High tunnel cucumbers Asian, Mandurian, and white

Trellised high tunnel Asian cucumbers.

 Mandurian round and Asian cucumbers.

Asian cucumbers grow straight when they trellised. If they are grown on the ground they are curved.

Asian cucumbers are large, but not seedy, even when it gets hot.

Asian cucumbers have spines that are easily wiped off with a paper towel.

Mandurian rounds are fuzzy but the fuzz washes off easily.

The Mandurian round is thin skinned and not seedy.

Standard Burpless soon to be trellised.

It is spring, but feels more like summer. I thought about putting pictures of our first tomatoes, but they did not last long enough to take pictures of. We will have to settle for cucumbers. We have several varieties of cucumbers. The three we have now are White Snacking, Mandurian, and Asian cucumbers. In a few weeks we will see a standard burpless. The high tunnel has really moved up the production time. The cucumber plants that are producing now were started in the green house and moved to the high tunnels just after the tomatoes. Cucumbers require a higher temperature than tomatoes, so are planted later. This year is starting off well with the warm spring temperatures. We are seeing accelerated production.

The White Snacking cumbers are no more then 4 to 5 inches long, and are one of the few sweet white cucumbers. They are pretty in salads or just right for a small snack. They can be used for pickling as well. The Mandurian Round is a fuzzy cucumber best picked at baseball size. They are fuzzy when you pick them but the fuzz washes off. They have a very thin peel so it is not necessary to peel these cucumbers.  The Mandurian Round is one of the sweetest cucumbers. Mandurians are in  a different family then most cucumbers, they are in the cucumis melo or the melon family. That means they are naturally burpless as well as sweet. The long cucumbers you see are Asian cucumbers. If you trellis the vines the cucumbers grow straight. If you let the vines cover the ground the fruit is curved. We like the Asian cucumbers because they are thin skinned like an English cucumber and never bitter. English cucumbers tend to go to seed when it gets hot. In Kansas we have very hot summers so we find this cucumber a better choice. Asian cucumbers do not get seedy nor do they get bitter in the heat. You do have to wrap them after harvesting, like an English cucumber, or they will go soft due to the thin skin.

We eat our cucumbers plain, but sometimes it 's nice to dress them up a little. Here is a easy recipe to try.

Slice cucumber into rounds
Slice an onion either sweet or a red
Balsamic vinaigrette
2 tablespoons vinegar mix into vinaigrette
1 teaspoon sugar mix into vinaigrette
Toss cucumber and onion till they are well coated with the dressing
Let sit for 30 to 45 minutes (this allows the vinegar to take the bitterness out of the onion)

Growing Tomato's

These are our high tunnels. The high tunnels are 20' x 90'. One is mostly tomatoes the other blue berries and raspberries.

Jerry is tilling the garden for more tomatoes. This tractor is a 1954 Allis Chalmers tractor. It was built when things were built to last.

This does not have much to do with tomatoes. This is Rylin she has just finished raiding the strawberries and snow peas. It was such a cute picture I had to use it.

Tomatoes make roots of the stem and should be planted up to the first leaves. A strong root system is essential to good growth.

These nodules will turn into roots

This tomato is in our outside garden. We will eventual put the tomatoes into a Florida weave trellis system to support the plant and keep the tomato's off the ground

Some heirloom tomato's have different shaded leaves then the hybrids. The leaves smell like tomatoes just like the hybrids. This is a heirloom tomato plant.

This is  a hybrid tomato plant.

This is a tomatillo plant. They are sometimes referred to as Mexican tomato's but they are in a different genus. The tomatillo is a member of the night shade family along with the egg plant and potato. Tomatillo's are good in salsas especially for those who do not like a strong tomato  flavor. Other tomatillo's are called ground cherries and have a pineapple flavor.

high tunnel tomato's

  Buffalo Creek Farms has around 120 tomato plants in the ground right now. We have over 20 varieties of tomato plants. The plants are mostly heirloom but there are varieties of hybrids as well. Some tomatoes are grown in the high tunnels others outside. The high tunnels are mostly filled with heirloom tomatoes, because the heirlooms are indeterminate. The indeterminate tomatoes continue to grow through out the season. The trellis system in the high tunnel is designed for this type of tomato plant. There are good reasons for both type. The outside tomato's will be put in to a Florida weave system.We have had a few ripe tomatoes already. I think we will start the real harvesting in about 3 weeks and continue throughout the season.

This high tunnel tomato is pretty amazing for May 12. We should have our first tomato's in the next few weeks.

This is a happy baby peach tree. All of our orchard is full of fruit.

It may be to hot for these to fully develop but baby beet greens are good to eat.

our broccli made great plants it is to bad there is very little broccli. I know you can eat the leaves but it is not the same.

Our high tunnel cucumbers. We have asian, white and hybrid

Our outside garden May 12. It is about an acre

There are lots of grapes on the grape vines this year

We found this high tunnel trellis system through the university of MN website.The  tomato's are indeterminate and will continue to grow through out the year. They will reach the top of the trellis system.

Kasumi cabbage

this baby is one of our asain cucumbers in the high tunnel. Asian cucumbers are always sweet never seedy. They are kind of like an english cucumber but they like the heat.

Our squash plants May12. We hope to have summer  squash in the net 3 to 4 weeks. We have 7 summer squashes and 2 winter squashes planted.

I am trying to figure out how to hide this little wonder so I can eat it myself. It looks to small to share!

rasberries planted this spring

little salsa pepper

Hi, my name is Kelly Krejci and this is our family farm. My husband and I, wanting to fulfill a life long dream of living on a farm, moved to Lawrence Kansas about 6 1/2 years ago. Our family consists of my husband, myself, our seven children, soon to be 2 grandchildren, 2 dogs, 2 horses etc. We still have three boys at home ages 13, 15, and 16. All of our children live in the area except my son Alex who is at Vanderbilt studying physics. All of our kids help on the farm in varying ways. Heather the oldest keeps our facebook pages. Jason, our oldest son, does our research and development. Daniel's wife Sawn designed our logo. Alex does my website and even came back to help put up the high tunnels. The three youngest boys mow, weed, or what ever we can get them to do.  I raise Persian kittens. Who doesn't want to spend the day playing with kittens? My husband, Jerry, installs shutters to pay the bills in his real life. In his fantasy world all he would do is plant trees, raspberries, raises piglets, etc. This blog is about us building our fantasy life. I will take just a minute to encourage everyone to live their dreams; it is never too late to redefine your life. The only true failure in your life will be the things you did not try. If two city people can move and try farming at our age it is not to late for anyone. Lets get started with what we have growing today.