Radishes are always fast producers as they prefer the early, cooler Spring days to germinate and grow. I pulled these beauties out this morning and after a dip in a bucket of water to get the dirt off, I squirreled them off to the kitchen for further washing and get them tucked into the fridge.
If left too long in the ground and once Mother Nature heats up, radishes will bolt (go into flowering mode) and the root will then get woody. So best to harvest these ruby gems as soon as you see a large portion of the root sticking up above the soil.
The remainder will be harvested over the next week which will then give the Tiny Tim tomatoes some room as you can hardly see them nestled between the rows of radishes.
Meanwhile, the peppers that I planted last week are diggin’ their new digs so much that flowers are opening and I even have one teeny-tiny pepper starting!
I finally learned the secret for planting happy peppers. Start them a month earlier than I normally do. Usually mid-March is seed planting time, but to give the slower growing peppers more time to mature before going in the ground, I started them mid-February. Definitely my strategy is paying off this year.
Looking forward to a fabulous harvest this year for not only radishes, peppers and tomatoes, but chard, beets, carrots, garlic and green onions too. If I can scrounge up a little space after I harvest the garlic in early July I may just plant some more kale too. You have to be careful with kale though, it grows rapidly and soon you are leaving baskets of kale on the neighbour’s porch whether they like it or not.
Like zucchini ….. a little goes a long way in the kale world.
Happy Gardening!
Deborah