Wednesday, April 29, 2009

Square Foot Garden Diagrams after planting this weekend

We went to the Locust Grove Farmer's Market Sunday and bought a couple of heirloom tomato plants, as well as one fairy tale eggplant plant and a patty pan squash plant. Keith grows everything he had for sale so we figured we'd try one or two and see how they grew. Here are the diagrams for the three that we have planted. #1 is fully planted at this point.

Remember, if you can't see the whole picture just click on it and you'll see it full size.




There are a few little shoots coming up from the beet seeds I put in last weekend, as well as the brussell sprouts. Jeff loves okra so I bought a few seeds to try growing it this year and I'm excited about growing Southern Peas (varieties of cow peas) because we got some at the Farmer's Market last year and they were delicious. I'll post more pictures as things develop.

I also put two lines of string between the squares of the panel of fencing in the pea garden because I read that peas that have something to climb grow better.

Wednesday, April 22, 2009

Pictures of the Square Foot Gardens


The first one with the weedblock beneath it

Here are the first two Square Foot Gardens, with the lattices for the other two behind them. You can see the pea fence in the background as well. Putting them together was surprisingly easy, as was mixing up the soil mixture, since we used the author's recommendation and did it on a tarp where we essentially just rolled things around until they were combined. Then we dragged the tarp to the gardens... quick and easy!

Our trailer load of supplies, most notably 60 cubic feet of vermiculite

The mixing area

I'll add pictures as things begin to grow. Right now there are only a few squares planted.

(If you can't see the whole picture just click on it)

Monday, April 20, 2009

Square Foot Gardens are officially planted!

This year we're trying out Square Foot Gardening, based on the book of that title by Mel Bartholomew.  I posted some pictures to my Flickr account of their construction through the first planting, and I'll gradually fill them in as the season progresses.  I've been snapping pictures here and there but I haven't had time to pop on and post them to this forum, with work and Cub Scouts and karate... life gets hectic this time of year!

My peas are growing, albeit slowly, but every variety I planted sprouted!  I'm so excited!  It makes my water to think of all of the wonderful peas I'll be harvesting before too much longer...  The greens came up too but they're in desperate need of thinning.  I wasn't patient enough to plant those nearly microscopic little seeds one at a time so now I need to spend some time thinning them out so that they can grow properly.  Only one variety of those didn't come up, the Fordhook Giant Swiss Chard.  I may try planting some in a square or two of a Square Foot Garden, but I haven't done so yet.

I'll try to get some of the random pictures I've taken posted this week.  I meant to trim my butterfly bushes back this weekend but I didn't get to it, so that's a project for one evening this week.  I don't want to wait too long because they're huge and I'd really like them to come in dense rather than gangly, not to mention that I fear how big the white one will end up if I don't cut it back.

Happy Spring, everyone!