perfect place for our pond.

Rainwater catchment basin during a heavy downpour.

We also decided to harvest rainwater from our roof and driveway, channeling the water either directly to the pond, or to an underground storage tank, which would serve as a reserve to refill the pond between rains and during the 5-month-long dry season. We went with a 1,100-gallon tank. For the installation of the tank, see the blog entry for November 27, 2010.

We had heard that there was a professional pond builder in Costa Rica, but after some discussion Maria and I decided to hire a local, Alexis Sanchez, to do the job. Alexis has extensive experience as a builder, is a jack of all trades, and has built a couple of small ponds with fountains. Also, he had already built two fences for us and we knew he was a hard worker, honest, conscientious, and reasonably priced. Alexis first built our water harvesting system. After that he built a temporary fence dividing our property in two, so our dogs wouldn't get into the pond. Also, he rewelded my 34-year-old wheelbarrow, fixed our electric gate, installed a door lock in the house, and then went on to build a patio at one end of the pond, a seven-foot high wall (as a windbreak), and a small structure to house our electric water pump. The whole process took six weeks, but he really did a lot of things other than the pond.

Alexis and helper transforming the rainwater catchment basin

Alexis, my wife, and I all agreed that we wanted a plastic liner anchored around the edges with cement and river-stone, we wanted a two-level pond, the shallow end being at least a foot deep, and the deep end between two and three feet deep, and we wanted a small waterfall. We also agreed, after some discussion, that it should not have a drain pipe at the bottom, but would have an overflow pipe at the top. In the event we ever wanted to drain the pond, we would have to use a pump.

It took Alexis and two helpers three days to modify the original rainwater catchment basin into the approximate dimensions we wanted. Next Alexis went to San Jose to buy the liner, which I had told him had to be at least 30 mil thick. He returned with a roll of polymer which was only 8 mil thick, saying that this was the thickest plastic available in Costa Rica. I was disappointed, but we agreed to put several layers down on top of each other. When we spread it out, we discovered that it was more than long enough, but was not quite wide enough to do the job. This resulted in further discussion, and an eventual plea for advice with the Yahoo ponders group ( http://groups.yahoo.com/group/PONDERS_INTERNATIONAL/ ). I quickly received an email from a professional pond builder back in the States warning me that overlapping liners (in order to fit our width) would be a critical mistake. He also strongly encouraged me to purchase EPDM liner 45 mils thick. Further discussion followed, and we finally agreed to make the pond about four inches shallower, which would bring the width in enough that we wouldn't have to use overlapping liners.

Covering the dirt with sand to protect the liner

As for using EPDM, this would have resulted in halting the construction for at least a month while we waited for the EPDM to be imported from the States. Maria said she'd go nuts if she had to look at that muddy hole in the ground for another month, so that settled that -- we went ahead with what we had. All this explanation may sound too detailed to some of you, but believe me, this is the short version.

Anchoring the liner with cement and river stone

One of the last things Alexis did was to build the waterfall. As you can see from the picture, it is shale, placed horizontally with cement. It has a horizontal two-inch pipe hidden at the top with a row of holes drilled in it, to give the cascade adequate width.

Maria & her sister admiring the pond (windbreak at left, housing for pump at lower right)

The pond is now finished, except for some landscaping around the outside of the cement and river stone. But in another week or two, we will hopefully have this finished.

Pagoda

We got our fish and snails at local aquarium stores. We have small-to-medium-sized kois of all colors that have grown by leaps and bounds in the three short weeks they have been in the pond. We also have several kinds of small goldfish, and also several swordtails. The smallest goldfish and the swordtails hang out in the shallow end; the kois in the deep end.

Getting plants was quite an adventure. Water hyacinth were the easiest -- we got them at a local nursery. We bought watercress at the local supermarket and rooted it in some damp soil. We went to a couple of places where we were told we could get "lirios de agua (water lilies)," but each time we discovered they were only water hyacinth. We have some kind of small plant we got from a stream. Not sure what it is. Water lettuce and duckweed we got from Barry Biesanz in Escazu ( Biesanz Woodworks -- http://www.biesanz.com/ ). For our one water lily we had to drive all the way to Alto la Palma, which is halfway between Puriscal and Parrita (on the Pacific coast). The water lily, along with some duckweed and water pickerel, was given to us by Mariel Castanada. She and her husband Brian took us on a tour of their beautiful resort/housing development ( http://www.altigua.com/ ). If anyone is considering moving to Costa Rica, their development is definitely worth checking out. We were able to make contact with both Barry and Mariel through the Yahoo Costa Rican Gardening group ( http://groups.yahoo.com/group/crgardening/ ).

Waterfall (on island in foreground is statue of monkey contemplating a human skull)

Our frogs we caught with a net at a local pond. We're not sure what kind they are. We got six, and two of them died. One of the survivors is serenading us in the evenings. All of the fish and snails seem to be healthy. The sides and bottom of the pond are covered in algae, but the water is very clear.

And . . . we just LOOOOOVE our pond!!!

Happy gardening!

