Growing Peanuts in Zone 4?

We have a huge Farmers market in downtown Minneapolis and it is almost always very crowded - every weekend.  There is a huge assortment of vegetables and fruit vendors selling stuff from their farms(and sometimes stuff shipped from another city or even country). Today was my first visit of the year, not so much to buy anything, but to check out what the farmers are selling locally.  Yes, that is my idea of garden planning for next year :)  Also, I end up buying so much stuff than I really should, so that will keep me busy for this coming week!

I use the farmers market as an idea of what other vegetables/fruits I could possibly grow in my own backyard.  If they can grow it, so can I!!  So imagine my surprise, when I found several people selling buckets of peanuts!!  Peanuts, is one thing I had never ever seen in this market before.  I have been going to this market virtually every year for over a dozen years!! 

Unfortunately, I did not have my camera with me, so I couldn't take a picture of the beautiful farmstands.  This is what I bought.

The pile on the left is $2.50 and the right side is $5.  I talked to the vendor and he told me that they save the same raw peanuts and plant them next year.  I have no idea if peanuts will do well in my backyard, but seeing the amount of peanuts they were selling, I'm willing to try.  I plan to save some and eat the rest.  If anyone has any ideas on growing peanuts, please let me know.

Also, these are pictures of the covering for the first light frost last sunday.  Plants were still burned underneath, so maybe I did something wrong....

 

 

Bittergourd(on right) burned under the sheets(:

 

Harvest Monday - Sept 24, 2012

This harvest is past our first light frost for the year!  As the frost was early Sunday morning, Saturday saw me busily picking out whatever I could salvage and then covering up everything as much as I could!  Being a windy day, it was hard to keep everything covered (:

Even the melons - 2 watermelons, 2 cantelopes were harvested, none of them ripe enough.  Tomatoes with lighter green colors were all harvested.  I did plan on covering them all, but somehow a frost means very watery tomatoes (when ripe).  Only brussel sprouts, chards, kohlrabi, carrots and beets were not picked/covered as they could withstand light frosts.

Thanks to Daphne for hosting Harvest Mondays, here's my contribution.

Cantelope(ripe), tomatoes, longbeans, cukes, okra

 

Tomatoes, ripe

 

Green tomatoes, before frost

 

2 watermelons and 2 cantelopes - not ripe.

 

 

 

 

 

Harvest Monday - Sept 17, 2012

This maybe the last major harvest for this year!  On the possiblity of a light frost today evening, I harvested as much as possible yesterday morning.  I found the watermelons were off the vine, not because they were ripe but because the vines started dying off, maybe because of cool nights(?)  I have no idea.  I cut open one on the demand of my younger child, but the inside hadn't yet turned a darker color yet, but it was consumed as a juice.  I was told it was delicious, nevertheless. 

I feel a little sad that this year's harvests of chili peppers and tomatoes are maybe half of what I had last year.  I was on vacation for the main part of their growth, so that might be a reason.  Anyways, something is better than nothing :)  I hope to do better next year!  I am very happy with the bittergourd plants.  I grew 2 plants out of maybe 20+ seeds, but they were saved from gourds we got from grocery store.  From those two plants, so far we've gotten 7 gourds!!  There are few more tiny ones, but they may not make it if there is a frost.  There are still a couple more melons that have to ripen. Most of the plants are starting to yellow and slow down on production.  This week is predicted to be about 20 degrees cooler! 

Thanks to Daphne for hosting the Harvest Mondays!  There are too many pictures this week, so my apologies in advance. 

Bush beans

 

Kohlrabi, tomatoes, okra, cukes, chili peppers

 

Watermelon, ripe jalapenos, chili peppers

 

White radishes

 

Tomatoes, bush beans, long beans, cuke

 

Radish greens

 

Cilantro

 

Fenugreek leaves

 

Garden produce!

 

 Jalapeno

 

Kung Pao peppers

 

Cayenne Pepppers

 

Bell Peppers

 

Tomatoes

 

Long beans, red chillies

 

Eggplant, bittergourds, watermelons, banana peppers, zucchini, cuke, kohlrabi

 

Beets

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Harvest Monday - Sept 10, 2012

I'm posting this a day later, as I've been busy yesterday and didn't get around to uploading everything!  This week, eggplants came in and so did tomatoes(finally!).  The moles/voles located my beets and proceeded to uproot the plants and eat the small beets(sigh...), so I spent sometime readjusting my fence and so far there are no more uprootings.

The cooler nights are making the plants slowly turn to yellow and fade away.  The signs are prominent on zucchini(powdery mildew), cukes(both), melon plants are browning and so too tomatoes and long beans.  The rest on the plants are on their way out and it won't be long before everything starts dying off.  The first frost here is around Sept 22nd.   Until then, these are the harvests for the week.  Thanks to Daphne for hosting the Harvest Mondays!

Fenugreek leaves

 

Bittergourds, banana peppers, long beans, eggplants

 

Beet leaves

 

Golden beets (some of them half eaten by voles)

 

Long beans, tomaotes, cuke

 

Swiss Chard

 

Kale

 

Basil

 

Tomato, cukes

 

Bush beans, turnips, tomato, cukes, okra

 

Long beans, tomatoes, orange bell, cukes, sage, thyme, red chillies

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Harvest Monday - Sept 3, 2012

This week we harvested the melons!!  Altogether 5 of them(different days) fell of their stems into the mesh bags tied around them(on the vertical trellis).  They were too juicy and fragrant! yum!  Also kohlrabi was finally harvested- first of the season.

Rest of the harvests were as usual - beans, cukes, zucchini, some raspberries and the last couple blackberries.  Thanks to Daphne for hosting Harvest Mondays!

The only melon to crack...

 

First of the kohlrabis, more carrots, cilantro, orange bell, cukes, zucchini

 

Long beans, another melon, zucchini

 

OK, I had to show this :)

 

Long beans, bush beans, tomatoes, cukes

 

Eggplants, banana peppers

 

Long beans, tomatoes, bush beans,  chillies

 

Long beans, white eggplant, orange bells, bush beans, cukes, red chilli peppers

 

Red raspberries

 

 Zucchini