July 4 is a day we can celebrate
our independence from food insecurity.
Our gardens look great!
Celebrate with the Alders
Milwaukee Alderwoman Milele A. Coggs and Alderman Nik Kovac, both of whom were instrumental in getting the Victory Garden up and running, are inviting residents to join them for a “meet and greet” at the newly restored Kilbourn Reservoir Park from 6 p.m. to 10 p.m. on Saturday, July 4, 2009.
There will be free face painting and balloons, and residents will enjoy some of the best views in the city from the bluff in the newly restored reservoir park, located at North Ave. and N. Bremen St. Also, fireworks will light up the sky after 9 p.m.
For those planning to watch the fireworks, Alderwoman Coggs suggests bringing along chairs and blankets. “This should be a fun, family-friendly time at a newly-restored public space that has great views of the city and the skyline,” she said.
WHAT: July 4 meet & greet hosted by Alds. Coggs & Kovac
WHEN: Saturday, July 4, 2009, 6:00 p.m. to 10:00 p.m.
WHERE: Kilbourn Reservoir Park – on the bluff at North and Bremen
SOME NOTES ON HARVEST
Yes, harvest! Some of us have crops ready to harvest in the Victory Garden!
Check your Radishes
Gently push the tops aside and check at the base of the plant. If you can see the top of a little red globe, pull it out and eat it! Radishes need to be harvested before they get too tough and woody. Pull them out and plant some more!
Cilantro Transforming Into Coriander
Some of you have cilantro that is getting tall and the leaves finer and feathery. It’s getting ready to blossom and make seeds – those seeds are coriander seeds. Harvest it, and plant some more – the young leaves are more deeply flavored; they seem to have less flavor after the plant blossoms.
Topping the Basil
If your basil plants are getting tall and starting to blossom, it’s a good time to trim them back and use the tops. If you keep cutting them back, the plant will get bushier, and produce ever more leaves. Again, you want to postpone blossoming as long as possible.
Lettuce & Mesclun Mixes
If these are big enough, now’s the time to harvest and plant some more. If we get hot weather (ever!) these crops will bolt and become bitter.
Watch Out For Garden Whales!
Keep an eye on those zucchinis and summer squashes. If you harvest them when they are tiny and succulent (3 to 5 inches) the plants will keep on blossoming and producing. If one of them hides from you and gets ginormous, the plant will figure its job is done and stop. Watch out for the wiley garden whale!
Tea Anyone?
We’re experimenting with compost tea over in the Clarke Food Garden on Clarke and Bremen. If anyone’s tomatoes or spinach are looking yellow and peaked after the rains, post a comment and we’ll bring some tea over to the garden for you to experiment with. Can’t hurt…
Cilantro doesn’t ‘transform’ into coriander – it’s what it’s called everywhere else in the world i’ve lived (UK and Australia) – we use coriander leaf or coriander seed – or ground coriander, made from seed.
great work on your Victory Garden, hope it continues to grow well 🙂
I stand corrected…
I love the gardens. Thankyou. I was in Livingston, MT last week and they are starting a community garden there, too. They have started small but have hopes for a greenhouse, and more plots but are wrangling with other parties for use of public space. I wish them luck.
They also have an awesome farmers market there.
I hope we can still organize some get together, the salad bar at the skykline music sounded sweet to me.
Will