lawn&garden harvest 2011

a w a t c h n e w s p a p e r s p u b l i c a t i o n

canned tomatoes = happiness in a jar PAGE 2 • fall/winter water guide PAGE 3 • living tea for living soil PAGE 4 • fall weed control PAGE 5 • it’s still farmers market season PAGE 7

HOPS TO MARKET – Scott and Pam Bennett, owners, founders and farmers of San Juan Hop Farm, do it all – planting, picking, drying, conditioning, baling—even stenciling the company name on the burlap sacks. The two celebrated San Juan Hop Farm’s second true harvest last week in Montrose after processing 3,000 pounds of dry hops. “You would not believe how many hops it takes to make a pound of hops,” Pam Bennett said. “It takes a lot!” A dry hop retains only 10 percent of its original weight, so in the case of San Juan Hop Farm, a 3,000-pound harvest requires 30,000 pounds of fresh hops. The farm has the infrastructure to grow hops on 34 acres, but as a startup, the Bennetts have plants on 15 acres and harvested 7.5 acres this past week. Due to a shortage of the popular Centennial hops in the Northwest, business is ‘brewing’ for San Juan Hop Farm (and a handful of other small-hop farms sprouting up in the Southwest). “Brewers are really psyched to get our hops,” Pam said. “The movement is to grow locally and buy locally.” Regional brewers like Ska Brewing Company, Colorado Native Beer, Moab Brewery, Boulder Beer, and Smuggler’s Brewery will be using San Juan Hops to craft their micro-brews this fall. (Photo by Brett Schreckengost)

thursday, september 8, 2011 the watch

2 lawn&garden

Happiness Is a Jar Of Home-Canned Spaghetti Sauce

by Gus Jarvis

Last winter, I was forced to check out the spaghetti sauce aisle at the supermarket for the first time in more than two years. It was early in the eve-ning, after a long weekend of

fishing, and I was tired, hungry and craving a comforting meal that only a big bowl of spaghet-ti could satisfy.

With all the crazy varieties of sauces in front of me, you’d think I would find what I need-ed. Instead, I found frustration.

Do I want the plain old New-man’s Own Marinara Sauce? Do I want Classico’s Caramel-ized Onion in Garlic? Emeril’s Eggplant Gaaahlic Sauce? How about Sockarooni Sauce? What

the hell is Sockarooni Sauce? Can’t I just buy a sauce that tastes fresh and vibrant?

It was then I regretted the handful of family members and friends who’d received a jar of our homemade canned sauce from last year, because none of these crazy varieties of sauces could satisfy my craving. Nev-er again, I told myself, will I just hand out our beautiful jars of homemade sauce to even the closest of friends. Hell,

I’m not sure even my mom de-serves one.

No store-bought sauce cap-tures the flavors of summer like homemade spaghetti sauce, and once you’ve tasted it, you’ll never shop the spaghetti sauce aisle with enthusiasm.

Torie and I are canning nov-ices. Our first canning venture was three years ago, when we decided to capture the flavor of the Western Slope’s green chili harvest, and canned 20 or so

jars of peach salsa. And while it had been in the back of our minds to do our own tomato sauce, one day the task was forced upon us.

Torie had gone out to grab a few pounds of roasted chilies at a roadside stand near our house on the east end of Montrose. She came back with the news that a local farmer had romas ready by the case and priced

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happy caNNiNG – Gus Jarvis in the midst of an all-day tomato-can-ning extravaganza. (Photo by Torie Jarvis)

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the watch thursday, september 8, 2011

NORWOOD – What better way to celebrate season’s end and the region’s long Indian summer than with a sunset-filled evening

of fine food and wine in an inti-mate rural setting. The community is invited to partake in the second annual Wright’s Mesa Harvest Dinner, Saturday, Oct. 8, 6 p.m. at the historic Joseph Ranch in Nor-wood. The event is a charitable fundraiser for the Wright Stuff Community Foundation, featur-ing a five-course meal prepared by chef Julie Thorneycroft using all locally-grown food, as well as wine from a regional vineyard. This year’s event will also include a silent auction.

The working menu for the event includes appetizers made with local tomatoes, a lamb shish kabob main course paired with yogurt sauce and Moroccan-spiced squash, and a dessert made from applies and cherries from Nucla. Other offerings will be in-corporated into the meal depend-ing upon what is fresh and locally available. This year guests will

be served pinot noir and chardon-nay from Black Bridge winery. Silent auction items include two original watercolor paintings, a Black Bridge Winery gift basket, ski passes and more. Tickets are $125/per individual, $225/couple or three for $325. Seating is lim-ited to 50.

