A Garden Update

It's feeling like summer already! And that means our garden is starting to thrive now, too! 

Almost two months ago, our carrots looked like this:

Carrot seedlings (and radish to the right)

Chewy was so excited about the new growth, he jumped in the raised bed and left a bunch of mischievous Chewy footprints in my nice, loose soil:

Why can't I eat them yet?

Now, the carrot bed is all full of carrot foliage, and Chewy took it upon himself to help thin them out. Thinning out the carrots gives the remaining ones more space to grow larger, and Chewy can enjoy munching on the baby carrots.

You're welcome!

This year we planted a rainbow carrot mix, so we'll have carrots in lots of colors. Chewy thinks they're all equally delicious, of course.

Our cucumbers are starting to grow, too. Here are two baby ones that are just starting out:

The kale is coming in nicely, too. Chewy likes to crunch-a-munch on the stalks, shred the leaves, and then clean up his mess (for the most part).

Kale for me!

Our strawberry patch has also kicked production up a notch. I put bird netting over it to keep the neighborhood birds from biting into all of them, but a determined Chewy cannot be stopped by bird netting. He ripped right through it trying to pull out a nice, big, ripe one!

Want strawberry!

It can be pretty funny watching Chewy pick strawberries, as he sniffs around to only get the ripe ones!

Walking right on the netting...target acquired!

People aren't the only ones that can enjoy a farm-to-table lifestyle. Chewy loves having access to a feast right outside our house! If he had his way, he'd get to eat it all!!

Growing Veggies for Your Dog, Part 4: Container Gardening

If you don't have a yard or a suitable planting location in your yard, you can utilize a patio, balcony, or even a sunny window for container gardening. The great thing about container gardening is that it's easy to control the soil conditions, sunlight, and water to provide the ideal growing conditions for your veggie plants.

Some seed companies mark their seed packets for whether they are suitable for growing in containers. I think Burpee seeds are especially great for beginner gardeners because the information on the seed packet is easy to comprehend, and it tells you when to plant in your region. Plus, they are sold at many stores - even in our local supermarket!

The little potted plant checkmark icon on the bottom right of each seed packet indicates suitability for container gardening

Armed with your seeds, grab some containers and potting soil, and you're good to go! Nearly any durable container can be used for gardening, but keep in mind that for a plant to grow nice and big, it needs enough space to spread its roots. Drainage is also important to prevent overwatering, so look for pots with drainage holes, or use materials where you can drill your own. Another alternative is to line the bottom of the pot with a few layers of gravel/pebbles to allow water to collect below the soil, or get those "self-watering planters" that have a reservoir space at the bottom.

There are also special containers for putting on railings, if you want to save floor space.

Railing planters with nasturtiums

And, there are "grow bags" that you can fold up for storage when you don't need them anymore.

Grow bags with young tomato plants
[[Tomato leaves & stems (and unripe tomatoes, to a lesser extent) are poisonous to dogs!!]]

The Big Bag Bed is a giant grow bag that is like an instant raised bed you can place anywhere you want.

Big Bag Bed Jr. with young zucchini plants

In my opinion, parsley, lettuce and spinach are the easiest dog-friendly vegetables/herbs to plant in pots. They are relatively small plants, so they don't require much space, and they don't require a ton of nutrients, either.

Broccoli and kale need more space and fertile soil to grow well, but they can also be great container plants.


Special considerations for container gardening:

Be sure to place potted plants out of reach of your pets, or train your pets to leave the containers alone. Not only is there a potential for a big dirt mess if they knock them over or dig in them, some potting mixes contain substances that should not be ingested. If that is a serious concern, there are "pet-safe" products available, such as the Dr. Earth line of organic soils and fertilizers.

For indoor growing, I would recommend purchasing started plants from a garden center instead of growing from seed. This is because sunlight through a window is typically not enough for a little seedling to develop strongly, resulting in tall, spindly plants that topple over.

Containers tend to dry out faster than the ground because there is less soil volume to retain water, so you may need to water more frequently.

Happy veggie gardening!

Back to advanced vegetables
Back to intermediate vegetables
Back to easy vegetables

Growing Veggies for Your Dog, Part 3: Advanced Vegetables

Some vegetables require much more work than others, from carefully prepping the soil, to rigorously controlling weeds, to waiting very patiently for the things to grow. While they may not actually be that difficult to grow, the following vegetables have long growing periods until they can be harvested (which leaves lots of time for things to go wrong), and require some extra care to flourish.

1. Carrots
Carrots are one of Chewy's favorite foods. When he was a puppy, the vet said to give him baby carrots as treats because they are low in calories. He has been munching and crunching on them ever since! In addition to being low in calories and high in fiber and vitamins, giving your dog a large, raw carrot to chew supposedly helps clean their teeth.

There are many varieties of carrots, with different thicknesses, lengths, and colors. You can even purchase seeds to grow a rainbow-colored crop!

