Not yet -- this morning I count 5 spears making their way up -- I'm going to wait until they're a little bigger to harvest them.Quote:
Originally Posted by BleeckerSt_Girl
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Not yet -- this morning I count 5 spears making their way up -- I'm going to wait until they're a little bigger to harvest them.Quote:
Originally Posted by BleeckerSt_Girl
Since we just bought a house we'll be planting a garden next year. (In process of moving, this week painted the rooms that needed painted.) We did plant my two blueberry bushes, which had been in large pots for about 4 years. We knew we wouldn't be staying in that home, just didn't know we'd be moving across the state. But we plan on staying here for a long time. So they are planted and bought two strawberry bushes today (half price at Lowe's) that will get planted either tomorrow or next weekend. Couldn't pass them up at half price, esp since I've wanted strawberry bushes for a long time.
That's good to hear that even with a late start you can still have a pretty good garden--that's the situation I will likely have this year as I am moving around the beginning of June and if I get the apartment I hope to get, the building has a spot in the yard where it sounds like I could put in a garden (I asked the landlord when he was showing me the place, since the spot in question is where a swimming pool was filled in and isn't all that attractive as it is now, and he said he's all for anything that improves the property!).Quote:
Originally Posted by BleeckerSt_Girl
Got the garden started this past weekend, still at work sprouting some seeds and fine-tuning the setup, but our balcony necessitated some 'creative' use of space. We have a vertical plot with kale, a couple types of lettuces, spinach and a couple types of peas, and an upside-down cherry tomato.
Along the rail, we've got the beans and carrots, now with the lavender and rosemary in between bean containers. The catnip has its own box, and another box will house our pak choi and fennel.
Here are some early pics from last week... more as the garden develops...
http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5144/...b8cf4e4bbc.jpg
http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5228/...b8072d679f.jpg
Kit that is very cool. :)
looking forward to more updates and pix!
So what Kit didn't mention is she used a linen shoe rack, an unused lean-against-the-wall type of bike rack, a small piece of pvc, a few U bolts, a small 1x3 board, duct tape (cuz there had to be some duct tape in there somewhere, right?) and made a vertical garden. Then she took a 2 liter pop bottle and made an upside down cherry tomato holder. A "recycled garden". :cool: :D Even the water run off gets recycled.
http://i143.photobucket.com/albums/r...Photo0190F.jpg
I finally got into my backyard yesterday, 5 hours later, my garden beds are all cleaned out and I raked a bunch of pine needles and bagged them to be picked up by bulk pickup. My aching back!
Now, manure, compost and I'll be ready to plant soon.
Last week, my front beds all cleaned out, planted some pansies for color; and got lucky at the nursery. They had overwintered gallon plants (perennials) mostly all around $20 plants, for $5. Of course, most of them had not sprouted yet, but that's okay. I planted a bunch of bleeding hearts and a thing called rodgerisia in my shade garden; a campanula bellflower and some type of ground cover in a sunny spot; and a couple of nice alaskan burdette (that's not right) supposed to be cold hardy. ANyway, i'll look up hte name again for you, but it has beautiful foliage. What a find!
Kit,
Love your vertical garden. You should submit your idea to Mother Earth, Organic Gardening magazine as a short article.
It's fantastic!!
Do any of you have a Mantis tiller? I'm thinking of getting one because I can't really hand-turn my Ohio clay due to my left-sided weakness. They have an electric one which intrigues me as I hate doing the gas oil mixture thing and I suck at pull-starting anything. I've rented tillers before but who wants to put a filthy, oily think inside their car...definitely not me.
Well, X gives me too much credit. I'd seen the idea of using a shoe rack somewhere, the biggest thing was just figuring out the execution. It's lurking on instructables.com somewhere.
This morning I saw teeny baby sprouts poking up from the soil of some of the seeds I planted last week- Swiss chard, kohlrabi, lettuces, and radishes. It's always so exciting to see the newborn babies push up through the earth! :p
Yes. It's great, but you cannot till with one finger like in the ads. It takes some doing, but it's much easier than the huge tillers. I find it very useful for planting perennial plants and shrubs. Digging the hole with the tiller is much easier and than with a shovel. I also plant my bulbs with an auger bit on my electric drill. I can plant about 100 bulbs in about 15 minutes that way.Quote:
Originally Posted by FlyingScot
But the best way that I've found is to build up, not down. Lay down newspaper--lots--and pile on soil and compost--lots. I add a few wheelbarrowsful of compost to each bed every season, and things grow wonderfully. I've found that adding a cup or two of dehydrated chicken manure really kickstarts the plants.
Kitsune, I love your vertical garden!! That would be a great way to do herbs near the kitchen.
I've taken some photos of my garden, but I'll have to download the photos and that ain't happening tonight.
Thanks for the info Tulip. I think I'm going to go ahead and get one. As for the newspapers. I have stacks of them just waiting for the purpose you described. In fact, I used them this winter/spring to kill the grass where I'm planning to garden. Worked like a charm! Now I just have to dig the area out deep enough to add some good soil and compost.