To make reservations, contact WSCF Executive Director Andrya Brantingham at 970/327-0555, ext. 11.

Native Fruits aNd Nuts class OFFered

this thursday

NORWOOD – San Miguel Basin Colorado State University Extension presents a Native Fruits and Nuts of Summer and Fall this Thursday, Sept. 8 at the Clockson Building, San Miguel County An-nex in Norwood, 8 a.m.-5 p.m.

Limited to 10 people, the class includes identification, gathering and preserving of native fruits and nuts. The cost is $25, and covers the class, an informational book-let, jellies and dessert. For more information and to register, con-tact the CSU Extension in Nor-wood, 970/327-4393 or email Maryw@sanmiguelcountyorg.

weehawkeN OFFers Fall hOrticulture classes

OURAY COUNTY – As summer draws to a close, it’s the perfect time to soak up some nature before cool fall weather creeps in. Weehawken Arts offers two classes to get you outside and get you dirty – in a good way.

Weehawken’s Fall Harvest Plant Walk with Melanie Kent on Saturday, Sept. 10, provides the opportunity to learn to identify edible and medicinal plants before they go dormant. During the slow-paced walk students will learn about powerful medicinal roots, such as osha, and how to ethically wildcraft them.

“We may just get lucky and make some medicine in the field to keep us healthy through the winter,” says instructor Melanie Kent.

The walk will begin in Ouray and runs from 10 a.m.-2 p.m. This workshop is intended for ages 10 through adult and costs $37 for Weehawken Members and $40 for non-members.

Yvette Henson of Colorado State University Extension returns

2nd Wright’s Mesa Harvest Dinner Planned In Norwood, Oct. 8

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Quick Facts

Water trees, shrubs, lawns, and perennials during prolonged dry fall and winter periods to pre-vent root damage that affects the health of the entire plant.

Water only when air and soil temperatures are above 40 de-grees F with no snow cover.

Established large trees have a root spread equal to or greater than the height of the tree. Apply water to the most critical part of the root zone within the drip line.

Dry air, low precipitation, lit-tle soil moisture, and fluctuating temperatures are characteristics of fall and winter in many areas of Colorado. There often can be little or no snow cover to provide soil moisture, particularly from October through March. Trees, shrubs, perennials and lawns can be damaged if they do not receive supplemental water.

The result of long, dry peri-ods during fall and winter is in-jury or death to parts of plant root

systems. Affected plants may ap-pear perfectly normal and resume growth in the spring using stored food energy. Plants may be weak-ened and all or parts may die in late spring or summer when tem-peratures rise. Weakened plants also may be subject to insect and disease problems.

plaNts seNsitive tO drOuGht iNJury

Woody plants with shallow root systems require supplemen-tal watering during extended dry fall and winter periods. These include European white and pa-per birches; Norway, silver, red, Rocky Mountain, and hybrid ma-ples; lindens, alder, hornbeams, dogwood, willows, and mountain ash. Evergreen plants that ben-efit include spruce, fir, arborvitae, yew, Oregon grape-holly, box-wood, and Manhattan euonymus. Woody plants benefit from mulch to conserve soil moisture.

Herbaceous perennials and ground covers in exposed sites are more subject to winter freez-ing and thawing. This opens

cracks in soil that expose roots to cold and drying. Winter watering combined with mulching can pre-vent damage.

Lawns also are prone to win-ter damage. Newly established lawns, whether seed or sod, are especially susceptible to damage. Susceptibility increases for lawns with south or west exposures.

wateriNG GuideliNes

Water only when air tem-peratures are above 40 degrees F. Apply water at mid-day so it will have time to soak in before possible freezing at night. A solid layer (persisting for more than a month) of ice on lawns can cause suffocation or result in matting of the grass.