A forked carrot

Carrots can be a little finicky - as a root vegetable, they like sandy, loose soil that is free of rocks and clumps. Rocks in the soil will cause forked carrots. Carrot seeds are tiny, so they may be a bit difficult to sow. They take a few weeks to germinate, and once they start growing, they need to be thinned out so that each carrot has enough space to develop. Weeds need to be carefully removed to avoid competition for nutrients and to prevent unshapely roots. Carrots prefer evenly moist soil, and a drastic change from dry to wet will cause split carrots.

Carrots take about 60-80 days to mature, but they can be pulled earlier for little carrots. When our crop of carrots is pretty much matured, I let Chewy go in and pick his own. He shakes the dirt off, munches on the root, shreds the carrot top, and then goes back for more!

Carrot for me!

2. Potatoes
Potato plants are grown from "seed potatoes," which are just chunks of potato. The plants grow from the eyes of the potatoes. You are SUPPOSED to buy certified, disease-free seed potatoes because any disease present in the plant one year will be carried over to the next year's growth, but last year I just used organic potatoes from the grocery store, and they still did pretty well.

Potatoes grow via tubers underground, so they need loose, fertile soil. Every few weeks, soil needs to be hilled up around the base of the plant to support the stem and to prevent sunlight from turning the top potatoes green. Green potatoes are poisonous! Also, there are quite a few insect pests that may damage potato plants and decrease yield.

You can dig up a few small potatoes to eat before your potato crop has fully matured.

Potatoes should be cooked before feeding to your dog - you can bake, steam, boil, etc.

3. Sweet potatoes
Sweet potato plants are vines grown from slips, which are sprouts that grow out of sweet potatoes. You can purchase them or grow your own (there are various methods to do so). Growing your own slips takes a couple weeks, so it is best to start early.

Since they are a vining crop, they need quite a bit of space to spread out and grow. It is the tubers that we harvest, so they need loose, rich soil. To make the plant concentrate its energy on forming a few nicely sized sweet potatoes instead of a bunch of tiny ones, the vines need to be pulled up periodically to break off the roots that formed along the stems.

It takes a long growing season for sweet potatoes to mature - about 3+ months. The sweet potatoes must be dug up carefully because they get scratched and bruised easily. For long-term storage, they need to be cured at 80°F and 90% humidity for 2 weeks.

Sweet potatoes should be cooked before feeding to your dog. Or, you can slice them and dehydrate them for thick + chewy OR thin + crunchy treats.

4. Pumpkin/Winter squash
Pumpkins and other winter squashes grow on vines that need warm, fertile soil. The vines can grow very long and take up a lot of space, so many people like to grow them along the edge of their garden. They take a long time to mature, need regular watering throughout the growing season, and are harvested in the fall. They need pollinators such as bees to set fruit, and may require special attention to grow nice and round.

There are a couple of insect pests that attack winter squash vines, and powdery mildew may grow on the leaves and weaken plants.

After harvest, winter squash needs to cure for 2 weeks in the sun to toughen the skin for storage.

Small sugar pumpkin

Winter squash should also be cooked before feeding to your dog. You can roast, steam or boil, and even add some puree into homemade dog treats.


Stay tuned for container planting...

Back to intermediate vegetables
Back to easy vegetables

Growing Veggies for Your Dog, Part 2: Intermediate Vegetable Plants

Continuing our series on vegetable gardening for dogs, here are a few plants that require a bit more care, whether in the form of physical supports, temperature requirements, or proneness to pests. They can easily be grown from seed, but some benefit from being started indoors to extend your growing season. It is even easier (but more costly) to purchase started seedlings from your local garden center and transplant them into your garden.

Mischief in the garden, courtesy of Chewy

Intermediate vegetables to grow for dogs

1. Broccoli
Broccoli is a cool weather crop, so it grows better in the spring and fall. Some varieties are heat tolerant, but still need time to get established before the harsh summer heat arrives. Intense heat will cause the plants to flower and produce seeds, instead of the yummy florets that we eat.

Broccoli is a magnet for cabbage worms and aphids, which can greatly damage your crop if left unchecked, so be vigilant in searching for these pests and removing them.

Aside from these cautions, broccoli can be quite easy to grow. As a bonus, after you harvest the main head, side shoots of little florets will continue to grow.

As an extra bonus, at the end of the growing season, Chewy gets to shred the broccoli stalks for fun.

2. Kale

Growing Veggies for Your Dog, Part 1: Easy, Low-maintenance Vegetables

Chewy, being a Golden that practically lives to eat, loves his veggies. Every year, we grow some veggies (and fruits) that we can share with him. Fresh vegetables from our garden add pizzazz to his commercially prepared diet, and are a low-calorie and vitamin-rich alternative to regular dog treats. In addition to getting unmatched freshness, growing your own vegetables allows you to control what goes into the soil and thus into you and your dog's food. Now that spring is almost here, it's time to plan our garden for the upcoming growing season.

