Got the garden all planted this past week. I wasn't as ready as I thought I
was. It wasn't as simple as popping the seedlings in. There were weeds to
remove first so the whole thing took all week. It was extra warm, one day
getting up to 91 degrees. The soil here is mostly clay. The amendments I added
last yr seemed to have disappeared amongst all that clay. My garden was a lawn
last spring. It took a lot of work to transform it but the soil needs help. My
big compost bin paid off with wheelbarrow after wheelbarrow full of lovely
compost. I was able to put enough in each bed to give the plants a good start.
In the short beds I added one wheelbarrow full and the longer beds (14' long)
got 2 wheelbarrows full.
I took the sandbox this year and planted corn in it. I put 4
wheelbarrows full of compost into that bed alone. I still felt like that
wasn't enough, I'm transforming sand into garden soil mind you. So when
I planted the corn, I dug a deep hole and filled it with good soil.
We'll see if that will be enough for them. I'm excited about growing
corn this year. We should get enough to eat and freeze! I planted 36
seedlings so we'll see how much we get from that! Now if you're a
gardener you're thinking why doesn't she add the sand to the beds and
help that clay soil? I did a lot of that last summer but I just don't
have the back to do it this spring.
This is the bed that I have squash in. Half is zucchini and half summer squash.
Here's the summer squash. These seeds were started just a couple weeks ago.
Here's the zucchini squash. We've gotten some heavy rain in the last few days. I only lost one zucchini plant. Luckily I had another one to pop in.
I always hang on to all my extra plants in case I need to replant some.
Here's a couple of tomato plants. I'm giving them 2 ft between plants this year. I think each plant will get bigger and I should get bigger fruit. Last yr I planted them 1 ft apart and got a lot of small tomatoes.
Here's the tomato bed, a little in the shade when I went out this morning. It rained last night so everything is happy. They grow so much better on rain water.
The tee pee is up and doing fine. The green beans are planted but none have come up yet.
Notice at the corners of each bed I've put long sticks in the ground. That's to keep the hose from getting in the beds and doing damage, while I drag the hose around to water.
This pic shows the base of the teepee where I dug a trench all the way around, just like last yr. It needs to be dug out every spring. In the course of the year it fills up with dirt and debris. In the middle is a thick layer of wood chips to keep the weeds down and give us a place to walk with no mud.
Here are the peas and cucumbers. Last year the peas were ahead of the cucumbers in growth. After the peas were done and taken down the cucumbers were trained onto the fence. This yr will be different, they look like they'll be competing for the trellis.
A couple of the cucumbers are already long enough to grab the trellis. They'll just have to share this summer.
We had so many late snowstorms, it kept me from planting peas earlier.
Here is a tomatillo plant. I gave them more room this yr as well.
The tomatillos are happy in their bed. There are 10 plants in here.
This is 1 of three blackberry plants that I got this yr. If this was our own house I would have put them in the ground. This way we can take them with us when we move in a couple yrs. The lattice behind it I made from apple branches a few yrs ago.
Another blackberry plant. The varieties I got are Apache, Ouachita and Triple Crown. The third plant came all dried out with no leaves so I'm nursing that one along till it gets more leaves.
It will recover but it was definitely stressed. A stressed plant won't give you as much produce.
Here's a cherry tomato plant that I started indoors at the end of December. It's now on our porch giving us a handful of tomatoes every day!
These blue pots have birdhouse gourd plants. They'll vine up this trellis and should give us some nice shade.
I was so excited to find an almond seed in the compost pile that had sprouted! Now I have a little almond tree!! How cool is that!!
Here's our granddaughter Stella, helping Grandma water the peas.
Here I'm explaining how the peas will climb up the trellis. The next week when she came she told me, "Peas climb up". She remembers everything. She's on her way to becoming a great gardener!
Have you planted anything? Let me know!
