Tuesday, May 28, 2013

Square foot gardening in action. Or not.

My raised beds are built, if not all filled, and the plants are laid out in grids, for the most part. Tonight I transplanted the Roma tomatoes and marigolds, and planted bush beans and sunflowers. Tomorrow I hope to get the zukes and cukes and sweet corn into the ground, and maybe some root crops. We had a good rain yesterday, with more promised for the weekend, so gotta move.

These three tomato plants are not actually planted in wood chips but in bags of Miracle-Gro. This is one of the beds that is not filled yet, so I layered some grass clippings on the bottom, situated the M-G on top of that, then disguised the plastic with wood chips. Once the tomatoes are done for the season, the M-G will get dumped into the bed.



Here are sixteen potato plants that, since this photo was snapped, have grown a lot. I dug out half the soil mixture, planted the potatoes as deep as I could, then as they grew, filled the bed back in. Since the pic was taken, I have been mulching the plants with the straw. Hope that does not attract voles like it did one year.



There are actually twelve pepper plants and four marigolds in this photo, but the marigolds and three of the pepper plants were grown by me and are far behind their Burpee bred brethren. (Maybe growing them in the garage was not such a good idea.)



The onions continue to thrive, but one of the four varieties of garlic I planted last fall failed to make an appearance this spring. Even though I mulched the bed heavily, it must not have been enough to keep the bulbs alive.



I intended to plant two Brussels sprouts plants and fill the rest of the bed with broccoli, but the latter did not survive my business trip and apparently you cannot buy just two Brussels sprouts plants as they come in a four-pack. I added marigolds to this bed today.



The snap peas are blooming, but the English peas are not what I expected. I think I inadvertently planted another short version of the latter. The pea beds are where I planted sunflowers, bush beans, and marigolds today.



Notice the poultry netting? Despite Finn's efforts, there are still baby bunnies in the yard. All the vegetable beds are wrapped, which makes gardening a bit awkward. I hope the neighbors don't mind staring at my fanny this summer, as there is no way to work in a crouch. My SO and I are contemplating more attractive fencing alternatives, but so far, the chicken wire is doing the job.

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