Gardening means more time outside for Chewy to relish in the fresh air and roll in the grass. He even likes to pick his own veggies! Sometimes he sniffs out the good ones before deciding which to pick. Other times, he just chomps/pulls away in a frenzy.

Carrot for me!

If you would like to start growing vegetables for your dog, below are some kinds to consider. They are especially good for beginning gardeners who would like some fool-proof plants to experiment with, or for those that want a low-maintenance crop.

These plants are easily grown from seed - just follow the instructions on the seed packet, especially paying attention to when to plant, sun requirements, planting depth, and plant spacing. When selecting plant varieties, consider the characteristics listed on the seed packet, such as sweetness, size and whether it is best suited for salad or cooking. Also pay attention to the days to maturity/harvest, so you have an idea of how long it will take to grow.

Vegetables can also be grown from nursery transplants, available at your local garden center. These are started plants that are ready to be planted into the ground.

Keep in mind that individual dogs, like people, have their own food preferences, and yours might refuse to eat certain veggies. Some dogs might dislike certain raw vegetables but still enjoy them when cooked.

Easy, relatively low-maintenance vegetables to grow for dogs

1. Radish

Radishes come in many different colors and varieties, many of which mature quickly and can be ready to harvest in as little as 21 days. When raw, radishes are crunchy and have a bit of a peppery bite, which a dog (or person) might not like. Chewy will gladly eat one anyway, because he is Chewy. To remove the bitterness, they can be sliced and soaked in water, steamed, or boiled. 

Pineapple Harvest!

Chewy and I LOVE pineapple. Did you know that you can grow new pineapples from the tops of the fruit? Although they are tropical plants, they do well in pots and therefore can theoretically be grown anywhere in the world (with some effort and much patience). Googling "how to grow a pineapple" will bring up plenty of instructions, tips and tricks.

Two years ago, I prepared a bunch of pineapple tops for planting, and this spring one of them flowered! It looked like a miniature pineapple, but covered in little purple flowers. After flowering, pineapple fruit takes about 6 months to mature.

A few months later, it looked like this:

Green pineapple

And another month later, it was pretty much yellow all around:

Yellow pineapple!

After 2+ years of waiting, our pineapple was finally ready to eat! You could smell it from about a foot away, but of course Chewy had to get his nose way up close:

 Chewy, being the food fanatic that he is, was very excited.

Can we eat it now?

You can see just how tiny our pineapple was compared to Chewy! Sorry I don't have any pictures of the inside of the pineapple...we were too busy eating! But it was wonderfully golden, sweet, and DELICIOUS!

 

Monday Mischief: Chewy vs. Lawnmover

The lawnmower was out to [attempt to] tidy up our lawn, and Chewy thought it might make for a great playdate. He kept trying to initiate a game of chase. He even pulled out all the moves, including barking, lunging, pouncing, and luring.*

Hi! I'm Chewy! Let's play!

Face-off!

- Time-out chew break -

I've got you cornered now!

Sometimes he would calm down and just walk along behind it.

♪ We're following the leader... ♫

Then, it was back to playtime.

Come and get me!

RUFF!

When all the mowing was done, Chewy decided the grass clippings would be fun to play with, too. 

Mmm...grass clippings

He dug around in the pile, and picked up the big clumps to shake out all over the place. So much for tidying up the yard...

*No Chewys or lawnmowers were hurt in the process.

Monday Mischief: Garden Mayhem

We added a few raised beds to our yard for planting veggies this spring. One of them is only 8" tall, and we use it primarily for planting carrots and radishes. Radishes are ready much sooner than carrots, so for most of the summer it was all carrots. Chewy of course caught on that there was food he liked in there, and it being a very convenient height, routinely hopped in to pick his own carrots. I planted them for him to eat anyway, so I let him feast to his liking.

When I planted my fall crop of carrots and radishes, I made a makeshift "fence" out of bamboo and string to keep my seedlings safe from the Chewy monster. Now that the plants are growing nice big leaves, Chewy's interest in the raised bed has been renewed, and my strings are no match for his love of carrots. He just crawls right under, or in some cases runs right through it.

Making his pick

The thing is, the big leaves all belong to radishes...

*rip tear shred*

And Chewy does not like radishes. They are a little bitter.

Blegh!

He does like to play with the leaves, though.

I'm innocent! ... Ignore the evidence!

Most of the carrots are still minuscule, but there are a couple nice ones hidden in there. Chewy just hasn't been able to find them yet.

Jackpot!

The funny thing is, when our strawberries were growing, Chewy would sniff up and down the rows to find a nice red one to eat. With the carrots, he would pick haphazardly, often pulling up a spindly little one. Now with radishes in the mix, he just pulls out anything!

Wordless Wednesday