If you build up, you don't have to dig down at all. My raised beds are 3'x6' that I made with some posts that the previous owner of my house had left in the yard. I just put down the paper and then filled up the box with compost and soil. No digging, no tilling.
The Mantis is still alot of work, but it's quieter and lighter than the gasoline tillers. Still alot of work, though, especially for large areas like gardens. Great for digging holes for shrubs, though.
I ate my one asparagus spear this morning with my breakfast. Tasty! :p
Good point. I hadn't thought of doing raised beds but I bet they'd be more successful than the poor plants struggling in clay. Plus my senior citizen father likes projects (lucky me). However, he tends to overbuild things so I'd probably end up with a self-watering, self-weeding monstrosity that actually picks and cooks the veggies automatically :-)Quote:
Originally Posted by tulip
Oooh, send your senior citizen father my way! My hubby will do projects, but he hates garden projects, so I have to do them all by myself! I'd love a father-built raised bed!Quote:
Originally Posted by FlyingScot
Quote:
Originally Posted by nbynw
=8-)
It looks like my lettuce has drowned in all the rain of the last few weeks (we had 13 inches in April, and 1.75 inches so far in May). But those mustard greens seem to be indestructible.
Homegrown asparagus, yum! I got some at the farmers market last Saturday, and it was wonderful. Someday I might just have to put in an asparagus patch...
Do blueberry bushes and strawberry bushes count? That's all we're getting this year. Actually moving into our new home this weekend. The blueberry and strawberry bushes are planted already. Hubby wants to build a raised garden and that is one of his projects for this summer/fall. The main project before moving in was painting kitchen (now tan, was hot pink) one bedroom (was light green, now light blue) and the bonus room (was two tone green, now bottom carmel and top a lighter shade that has a bit of an italian type feel to it). The bedroom color was ok, but having been a kid's room was pretty scuffed up, so it got repainted. The other major project was making two rain barrels which are awesome.
Sure. why not? We are nearly finished with our move. Our animals are moving next Monday. Already at my new place, I have about 10 blueberry, 6 raspberry, 3 marion berry, 2 logan berry, 50+ strawberry plants are waiting to be planted. The berry plants will be formed into hedgerow to give us wind break for our veggie garden. strawberry will be used as ground cover to control erosion.Quote:
Originally Posted by Koronin
Since our move has been taking longer than I want and the weather in Portland area has not been conducive to growing, we are planning on making a solar heated poly tunnel to make up for the late start for our heirloom tomato and rest of our veggies.
We are looking at the weather for the move. not too hot and not raining. Next Monday looks like the day for the final move.
Does anyone know how to harvest lettuce when it is young to keep it producing? I just planted a mix of baby lettuce plants but I am not sure when I can start to harvest. It looks good enough to eat now! Also how about swiss chard? Can you eat baby swiss chard?
Congrats on your move. I so know what you mean about it taking longer than you want it to. We're hoping to have everything moved by the end of the weekend. Then will need to clean (hire people to do carpets and spray for fleas as required by the rental company, and are going to hire a person to do cleaning as well, lady we are hiring knows exactly what the rental company inspects and will make sure it passes the inspection.)Quote:
Originally Posted by smilingcat
Sounds like you have a great idea for your garden.
Definitely! I like it better when it's small. I usually take the outer leaf or 2, and leave the rest for the plant to use:)Quote:
Originally Posted by Brandi
Lots of blended or mesclun lettuce seed mixes are intended to be cut-and-come-again. Once it's over 2" tall just start giving it haircuts and using the longer tender leaf tops- it'll keep growing! Just don't cut it too close to the ground so that it can't recover.
Swiss chard is slightly different- don't give it a 'haircut' but rather cut and use the whole outer leaves as often as you like, even when small and tender.
you don't pluck lettuce? You cut it?
I have potatoes, radishes, carrots and spring onions in tubs outside, all are coming through now except the spring onions. I have mint, basil, coriander and parsley inside on the kitchen windowsill. The Mister has promised me raissed beds if I can find someone to build them (he is open to the idea of less lawn to mow).
I love the vertical garden!
You could also look at these. They may not be pretty, but they're fairly cost effective (when I priced them against lumber) and they definitely work. They're easy to put together - particularly the 3x3's.Quote:
Originally Posted by hebe
You can't really cut head lettuce and have it grow a new head, so you harvest the whole head and that's it.Quote:
Originally Posted by Brandi
Leaf lettuce will continue putting up new leaves if you either cut off whole outer leaves or give the whole plant a little haircut and take maybe the top half.
