Last week we got 2.8" of rain within 48 hours and the temps have really started to stay warmer, things are really starting to turn green. The spring bulbs are alive and starting to bloom to give color again to what was so blah after this what seemed to be forever winter season. Here is a good show of what just 5 days can do to the yard with some rain and warm weather:
I have been hard at work this early spring working on the garden. As you can see from the photo above that I finally have all the wooden side boards installed on all the beds! I've almost got all the paths installed with their walkway materials. I'm putting down very thick layers of cardboard and newspapers and then straw over top of that. Hoping that will keep the weeds at bay as well as keeping my feet from being muddy when I work out there.
Today is the first day the Forsythia is in bloom!!
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| Driveway entry beds. |
Last night (4/15/13) I planted some broccoli and brussels sprouts that I bought at the nursery over the weekend. I have some growing from seed in the basement but not getting a great germination rate (can't remember how old the seeds are), so decided to just get a head start and get some in now and then have a later crop of what ever ones end up starting. Both of those are very cold hardy but supposed to dip down into the mid 20's this weekend so I'm going to be using old 2 liter and milk jugs with the bottoms cut out to place over them to give them some protection - cheap/free cloches.
My older rhubarb plant came out a few weeks ago and is really doing well, has a good set of leaves on it. The one my parents gave me last year just started to pop up on Sunday - was so happy to see that as it is a part of the plant that was my grandparents... so its part of a 50+ yr old plant and I'd hate it if I killed it!! I'll keep amending the area with more compost as rhubarb loves that! Looking forward to trying new things with it this year after seeing a post of one of my fellow YourGardenShow friends blogged last year with great new ways to use it.
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| 50+ yr old rhubarb plant from my grandparents garden originally. |
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| The other one, well ahead of the other plant. |
I planted peas about 2-3 weeks apart on either side of my pea fence. This year I'm using one of my old doggie play pen fences, got them when the dogs were puppies and even used them for the hens as a run until they figured out they could fly up & out of it... (hence the chicken tractor project). Last year I had used one of those string trellis pea fences - I think it was from Burpees that I found at Lowes. Unless you are only planting a handful of peas - don't use that product... worthless. Once the plants got heavy with fruit the string started to break and folded over on itself, making it VERY hard to harvest. That is why I decided to use metal this year. After I planted the 1st round of peas, the weather took a dive - got really cold, snow, etc... those peas are just now coming up. The ones I planted 2-3 weeks after that are now also starting to come up - so much for the staggered planting time to extend the harvest.
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| Peas popping out of the ground. |
The other items I have going in the garden is onions and potatoes. Mo stopped at the nursery on the way home from work last week and got me a good supply. I have all the potatoes in and the onion bunches - but still have some onion sets I need to get out. We will have a LOT of onions this year. =) I'm trying to plant the onions along the edge of the beds to use up that normally wasted space, as well as being a companion plant for many other plants - especially the cole crops like cabbage, broccoli, etc. "They" say that the onions near by should help keep the cabbage loppers away - which was a major pest for me last year so we'll see is it does help at all... if not my trusty bottle of soapy water and tweezers will be used again to hand pick them.
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Some of the onions planted on each side of the bed.
Cabbage will be going in the middle. |
I also purchased a set of 3 water wells for tomato plants to try it out. Supposed to be able to plant out 6 weeks early using them. I have a variety I'm growing this year called Sub Arctic Plenty that is supposed to be more cold hardy than normal - so I might try planting 3 of those out with the water wells early next week to give it a try.
Watch for my next upcoming project blog which is a french drain in the driveway...