Plants receiving reflected heat from buildings, walls and fences are more subject to dam-age. The low angle of winter sun makes this more likely in south or west exposures. Windy sites result in faster drying of sod and plants and require additional wa-

Horticultural BriefsBy Watch Staff

see brieFs on page 7

see wateriNG on page 7

4 lawn&gardenthursday, september 8, 2011 the watch

TeaCo Biological Supply Serves Montrose and Telluride Region

by martinique davis

TELLURIDE/MONTROSE – Water swirls in a funnel-shaped vat, bubbling through a series of connected tubes. The concoction mulling inside is alive, a simple yet powerful recipe, explains TeaCo Biological Supply owner Scotty Abrahams, blending components like all-organic compost, sea kelp, worm castings, and molasses in a medium of “living” (not chlorinat-ed) water. The brownish liquid he pours from a spout into a recycled one-gallon jug is unlike any fertil-izer you can buy on the commercial market, Abrahams says. What’s more, it could change the way con-sumers fertilize their landscapes.

“Most traditional fertilizers just feed the plant; we feed the soil,” Abrahams says, detailing the process by which this Vortex Brewing System creates TeaCo compost tea. Rather than utilizing chlorinated, or anaerobic, water as merely a medium for the fertilizer, the Vortex brewer actually makes water an important element of the

formula by restoring it to its “living” form on the molecular level. “So be-fore we even put anything into the brewer, we’re working with something that’s much different in form molecularly,” Abra-hams says.

Next comes the addi-tion of the compost, sea kelp, worm castings, and molasses to make a ba-sic sugar-based compost tea, which, Abrahams is quick to note, works much differently than traditional salt-based, anaerobic fertilizers, as well as all-organic but non-aerobic products. TeaCo compost tea en-riches the soil, feeding everything in the “soil web.”

Plants are merely byproducts of a well-fed soil web, just like a tree is a byproduct of a healthy soil web in a forest, Abrahams explains. “It’s all very dependent on mycol-ogy,” he says, noting that TeaCo fertilizers replicate the natural pro-cesses for feeding plants using wa-ter that’s alive, with sugar-based, naturally occurring ingredients that don’t strip the soil of its ben-eficial microbes, and actually help restore those microbes in already degraded soils.

A passionate indoor grower,

Abrahams knows fertilizer prod-ucts; he is also the owner of Tellu-ride Hydroponics and Montrose-based Colorado Hydroponics retail stores, wherein hundreds of different name-brand organic fer-tilizers line the shelves. His TeaCo compost tea could replace all of them, he says, because it can out-perform other products yet costs the same or even less. Not to men-tion TeaCo compost tea is made locally, and can be customized based on the type of landscape on which it will be used.

Living compost tea hasn’t bro-ken into the conventional agricul-tural and residential landscaping market because of one major stum-bling block: availability. Because of the unique, “living” nature of

the formula, it has a shelf life and thus cannot be mass bottled, sealed, and shipped to points across the map. As Abrahams describes, that would negate the product’s ben-efits as a “living” or aerobic fertil-izer, since the conventional manu-facturing and shipping processes would essentially kill the microbes that make “living” water animate. The TeaCo company gets around that obstacle by making compost tea on-site in both Montrose and Telluride; it is also available for delivery across the region.

The product can be purchased in as little as 16 oz. bottles, for $5.95, up to five gallons at $49.95, for smaller-scale applications at home, both indoors and out. For larger-scale applications, like

lawns, pastures, golf courses, and other landscapes, TeaCo can coor-dinate shipment and application. The company can also advise larg-er-scale consumers about opportu-nities to create their own compost tea on-site with the Vortex-brand brewing system.

For more information about TeaCo products, contact 970/728-5001 or email teacoloradohydro@gmail.com. TeaCo Biological Sup-ply is located at 714 South Park Drive, Unit D in Telluride (Illium) next to Telluride Hydroponics. TeaCo products are also available at Colorado Hydroponics in Mon-trose, located at 2740 Commercial Way, Unit 1, next to McDonald’s on the corner of S. Townsend Ave. and O’delle Rd.

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LivinG cOmpOst tea – Scotty Abrahams showing off the final product. (Photo by Brett Schreckengost)

lawn&garden 5 the watch thursday, september 8, 2011

by sheila Grother, san miGuel county weed proGram manaGer

As fall approaches we tend to stop thinking about noxious weeds – after all they’ve finished growing, they’ve sent their seeds skyward or to the ground and it appears to be too late to think about controlling them for this year. You may think this, but you are wrong.

Late season weed control can actually be the most effective of all. A little effort now can mean less work, fewer weeds and more desirable vegetation next spring. Prevention is a key element in any integrated weed control program and now is the time to prevent those nasty weeds from invading your space in 2012.

