# Northern Minnesota garden is producing



## Dick Hanks (Aug 16, 2007)

The salad stuff like romaine, arugula, radishes, etc., have benn producing for some time. The cukes, tomatoes, onions are coming on stream right now in volume. Beans are just blooming so they, and the potatoes will ready to pick some in about 10 days.

The 1st picture is Romaine.
2nd picture is my biggest onion @ about 3" across so far - still growing
3rd picture is some of the seed berries that formed from blossoms on my potato plants. I haven't seen them get that big before.


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## Dick Hanks (Aug 16, 2007)

Here are some more pictures:

The onions are getting bigger than I expected. I didn't leave enough room between the plants.

Getting lots of nice clumps of big tomatoes.

The lone tomato is a Giant Belgium. It was my early best hope for a big mater this year, but it let me down. It made it to 5" across so fast that I was sure it would get to 6 or 6.5". Not the case. It stalled out at about 5" I'll pick and weight it in a day or two. Looks to be barely over a pound. I still have some other plants that may give me a big un.


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## Dick Hanks (Aug 16, 2007)

More pictures:

1) One of the 38 blueberries bushes

2) I like how they grow ing nice clumps sometimes.

3) This ice cream pail was heaping full after picking, but we took a big bowl full out of it before taking the picture. 6.5#s of berries. I should get about 7 pails full like that this year. So around 45#. Should be more like
80 to 100#s but I had a lot of winter damage to the bushes.


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## Dick Hanks (Aug 16, 2007)

More pictures:

The raspberries are just starting to wind down from the peak picks @ around 4#s per day. The total pick of summer raspberries will be about 45#s. Almost the same as the blueberries. The raspberry plants as had winter damage. The should have been closer to 60 #s.

The fall raspberries will be starting in about 3 weeks and will go to the 1st frost. That's usually around mid September.


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## Rubberback (Sep 9, 2008)

Looking good! You might wanna pick some of those onions. We are through here & your just starting to roll.


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## Meadowlark (Jul 19, 2008)

I'm jealous...love those berries.


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## Dick Hanks (Aug 16, 2007)

I picked the "Big Belgium" tomato this morning. It weighs 1# 8oz. There is a "Super Steak" plant that has a couple of tomatoes on it that appear to be over a pound already, and they are still very green. They may not get that big because there must be at least 10#s of green tomatoes on the same plant. The plant is big, but there is a lot of competition for the same nutrients. I saw a 'Cherokee Purple" that had to be over 1# as well. Looks like it will be a good tomato year.


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## whistech (Jul 25, 2005)

Dick, your garden is really producing and looking beautiful.


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## Wado (May 15, 2011)

I have a cousin that lives in Madison Lake Minnesota. He also has a ranch down here in Texas south of San Antonio. I know the winters are brutal there at times but it looks like a pretty mild climate from your pictures. I talked to my cuz earlier this year and he was contemplating moving here. I bet if he was with me this past week out in Frio County in Texas he would hunker down right there. It was 101 degrees yesterday about three miles from his place and every ten minutes a dust devil would scoot across the plowed fields. You sure grow some pretty stuff up there, my garden looks like where they tested the atom bomb right now. And I don't know why they call it "Frio" County because it sure isn't cold there. I live on the coast but go to our ranch every other week or so, it sure is a relief to get back down here to the sea breeze. Nice job on the garden.


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## Dick Hanks (Aug 16, 2007)

Wado said:


> I have a cousin that lives in Madison Lake Minnesota. He also has a ranch down here in Texas south of San Antonio. I know the winters are brutal there at times but it looks like a pretty mild climate from your pictures. I talked to my cuz earlier this year and he was contemplating moving here. I bet if he was with me this past week out in Frio County in Texas he would hunker down right there. It was 101 degrees yesterday about three miles from his place and every ten minutes a dust devil would scoot across the plowed fields. You sure grow some pretty stuff up there, my garden looks like where they tested the atom bomb right now. And I don't know why they call it "Frio" County because it sure isn't cold there. I live on the coast but go to our ranch every other week or so, it sure is a relief to get back down here to the sea breeze. Nice job on the garden.


