The Garden, July 1

Garden Disaster

If you ever wondered what would happen if you turned your back on your garden for two months in the summer, you don't need to anymore.  This is what will happen:

The weeds will grow up out of every possible bit of ground that isn't completely mulched.  Even if it is mulched, the weeds will bust through and grow, grow, grow.

The weeds will eventually smother everything, even the baby strawberry plants you tenderly cared for during the spring.  You won't even be able to distinguish the beds from the paths--the weeds will hide it all!   

After a summer of neglecting my garden in order to focus on our house, this is what I'm facing for my fall work.  I'm feeling so overwhelmed by it all!  Just thinking about the back-breaking work that went into creating these gardens over the last six years and the amount of back-breaking work it will take to get them back into shape for next spring makes me want to throw my hands up in the air and walk away.  But I know I can't do that.  Facing next spring, summer and fall without gardening would be even more depressing than looking at the weed-smothered garden of right now.

Here are the options I'm mulling over:
1.  Save the strawberries, let everything else go. 
2.  Save the strawberries, and plant garlic (which means wedding a section of the garden, prepping the garlic bed and planting).
3.  Save the strawberries and work bit by bit to rescue the garden, too.  That would mean finding the beds again, wedding them, prepping them with all the things that need to go into them for productivity, and then wedding and re-mulching the paths. 
4.  Do absolutely nothing with the garden until the house is done, we're moved in and I can focus on the garden again. 

I keep oscillating between all four options, but right now I'm thinking more and more about option 3.  I just don't know if I could face a spring without getting into the soil and planting!  Any suggestions?

Catching Up!

It's been two months since I last posted!  Why so long?  School, work, icky weather, projects--all of those kinds of things.  Since I last wrote the weather has finally turned spring-like.  We've had mostly sunny days for the last week and the temperatures have been getting into the sixties.  After a month of rain, fog and temps in the 40s, I was ready for the sunshine and so were my plants!  As soon as the sun came out the garden began to grow, and now it's not looking half bad.

The garlic.  Remember when you could barely see it poking out of the ground?  Now it's knee high!

Potatoes in the front and onions in the back.  I transplanted the onions probably a month ago and they did NOTHING until about a week ago when the sun came out.  Now I bet they've doubled in size. 

Peas.  Again, they did nothing but sit there and get munched by slugs until the sun came out.  Now they're climbing up the netting and producing nice new growth. 

I just transplanted these tomato plants over the weekend.  It's nice and warm and humid in the greenhouse--perfect for tomatoes.  I hope to see them taking over the place soon!

The deer got into my strawberries a couple of weeks ago.  I broke down in tears!  But it wasn't long before the plants began to regenerate leaves and set flowers again.  Now there are little tiny green berries developing.

The only brussles sprout seedling that wasn't demolished by mice.  That's right--the darn rodents got into the cold frame holding all of my brassicas and got almost all of them.  Fortunately, the neighbor's cat got into the greenhouse and scared the little buggers away before they could get everything!  A few lived plants lived and are now growing nicely in the garden. 

I can't wait to see this peony bloom!  The ants are just showing up, so hopefully it will be soon!

My first lettuce outside of the greenhouse and cold frames.

Baby carrots.

Considering the mice, the deer, the slugs, the snails, the rain, the fog and the cold, the garden is doing alright.  I just hope the sun sticks around for a bit! 

A Saturday in the Spring

Busy, busy, busy.  That would describe our day.  Jason worked on the leech field all day.  He leveled and leveled and leveled and then finally put down the drains.  They are all in place now and it looks great!  He's hoping to be ready for an inspection by next Saturday.

I was working on garden things all day long.  It was delightful!

All of the fixing for soil blocks.  Seed starting mix, a five gallon bucket and a seed tray.  I couldn't for the life of me find my soil blocker.  I must have looked for two hours today!  I searched the whole apartment and all of the other likely places I might have put it after using it last spring, but no luck.  Finally I took a little applesauce container that was in the trash at school and used it to make the soil blocks.  It worked.  It took a long time, but it worked.  

Here are the applesauce container soil blocks.  Not too bad looking. 

And the seeds waiting to be planted.  

And here they are: red cabbage, green cabbage, kale, brussels sprouts, dill and cilantro, ready to go into the coldframe and grow!

Sitting next to those lovely onion seedlings is a flat of peas.  I'm trying  two different things with the garden this year:  1.)  I'm planting by the moon.  It's a method that's been used for ages and I'm going to give it a try.  I can't wait to see the results!  2.)  I'm starting a bunch of things in flats in the greenhouse rather than direct seeding.  I think it will give the little plants a head start and I think they might be more likely to overcome the slugs and other pests in the garden.  Plus I can hold off on planting until the ground has warmed up a bit, but not loose time.  We will see if it's worth it.  In the meantime, I'm enjoying the thrill of garden plans and preparation!    

The Homefront

After a week of recovering from an injury, Jason is back to work on the house!  He is now working on the septic system.  It's looking great.

The hole for the septic tank. 

The septic tank and the drains for the leech field. 

Working on leveling the leech field. 

He has also been working on framing in more windows.

In the garden there is all sorts of excitement, too! 

Onion seedlings.  I'm hoping to transplant in two weeks, so I moved them out of their coldframe today and put them into the greenhouse to harden them off. 

Perennial scallions.  We ate some of these in our supper last night.  Delicious!

The garlic just sending up its first shoots.  Can you see the little shoot in the picture?

Looking like something from outer space, rhubarb!

A pleasant surprise--two of my grafting attempts made it!  Here is the first one I noticed. 

And here is the second one I noticed.  Now, don't ask me what kind of apple they will produce.  I was pretty convinced none of my grafting attempts would work last spring, so I didn't label any of them!  These will be a surprise when they begin to produce fruit in a few years.