Late season weed control may involve hand-pulling ma-ture plants, or cutting seedheads, before seeds are distributed – a good strategy for annual weeds and biennials such as burdock, houndstongue and musk thistle. Remember to collect the seed-heads and dispose of them prop-erly or your efforts may backfire. Don’t attempt to compost plant material that contains weed seeds; temperatures may not get high enough to completely destroy the seeds. If you still have green growing weeds that have not yet seeded you may want to consider mowing them before the seed is completely formed to reduce seed distribution for next year. This is particularly effective with annual

plants and weedy grasses. For the control of rhizoma-

tous perennial plants, one of the best times to apply herbicides is in the fall when the plants are stor-ing energy for the winter. Russian knapweed and Canada thistle, two fairly common invaders across the area, are readily controlled in the fall. Research plots have demon-strated excellent control on Rus-sian knapweed that was treated in early December, even after the plants appear to be dormant. Rus-sian knapweed and Canada thistle rosettes appear in the fall after seed is set and are particularly vulner-able to herbicides. Both are peren-nial plants that spread by roots and seeds and store a large amount of energy in their root systems to-wards the next year’s growth.

Get a good head start on next year’s weed control by working on it now.

Both San Miguel and Mon-trose Counties have cost share programs for private landown-ers. The cost share programs have been developed to reduce the cost of weed control to pri-vate landowners and decrease the spread of weeds onto neighbor-ing property, whether roadside, public land or a neighbor. For applications and more informa-tion contact San Miguel County at 970/327-0399 or Montrose County at 970/249-5216.

For more specific control rec-ommendations or identification information, please don’t hesitate to contact your county weed con-trol program.

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ready to re-seed – End-of-sea-son Canada thistle. (Courtesy photo)

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to sell. We said yes to 50 pounds of the ripe, sweet and irresistible tomatoes and dove head first into our first batch of canned tomato sauce.

First we consulted the Natu-ral Center for Home Food Pres-ervation website for safe water-bath canning tips and a recipe. Voila! – we found exactly what we needed, a recipe with just about everything I wanted in a good, flavor-packed sauce: Gar-lic, green peppers, onion, oreg-ano, and some brown sugar to keep it from tasting too acidic.

With boxes of fresh produce, empty jars and a steaming kitch-en, our canning mission was un-derway, and we wasted no time trashing our small kitchen. To-mato juice everywhere, includ-ing the floor. Sauce splatters on the stove. It was hard work and overwhelming at times, and we wondered if all of this trouble was really worth a case of canned spaghetti sauce. But after an exhausting day, first standing over a boiling stove and then a long cleanup, we went to bed satisfied with our beautiful lineup of sauce-filled jars. The next morning, we checked to see if the tops remained sealed. So far so good.

Next came the hardest part. How long can we wait to open one of these gems? Curiosity got the best of us, and two days later, we popped open a jar. It tasted pretty good, but our true appre-ciation of the flavor of the sauce came in mid-January, when the temperature outside hovered around 15 degrees.

With a break of the jar’s seal, the magic of locally grown tomatoes came alive once again – a gratifying treat during a de-pressing winter. Sweet, bright, acidic and satisfying. It may be a cliché to call it canned happi-ness or even canned summer, but it’s truly in-your-face good.

It was during that dreary and long winter that we decided to celebrate the end of every sum-mer with canning sauce – that one day of hard work was a small price to pay for a whole year’s worth of summer joy. Since then, we’ve gotten better at the canning process, as well as our timing.

First, we can when college football starts, so when we’re stuck in the house for an entire Saturday, at least there’s great TV. (Note to canning sports-fans: Put the remote control in plastic wrap, to make channel changing easier.) We also make sure to have lots of beer on hand, which goes well with football, makes canning more fun and cools a parched throat caused by an extra steamy kitchen. We learned the hard way to always wear food-prep gloves when blanching/de-seeding the toma-toes to keep the acid from eating away at our skin.

One final thought: If you want to make it through an en-tire year with your canned sauce

– resist giving it away. Resist the impulse to hand out jars all around, for your friends to try. This is a mistake. Your friends don’t need to know how good your sauce is. Only you need to

know how good your sauce is. Call me greedy here, but be-

lieve me, it’s no fun pacing the tomato-sauce aisle in February, when what you’re really craving is a jar of summer joy.

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step by step – From raw (top) to cooked to the finished product (bottom), after 45 minutes in a steam bath. (Photo by Torie Jarvis)

the watch thursday, september 8, 2011

ter. Lawns in warm exposures are prone to late winter mite damage. Water is the best treatment to pre-vent turf injury.