If that is the Madison Lake by Mankato, MN., I fished that lake over 45 years ago when I was going to scool at Mankato State College. Good memories from that place.

Thank all of you guys on this thread for the kind words about my garden. We have hit kind of a dry spell, and I'm just starting to have to water now. Everything is starting to grow really fast.

Picking more tomatoes every day. We have lots of family here for the weekend so we made a huge batch of salsa. The tomatoes, onions, jalapeno and Anaheim peppers are all from the garden. We bought the garlic and cilantro. I normally grow cilantro, but not garlic.

Will have to start canning in about 1 week.

Here is a picture of one of the BLTs that we made with slices of the Giant Belgium tomato. There is lettuce, bacon and a slice of toast under that slice of tomato! Sorry about the bad camera focus.


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## Dick Hanks (Aug 16, 2007)

More tomato varieties are starting to ripen. Of the early varieties, Bloody Butcher and Glacier, and Early Pick, the Bloody Butcher seems to be the best flavor. Both BB and Glacier are small tomatoes. Early Pick is larger but it sure isn't very early.

I have been picking Cherokee Purple for over a week and still haven't picked an EP. The 2 larger Cherokee Purple in the picture are right at 1# even. The 3 small tomatoes in the foreground are Indigo Rose.

The Indigo Rose look great, but have kind of bland flavor. They reminded me of store bought tomato taste.

The varieties that haven't ripened any fruit yet are Mortgage Lifter, Super Steak Hybrid, Super Beef Steak and Black Krim. These have a LOT of tomatoes set on them and picking should start next week. Most of the nights have been down into the 50s so that has slowed them down some.

Here are the Cherokee Purple and Indigo Rose:


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## Lat22 (Apr 7, 2005)

Dick Hanks said:


> If that is the Madison Lake by Mankato, MN., I fished that lake over 45 years ago when I was going to scool at Mankato State College. Good memories from that place.
> 
> Thank all of you guys on this thread for the kind words about my garden. We have hit kind of a dry spell, and I'm just starting to have to water now. Everything is starting to grow really fast.
> 
> ...


Is that a piece of Master's English Muffin toasting bread? I've been in Hackensack all week eating that stuff up. Back to muggy, hot Houston tomorrow. Love it up here.


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## Dick Hanks (Aug 16, 2007)

Mid August update: Still getting a lot of tomatoes but my Black Krim just don't want to ripen. The plants must have around 15#s to 20#s each of green tomatoes on them. All of the nights have been in the 53 to 62 degree range. I'm guess that Black Krim doesn't like the cool nights. Still have about a month before the end of the season, so I think that they will still come through. Cherokee Purple, Giant Belgium, and several other smaller varieties are doing great. 

A lot more cukes than we can eat. I remember W.R. Ranch saying once that "he was pulling all of his cukes". I asked him if it was because it was getting too hot down there. He answered: "Well that is part of it, but mostly because he just could eat any more of them. The neighbors are pull their drapes if they see me with a bag of cukes!" I'm not quite there, but getting close.

I'll even have some winter squash that is pickable in another 2 weeks.

The pepper plants are cranking out on a regular basis.

The blueberry pick was much better than I though that I would be. We have already taken over 60# off of the bushes and the is 10 to 15#s to go. Summer raspberries finished @ about 45#s. The fall raspberries are just starting.

My big surprise for the season has been onions. Normally, I always plant onion sets (little bulbs) and I have never had a onion get any bigger than the size of a baseball. 
This is partly due to my not raising them to be all that they could be. 

About 10 weeks ago there was an onion thread here. In it, Meadowlark spelled out about 6 or 7 tips to raising good onions. It was all great advice. 

This year I tried small onion plants instead of sets. They are Walla Wallas and came in bundles of 50 or 60 with a rubber band around them. Walla Wallas are a long day onion, which I need for the summers up here. Between switching to little plants, and getting great advice, they got big and sweet.. The one in the pictures is 1# 3 oz. It is in the top 4 of my big ones. None will go over 1.5#s, but that's still really good for me. This has been a good year.


