Monticello and the Heritage Harvest Festival

My wife and I attended the Festival this past weekend.  We drove down Friday afternoon through the insane traffic that is Washington DC.  We were able to get in to beautiful Charlottesville Virginia, check in to our hotel and then go to the pedestrian mall in the downtown area.  We had been here before but this time was quite different.  It was the home opener for the Univ. of Virginia against Notre Dame.  Guess what color shirt I was wearing - that's right!  Bright green like I was from Notre Dame.  I laid low once I figured that out.
It was a mob scene although it did not seem intense.  I love this little mall as it is quite nice with the blend of eateries and it's quirky stores that populate the mall.  You can eat outside or inside the various restaurants.  There was a nice mix of the students youth from Virginia and the older folks - mostly alumni.  It has an ampitheater on the one end and we listened to the Skip Castro Band for awhile.  We left there just before the UVA pep rally was to start in order to avoid the crush of the people there.
We woke up on Saturday and made our way to Monticello.  When we arrived, it was lightly raining and the mountaintop was covered with clouds and fog.  I had signed up for a Soil Renaissance workshop and a class about winter gardening.  We made our way to the various vendors and perused and purchased a few items from them.  We took in a tomato tasting table from Seed Savers Exchange.  I must say, the chocolate cherry tomato's were delicious.  Only issue I had was that they did not have seed packs for many of the varieties being presented.  Come to find out, they were testing them so they may come available in the future.  I will have to keep an eye out for their catalog to see if any made the cut to packets.
Let me begin the description of what I(we) took in at the festival.  I will begin the same way I tell people to start a garden - with the soil.  Soil renaissance is a group of loosely held organizations that have as their primary goal the education of today's farmer about soil and how to sustain it.  It really was quite interesting to hear the various speakers - one from Soil renaissance, a local farmer, an extension representative from Va., the Monticello chief gardener and a professor from Va. Tech.  All had very interesting points of view and experiences.  While I was sitting listening to each speaker, I was ticking off what I do in my garden as each subject came up.  It was quite gratifying to know that my practices were in line with most of the speakers.  One place I did not mesh with one of the speakers was with the use of herbicides on their crops.  I completely understand that they have a livelihood to protect unlike me.  I garden for the joy of it and not for direct income.  There is a vast difference.
Interestingly, one of the organizations that Soil Renaissance does interact with is the Rodale institute in Kutztown Pa., not far from the Baltimore area. They are pioneers of the organic method and they date back to the early 1950's. According to the SR people, they participate regularly within the SR movement.  Rodale does classes and has tours during the year.  I will have to get up there to see the Institute.  I believe they have over 300 acres of test fields.  They are very cutting edge and I have been reading their website and picking up techniques and such for more than a few years.  If you get the chance and are in the area, it may well be worth the time to go there.
Well, that's all for now.  I will be writing more about this visit but there is so much to tell I feel it needs to be broken down over the next week or so.  I also have pictures which I will also share in the very near future.   If you have any question about this or any other topic, please feel free to leave a comment.  Until next time, Happy Gardening!
  

Harvest abounds

This past Sunday I went out to the garden to see what I had to harvest.  To my surprise, there was quite a lot of veggies to pick.  As seen below, I picked a very nice sized Watermelon (Celebrity), a bunch of Peppers, two cucumbers and, as has been the case all year, a ton of tomatoes.

The watermelon measured 16" long and weighed 15 lbs plus.  I took it over to our family's Labor day picnic.  It smelled great and tasted even better.  Nothing like a fresh watermelon that was picked 6 hours earlier.  I haven't had too much success with watermelons but this year I did get two very nice ones.  I will be repeating this planting next year.  Only thing I will do differently is I will start them sooner in the garden.  

Off topic here, but on Saturday, my wife and I took a trip out to Frederick Maryland to a place called Chartreuse & Co. They have about 4 barns and several houses filled by vendors with antiques and other items.  Each Spring and Fall they have big events where the barns, houses and the fields around them are filled with vendors selling their stuff.  When we arrived, we were a little shocked to find out just how popular this event is.  There were cars everywhere and there were even two buses.  There were cars from Pa.,Virginia and Maryland.  There was so much to see that it took us quite a while to get to all the sites.  I did buy several items that I intended on using in my gardening as seen below.  

No, I didn't buy the dog.  That is my buddy Barkley dutifully guarding my purchases.  I plan on using the bucket and funnel for my compost teas so I can filter it.  The box at the bottom is an old security lock box.  That is where I intend on storing my seeds this winter

Well, that's all for now.  Next weekend my wife and I are travelling to Monticello to take in some seminars they are having as a part of their Heritage Harvest Festival.  I visited it once before and it was very breathtaking.  This time though is to learn about the soil and how to do winter gardening.  I will tell you all about it next week once I catch my breath.  Until next time, happy gardening!