Vegetable Garden, Part 2

4-week-old asparagus seedlings planted in flat

The vegetable garden is showing great promise. We have already harvested a few ears of corn, mustard greens, jalapeña peppers, peanuts, and lettuce, and have gone through several crops of cilantro and radishes. We now have 6 raised beds, and 2 more on the way. We have cabbage and purple and yellow onion seedlings in the garden, about ready for transplanting. In flats we have lettuce, beets, broccoli, white onions, and asparagus.

Tomato plants in the windowsill of our balcony, avoiding the heavy rains. Note: 2nd plant from the left had an infestation of green aphids and leaf mites, which were removed by hand.

Here's a rundown of whats happening . . .

ASPARAGUS
Got about 60% germination in flats. Should be ready to go into permanent beds in a couple of weeks.

BEETS
In flats, to be transplanted soon.

BROCCOLI
In flats, to be transplanted soon.

BUSH BEANS
To be planted in dry season.

CABBAGE
In flats, to be transplanted soon.

CARROTS
Have sprouted and are in need of thining.

CAULIFLOWER
To be planted in dry season.

CILANTRO
Have gone through several harvests and have more on the way.

CORN
1st planting - (silver king) wiped out by grubs & wet, clay soil.
2nd planting - (silver king) treated for grubs and stalk borers (100% infestation); heavy rains during tasseling period reduced ear size and rotted some of the corn.
3rd planting - (silver queen) Treated for stalk borers (near 100% infestation); plants looking excellent now; beginning to tassel.
4th planting - (silver king) about 4 inches high (some signs of stalk borer infestation)

CUCUMBERS
1st planting - wiped out by wet weather.
2nd planting - waiting for dry season to plant.

LETTUCE
1st planting - harvest was mediocre.
2nd planting - harvesting a bumper crop.

MUSTARD GREENS
1st planting - big success
2nd planting - a couple of inches high.

OKRA
1st planting - pooped out.
2nd planting - plants have good color, but are very small and spindly. A mystery. The question now is, should we try a third time with a different variety, or call it quits.

ONIONS
White - in flat, soon to be transplanted.
Purple - in the garden, soon to be transplanted.
Yellow - in the garden, soon to be transplanted.

PEANUTS
1st planting - mediocre harvest, but a miracle given the awful weather and soil.
2nd planting - has sprouted and is looking good.

PEPPERS
jalapeña - bought 6 plants at EPA, which produced a bumper crop until torrential rains arrived and wiped them out. 2 more plants purchased at EPA are looking good and beginning to produce.
Sweet - Not sure what variety they are; doing fairly well despite heavy rains.

POTATOES
Potatoes purchased at farmers market in San Isidro de Heredia; beginning to poke up through the soil.

RADISHES
Harvested several crops of different varieties. If only other vegetables were this easy to grow.

SQUASH
Planted a native heirloom variety which are leafing out and hopefully will begin to produce vines soon.

SWEET POTATOES
Beginning to vine. Variety unknown.

TOMATOES
1st planting of 4 plants - lost to heavy rains and high humidity.
2nd planting of 4 plants - planted in garden, then dug up and moved to pots on balcony due to very wet weather. Looking very good at this time. One variety is heirloom Cherokee purple (I want to make sure a can harvest some seeds).

WATERMELON
To be planted in dry season.

Happy gardening!

November Weather Report -- Fair Weather Continues

We experienced three weather patterns during November. At the outset west winds brought rain and fog, dumping seven inches of rain during the first five days. Then the winds shifted around to the northeast, bringing mostly sunny weather with periods of calm alternating with light breezes. The month finished with stronger northeast winds, with alternating periods of sun, and light showers. The showers sometimes lasted most of the day, but were hardly measurable on the rain gauge. This last period was more like typical December weather hereabouts: gusty northeast trade winds with light to very light (spray) showers, with the sun shinning the whole time. Rainbows are common, as are beautiful sunsets. The Ticos call these moderate showers with gusty winds, "garubas del Niño" (rains from the Christ child) in anticipation of the Christmas season. Lighter showers with stronger, gusty winds (what I call spray precipitation) are called pelo del gato (cat hair), a very apt term. Total rainfall for the month was 9.8 inches.The high temperature was 78.

Tithonia diversifolia

Our good friend Louis Bregger arrived from the States on November 21, bringing with him an anemometer (wind gauge) that I'd ordered over the internet. The highest wind speed I've recorded so far is 18 mph. Last December and January were extremely windy here, which prompted me to purchase the anemometer, so that we could see exactly how strong the winds blow. So far, it seems less windy this year.

Yours truly standing next to our Dahlia imperialis.

I've included photos of two wild flowers that bloom here this time of year: Tithonia diversifolia (tree marigold or Bolivian sunflower) and Dahlia imperialis (tree dahlia). They're both in the aster family and are native species. They grow wild along the roadsides, but are occasionally grown by homewners as ornamentals. The tithonia can grow to over 12 feet tall and the dahlia to as much as 10 feet. Some of the dahlia flowers are doubles, others singles. We've become interested in the small, black stingless bees (called "congas" by the Ticos) who like to eat the sap of the dahlia, chewing at the leaves or at the leaf stems.

Happy gardening!