Dig This: Our Adventures in Gardening

The Empty Garden

2009-06-25T16:20:00.000-07:00

I thought I should update this blog and confess that I am a plant killer and our garden is non-existent right now. A few months ago I bought a few veggies in pots (I was sad that I didn't start anything from seeds--just too busy), but then never made time to plant them and they shriveled up and died. The problem was wanting to expand the garden with a couple more raised beds and never having time to get that done while neglecting to put stuff in the one we already have. I just wanted drip irrigation set up in all of them before planting. Oh, well. I'm looking forward to a fall garden.
You can see in the photo that I have soil conditioner all ready to mix in, (as well as a cork trivet?)
I just need a little more time, which I hope is coming in August.

Pea Harvest

2009-03-10T07:54:00.001-07:00

Here are some of our yummy peas, washed and ready to steam. Mostly we've just been pulling them off and snacking on them raw, which has been really delicious. Eating these at dinner we discovered that it's really fun to shoot peas out of the pod! The plants are drying up from the bottom up, and I don't know if this is a disease or just because it's the end of its life cycle.
Some things I learned about peas that I need to do next year:

I need a taller support system. I used my tomato cages, but these grew about 8 or 9 feet and they're falling over. Next year I'll use bean poles or string or something.
I need to plant farther apart between rows (which is hard to do in my raised bed). It's hard to get to the peas in the middle.
My family needs more!

2 Months After Planting

2009-01-08T16:08:00.001-08:00

After a bit of neglect due to the holidays and going out of town, the garden seems to be thriving nonetheless.

The peas have little white spots on the leaves, and I don't know if this is normal. I only see little things that look like pods. I need to check the seed packet to see if things are going too slow?

The onions smell so good!! I read somewhere about laying the onion sprouts flat when they start to wilt, but I missed doing that:

I only thinned about half of the plot of carrots before leaving town, so there are a lot of crowded carrots and I'm realizing this photo should have been rotated:

Here's one of the thinned carrots:

Here a a bunch of baby, baby, baby carrots from thinning. I'm going to cut them up and toss them in our salad tonight, along with a green onion. Super exciting!

Sprouting Up

2008-11-20T13:10:00.000-08:00

Twelve days after planting our seeds, here's what we have:

Carrots:

Onions:

Peas:

A Few Veggies

2008-11-08T13:25:00.000-08:00

Miss Muffett planting peas.

My one and only raised bed. In the left third there are two rows of Sugar Snap Peas. The middle has two rows of white onions, one row will be green onions. The right third we broadcast Red Cored Chantenay carrot seeds. We have such weird weather right now--90 degree days, then rain and wind. Who knows what the veggies will think? I don't have all the parts I need for drip irrigation, hopefully I will get them soon. I also sprinkled Cayenne Pepper because we've had problems with cats using our garden as a litter box.

Notes: Added Amend and compost to soil. Used Dynamite plant food (13-13-13) throughout. It's a few years old so I don't know if it is very potent or even the best formula. Put bagged garden soil in thin layer over carrot seeds.

Herb Planting

2008-11-06T12:50:00.000-08:00

Stinkerdoodle helped me get this pot ready for planting cilantro, plain parsley, and fernleaf dill. I'm not sure how they will do all together in this pot, but the last time we planted dill, it was way bigger than we needed.

Notes: Used Sta-Green planting mix, planted three of each kind of seed (Start Smart brand)