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## Meadowlark (Jul 19, 2008)

Yes sir, those are fine onions. 

When do you expect the first frost? With the season we have had seems like it may be earlier than normal for you....and for us later on. I'm thinking another cold winter here.


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## Rubberback (Sep 9, 2008)

Nice eats Dick! Glad your onions did good. I'm still eating melons & I'm now into the canned goods.
I too think it will be a cold winter I'm stocking up on firewood.


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## Dick Hanks (Aug 16, 2007)

I'm thinking that you guys are right.... It's a cooler trend that started late last fall, and who knows when it will end. Last winter was long and brutal, even by northern Minnesota standards. We were in Port Aransas for all of Dec/Jan/Feb and still had a lot of winter when we got home in early March. Port A. was way cooler than normal as well. We won't get back to Port A. until Jan this year. I sure wish it was sooner, but we are doing a traditional "White Christmas" with the family this year in MN. Probably will get some ice fishing time in!

We haven't turn on the air conditioning at all this year. That is VERY unusual. Looking at the extended forecast, I doubt that we will turn it on at all this year.
Our normal 1st frost is about 9/15. I sure hope that we get that long this year. The bulk of my large variety tomatoes for canning are ripening so slow. They just aren't getting the heat that they need to turn color. Especially night time temps.

The cooler temps have made for some very good fishing, and comfortable sleeping temps with the windows open though. There is no "up side" for cold winters.


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## Dick Hanks (Aug 16, 2007)

I don't want over do these tomato posts, but I thought that this one might be interesting. On another Giant Belgium plant (not the one that had the 1.5# tomato) there has been a cluster growing that I thought would become impressive. It looked like there were 4 tomatoes in the cluster, and the whole cluster might go close to 5#s.

Today, when I checked them, it seemed like the 2 outside tomatoes were putting a lot of pressure on the 2 inside ones. I decided that the 2 inside ones should be picked a little early so that they didn't get squished.

As it turned out the 2 middle ones were actually one big one! It weighed in at 2# 4.8 oz. Of the 2 remaining, I think that the one on the right will be at least 1# 8oz and the one on the left will be over 1#. So the cluster probably is over 5#s.

I have a picture (not in this post) of a 1# 11oz Cherokee Purple also picked yesterday, but I don't want to over do it. 

I just read that some guy in Minnesota grew an over 8# tomato this summer. A new world record I guess. On a plant that was only 3 ft high no less!


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## donaken (Nov 25, 2010)

Impressive Eats Dick! Jealous of the cool weather, but not the COLD weather..


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## Dick Hanks (Aug 16, 2007)

Most of the gardeners in northern Minnesota are getting ready for the "Fat Lady" to sing. It will be all over when she does. There isn't any frost predicted before Sept 15th, but we will have 2 days where the high is 49 and the low is 38 before the 15th. 

Tomatoes, and peppers are still cranking out a lot, but that will change soon. We have finished up all of our tomato canning already. Now we are giving most of them away. I'm even getting some late season green beans. Cukes are about washed up. It was a good year for both Yukon Gold and the Red spuds.

The Acorn squash pictured is the biggest that I can remember ever growing. There is another one like it, that is still on the vine, but the rest are normal size.

The 5 tomatoes in the picture were just picked. All are big enough that a single slice from them will completely cover a slice of bread for a BLT. The ones that are a pink color are the Giant Belgium. They were my favorite tomato this year, of the 11 varieties grown. Late summer rains caused a lot of splitting and blossom end rot on many varieties. The Giant Belgium had no problems with either of these. 

Giant Belgium is a pink variety. Pinks are know for excellent flavor and sweetness, but short on the acid/ tomato tangyness that I like. This was more pronounced in the ones that I picked in late July. Now, in the late season, they are more tangy, and they are right at the top of my list for taste, texture, and productivity. Size was just a bonus. I like big tomatoes for BLTs. Maybe this years conditions just really favored this variety. Who know what next year will bring?


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