Monitor weather conditions and water during extended dry periods without snow cover – one to two times per month.

NewLy pLaNted Vs. estabLIshed pLaNts

Newly planted trees are most susceptible to winter drought injury. Woody trees generally take one year to establish for each inch of trunk diameter. For example, a two-inch diameter (caliper) tree takes a minimum

of two years to establish under normal conditions.

Trees obtain water best when it is allowed to soak into the soil slowly to a depth of 12 inches. Methods of watering trees in-clude: sprinklers, deep-root fork or needle, soaker hose or soft spray wand. Apply water to many locations under the drip line and beyond if possible. If you use a deep-root fork or needle, insert no deeper than 8 inches into the soil. As a general survival rule, apply 10 gallons of water for each diameter inch of the tree. For example, a two-inch diameter tree needs 20 gallons per water-ing. Use a ruler to measure your tree’s diameter.

Newly planted shrubs re-

quire more water than established shrubs that have been planted for at least one year. The following recommendations assume shrubs are mulched to retain moisture. In dry winters, all shrubs benefit from winter watering from Oc-tober through March. Apply five gallons two times per month for a newly planted shrub. Small es-tablished shrubs (less than three

feet tall) should receive five gal-lons monthly. Large established shrubs (more than six feet) re-quire 18 gallons on a monthly ba-sis. Decrease amounts to account for precipitation. Water within the drip line of the shrub and around the base.

Herbaceous perennial estab-lishment periods vary. Bare root plants require longer to establish

than container plants. Perennials transplanted late in the fall will not establish as quickly as plants planted in spring. Winter water-ing is advisable with late planted perennials, bare root plants, and perennials located in windy or southwest exposures.

– Courtesy Colorado State University Extension

to Weehawken this month to offer a Composting 101 class on Thurs-day, Sept. 15 in Ridgway. Class participants will learn the basics for creating indoor and outdoor composting systems, with an em-phasis on indoor and small-space systems composting in vessels, vermicomposting (with worms), and anaerobic composting.

Other topics covered will be the benefits of composting, troubleshooting, what to do with

finished compost, pest control and exclusion, and composting resources.

Composting 101 will run from 6 to 8 p.m. and is intended for ages 16 through adult. The fee for the workshop is $19 for Wee-hawken members or $21 for non-members.

For more information on these and other workshops, or for on-line registration, visit Weehawken Creative Arts at www.weehawke-narts.org or call Weehawken at 970/318-0150.

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graNd JuNctIoN, Main StreetThursdays, 5-8:30 p.m., through Sept. 15970/245-9697

maNcos, 178 E. Frontage Rd.Thursdays, 4:30-6:30 p.m., through Sept. 29970/533-7725, www.mancoscolorado.com

moNtrose, South 1st St. & Uncompahgre, Centennial PlazaWednesdays, 8:30 a.m.-1 p.m., through SeptemberSaturdays, 8:30 a.m.-1 p.m., through October970/209-8463, www.montrosefarmersmarket.com

Norwood, 1120 Summit St.Saturdays, 9 a.m.-1 p.m., through Oct. 8NorwoodFarmMarket@Yahoo.com, norwoodfarmmarket.org

paoNIa, 3rd & Grand StreetsSaturdays, 10 a.m.-2 p.m., through October970/835-7600

rIdgway, Ouray County 4-H Event Center Parking LotFridays, 1-5 p.m., through Oct. 14www.farmersmarketridgway.com

teLLurIde, South Oak StreetFridays, 11 a.m.-4 p.m., through Oct. 14415/728-2509, www.thetelluridefarmersmarket.com

REGIONALFARMERS MARKETS

lawn&garden 7 harVestINg haLLoweeN pumpKINs – K.J. Heinze found the perfect carving pumpkin last year at DeVries Buffalo Ranch Pumpkin Patch near Olathe. (File photo)

autumn is awesomeat camelot gardens

i n s t o r e s p e c i a l s • g r e a t a d v i c e • o p e n 7 d a y s a w e e k

nursery ......Beautiful trees & shrubs......natives......drought resistant

soils......organics and potting soils

Perennials......over 1200 varieties!!

christmas shoP oPen before you know it!

delivery/installationavailable

gift shoP ......something for everyone

seeds & hydroPonic suPlies

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