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I really wanted to put in Walla Wallas today but the soil is still 'dirt' so I went to the local Home Depot and got some 'emergency cow poop', came home and I dumped about a bag and a half between the two spaces.
At this very moment I am reading a book called 'Cubed Foot Gardening' by Christopher O. Bird. Well, I really like what he has to say. So, I am doing an intensive seasonal rotation garden. Going through it I decided to ignore the packets suggestions (I know! WHAT ARE YOU THINKING???) Either way, I looked through our last frost, possible first frost...and found that for some reason (Ring of fire? Could it be the volcanoes? Hmmm...maybe ;) ) that our growing season is actually LONGER then where I grew up in NC! Maybe a month or so longer! Wow.
So, I planted! I planted the Walla Walla's that I was going to anyways, but also planted the smooth leafed Olympic spinach according to the 'cubed' ft design. Spinach is kinda tall so it gets the north side of the garden all over! Then I put the onions in front of the spinach to fill the area on the north side. On the south side I planted all the lettuces and some onions. I put the butterleaf and greenleaf through my newly opened area and then a 'garlic rectangle' and early radishes. So, assuming things work the way I have been reading, both online and in the book, and from what I saw last year....I should have solid green in about a month! wOOt!
Next week? Cold Frames based out of the containers that our greens come in.
I
shall plant the tomatoes, I have Brandywine and my cross breed black
prince/brandywines from last year, and some cherry sweets :D
It is
getting cold and much cleanup must be done. I need to get some mulch to
help the fact that I have a neighbor cat that pooped in the bed! Once I
get some mulch I will plant Garlic and Walla Walla sweet onions. I
already picked up some Brussels Sprouts and Purple Kohlrabi seed for
spring too so that will be fun!
And now, for fun, my pot stash!
Oct 3, 2007 | 11:11 AM PST
So, I have a new cam, so pics will be forthcoming. We have been getting rather a bit of rain (about time) but it is finally the end of the 'real' gardening season. If I can figure out a way to do it with minimal dirt (I know I should use at least a 5 gallon container but am willing to take a risk) I may cold stratify some of the tomato seeds I saved and start them up here in the office. That would be kind of cool, having some fresh tomatoes here. I kept some Black Prince and Brandywine seeds, although who knows what they will end up being as there were a few different varieties of tomatoes out there and I did not bag them so they are no doubt cross pollinated. I really don't mind, as long as they are fresh! I am planning on starting up some of the Jalapeno seeds I saved, I know it will do fine in a relatively smaller pot. I have all this sunshine here at my desk so I might as well take advantage of it, right?
I brought a couple Schefflera's in to the office.
My favorite story about Schefflera's...A pal of mine owned a hotel on the NC coast and the hurricane wall they had put in was coming down after a particularly nasty storm so the hotel had to come down. The people who were hired to take all the furniture and whatnot out and put it in storage really were not all that smart as they put all the plants in the storage unit as well. Three months later we opened up the unit, having already assumed the plants were living in the movers homes (nothing to quibble about, this all had to be done fast so the owner just figured a home is a home) and there they were. No water, no sun, three months...they were fine. They were Schefflera.
Time
to get going on some winter gardening. I got seed for Walla Walla sweet
onins, Garlic cloves, Purple Kohlrabi, Brussels Sprouts and Spinach so
far. I have cleared the sugar snap pea bed so now all I need to do is
take down the trellis (I used screws so it is basically collapsible)
and recondition the little plot o'dirt and wait for the maters to
finish up, collect the radish seeds from the early radish's that I let
bolt and do that soil as well. I want to put in garlic, onions,
Brussels Sprouts and Kohlrabi. They are very neat looking plants.
I will plant the spinach and plan on several lettuce varieties for this fall and come early spring in my tomato and radish bed, yum!
My baby Radishes...they are an early variety, harvest in 22 DAYS! So I will plant a second round when it is time for these...and I love snacking on radishes :D
Then there is the garlic, I went to get some free pots (I love free pots, I use SO many) and she gave me some garlic...and some of what she thought might be volunteer garlic but when I dumped them out of the pot I very carefully separated them and planted them...sweet white onions :D
So there were a few days here that SERIOUSLY baked and I got worried about the sugar snap peas I had sowed so I few them epsom salts and watered it in really good and KABAM! Let there be sugar snap peas! I have the material I need so I will be building a nice platform/Japanese style trellis for them this weekend. I was working on the fishtank cover but HAVE to get the trellis done...will try to get them both done as I really want to get that tank going, it is 55 gallon.
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