Garden Update

I haven't written about the gardens in a while, so it's past time to tell you what's going on.

We made a small new garden this year where an outbuilding used to be. This garden is for additional spring veggies and squash. Everything is planted and coming up beautifully except of course the squash--too early yet for that.

This year's plan is to grow more of the things we eat often--carrots, onions, broccoli, peas, lettuce. I have four plantings of lettuce going now. We are harvesting from two of them; the others will be ready, I hope, when these first ones play out. I did two plantings of carrots, onions, and broccoli and hope this will extend the fresh season for these vegetables.

We planted potatoes (red-skinned) a month ago and they are coming up well in another piece of new ground. We are letting the big garden rest this year and will be planting some cover crops to increase its nutrients. It is being downsized anyway since we planted some heritage apple trees at the back of it last year.

Today Larry put out 7 tomato plants. With no greenhouse this year I have to buy plants and it hurts! They're expensive! These will be the "house" tomatoes, the ones we run out to grab for meals. At least that's the plan. The last two gardens are not yet plowed but as soon as this rainy patch of weather is over they're next on the to-do list.

We cleaned up the raspberry and blackberry patches that I planted last year. We didn't do much with them after planting them and that was a mistake. We were able to get them back in line and I am hoping for berries this year. We moved some starts to enlarge the patches, and we also moved two peach tree seedlings that came up in my flower bed. Although everyone tells me that these seedling trees will not do well, we have always had pretty good luck with them. We'll see how these do. I have two or three cherry tree seedlings coming up in a different flower bed and these will be moved in the fall. I planted seeds from black cherries in hopes something might sprout--you never know.

The flowers beds--well, I have not been inspired to work in them this year. I think it is because I have had so many other projects on my plate the past two months. I got a good start on them this week, and I hope I will have them looking nice by Memorial Day. This one is almost done and I've pulled the weeds out of most of the others. I planted a few annuals today and moved a couple plants that had come up outside the beds. Many plants that usually don't survive winter made it through this year--mums, rosemary, and even a few that are actually annuals. It was a mild winter, of course.

The grapes look wonderful this year. Larry has gotten the knack of pruning them and they are going gangbusters. He built the arbor in the second photo with some scrap railing and timbers from the shed we tore down. It supports some vines that used to have the shed for support. Thankfully the grapes did not get frosted in those late frosts we had.

Our apples and pear trees also dodged that bullet. The only tree that seems to have been affected is the mulberry, and it will definitely have a smaller crop this year. That's okay since a small crop on that tree is still far more than we can use. My little cherry tree is coming along and has quite a few berries on it, and the other young trees planted in the past two years look good too.

We have lots of asparagus! And it has seeded itself all over the place--in all the wrong places of course, just as the parent plants are in completely the wrong place. They are thriving in the gravel beside my car and I should not complain because I love asparagus. I am hoping the seedling survive long enough to be transplanted to some place easier to deal with.

All in all, it's been a very good year so far for the gardens. Soon we'll be planting beans, corn, tomatoes, cucumbers and whatever else comes to mind--although there will be fewer peppers because we've had far more than we can use for the past two years.

How is your garden coming along?