All lettuce tends to get bitter as it gets older, so it;s good to keep planting seed at intervals and discard the older lettuce plants once they get spindly and send up flower stalks, if you haven't used them already. Lettuce is best when young, sweet, and tender. Never sow lettuce seeds all at once. :)
So head lettuce you mean like ice berg? Most of my little lettuce is red leaf, butter, romaine (I think) and a frilly green one. It was a 6 pack. I should try the seeds. I have them in containers because the snails are so bad here. right now they are all about 3 inches tall and looking very pretty.Quote:
Originally Posted by BleeckerSt_Girl
My 10 little baby blueberry bushes that we planted last Spring are flowering for the first time, and I can see some baby blueberries forming! Our first blueberries, so exciting! Looks like we might get a few dozen. (And yes, I already bought some excellent bird netting that we'll put on just before the berries start turning blue) ;)
Got the 13 tomato plants in. Planted the cucumbers and the bush beans too.
Salad-wise, we are already harvesting lots of lettuce, bok choy, kale, spinach, scallions, and radishes.
I was just outside in the rain planting 30 radicchio plants. I find that managing the garden at school keeps me much more on track than if I tried to do it at home. I like gardening for the cafeteria and we also sell to my friend's restaurant. It keeps me on my gardening toes!
The tomato plants we planted a few weeks back still don't seem to be taking, but there are a number of plants I kept under the grow lights inside that are much heartier and will probably succeed with more oomph when I plant them out there.
I started the carrots from seed and they seem like really slow starters-- then again, this is the first time I've ever grown carrots. The seedlings were extra tiny for weeks and weeks and now they are just starting to increase in size. It could be a function of the clayey Missouri soil... I have a mind to make two new raised beds with a sandier peatier soil exclusively for carrots and other root veggies that like things loose and limber.
The zucchini is ridiculous right now-- if I can keep the ants away, I'm going to have loads of it to sell! But the crookneck squash is having a tough time adapting to the outdoors after being started inside. We'll have to see.
Now if I could just keep the squirrels from eating my cucumber seedlings straight away, I'll be a happy woman!
Some pictures!
English pea trellis:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v4...10414_1072.jpg
The garden prior to planting this March:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v4...10414_1077.jpg
I'll try to get some current pictures up soon!
Nice, Reesha!
Here are some of my recent photos. I harvested a bunch of sweet peas this morning. Mmmm. My tomatoes are about 3-feet tall and producing fruit, and my potatoes have started to bloom. Lots of lettuce and kale still, too.
Oooo beautiful lettuce tulip. I love your landscaping too! The herbs amongst the pavers is especially darling.
I have big plans for my back yard, but I think I want new wheels for my bike more... hmmm
I ran out and took some pictures of the garden and my set up at school. It is too much fun to get paid to do this. First you see the grow light set up in my classroom (just after planting radicchio, hence empty tray), the zucchini box, the wild sugar snap pea tangle and some lovely rained-on lettuce that is still too tiny to harvest.
Wonderful gardens everyone! I love the fresh greens and the shady stones.
In a way, it felt good to get a break from gardening all winter. It enables me to come back to it all excited and refreshed each Spring. I lived in Puerto Rico where there was no enforced 'winter break' for gardens and after a several years I lost that sense of seasons and big Spring excitement.
Sort of like the old country western song- "How can I miss you if you never go away?" lol!
I went on a 5 day trip and when i got home my veggie garden was bursting with perfect lettuce- far more than we can eat. Not surprising since I tend to plant more lettuce seed than we need- i love to experiment with the various colors and types, and lettuce seed doesn't cost much. Lettuce varieties are so pretty!
So just like last year i harvested a whole bunch, washed, bagged it in several gallon ziplock bags and brought it to my town's silent food pantry, where i volunteer several times a month. My 'thing' is bringing my extra garden produce there all summer when I have a surplus.
For dinner my husband and I had a big fresh salad of lettuces and radishes with chevre cheese, out on the kitchen porch overlooking the garden in the golden late afternoon sun. Our honeybees were all over the catmint in full bloom...so lovely!
That sounds heavenly, Lisa!
Today I took my summer school kids out to the garden where they happily ate all of my English and Sugar Snap peas. We didn't really have enough to sell but the kids enjoyed them tons!
I've got 4" zucchini out there, can't wait to harvest them at 8 inches!
I think I'm going to try to plant baby greens under a screen... just have to figure out how to put up the screen!
Reesha, those kids will never forget going into a garden and eating peas right off the vine. :)
Quote:
Originally Posted by BleeckerSt_Girl
What a wonderful evening dinner! It sounds so peaceful. I finally got my garden in last week. Planted eggplant, tomatoes, squashes of various types, cucumbers, winter savory, basil, thyme, seeds of green beans, chard, lettuce, parsley.
Also, got my seed bed for flowers in; sunflowers, cosmos, zinnias, marigolds, naturtiums, and also put in some lettuce and herb seeds in this bed as well. Hopefully, it will be as pretty as last year's flower bed. Put some 4 oclocks and tall marigolds in a pot and planted some new hollyhocks in the perennial bed next to the vege raised beds.
I think I am going to have to give up on my swiss chard. I can not find what is sucking the life out of the leaves? Been using Safer spray on them and it's not working. Ugh! My lettuce looks wonderful and my beans are starting to go up the poles!