I haven’t posted in several days for a few reasons. First, I have had a cold and didn’t feel too great for a few days. Then, I spent almost all day Friday working in the garden with the help of a family friend. She is so knowledgeable about all types of plants and gardening and I was so grateful for her tutelage. She even gave me most of the plants we planted. She has her own greenhouse which is very nice.
The picture above is a shot of how the garden looks right now from ground level. I was almost ready to say that I would post a picture each week of how it is progressing, but I better not. However, I will say that I will post pictures when I can. The plants and seeds in this garden are tomatoes, carrots, cucumbers, green peppers (not planted yet), broccoli, cabbage, onions, sweet potatoes, green beans, zucchini, spinach, and a salad mix. I need to create a new garden spot if I am going to plant any sweet corn.
We planted 8 San Mateo tomato plants (These are supposed to be like Roma tomatoes, but better suited for our soil.) and 2 grape tomato plants. My friend told me that putting some garden sulfur in each hole and mixing it into the soil will help the tomatoes. She also said to put some wood stove ashes on the soil around the plants to prevent cutworms from killing them. The plants are 3 feet apart in a single row.
Broccoli was stagger planted meaning that we made a row of 12 at 2 feet apart and then went right beside that row with another row of 12. We planted those plants sort of in-between the other row. That may not make sense, so I will have to post a picture another time of exactly what that looks like. We put a sprinkling of oyster shells (like people give to chickens) in each hole and mixed it up before planting the broccoli. I forget what this is supposed to do for the plant.
We planted 24 cabbage plants in the same manner as the broccoli again using the oyster shells in the plants. I did want to mention that we filled each hole with water before putting the plant in. (This was done for all established plants that were planted, not for seeds). I was told that this not only hydrates the plants, but it also gets air out of the soil. Then we watered the plants again after putting them in the ground and covering the roots with dirt. One more tip she gave me was to take off the leaves of the plant near the roots. She said you don’t want any leaves to be under the soil.
I planted 12 sweet potato plants and they are in a single row 18 inches apart. We planted the plants in an area of soil that we built up to be much higher than the rest of the garden. If there was water on the ground below it would look like the sweet potatoes were surrounded by a moat.
I am so excited about the better utilization of my garden space this year. There will be much work to do still, but the end result will be so worth it. 🙂