Got Plans?

[Valerie]

So, anybody got any interesting garden plans for the upcoming?

I've been reading some stuff and thinking about stuff, and have a few tentative plans.

When Ace gets fruit trees, I want to get at least one plum, so my huge old one will have someone to pollinate with.

I want to order at least 2 elderberry bushes (maybe 4, though) so I can make syrup before flu season each year (and jelly if we have a lot of juice; it's yummy)

I want to plant white clover under all my fruit trees. It's supposed to set nitrogen like a legume, keep weeds from getting in, and draw beneficial insects that feed on some of the bad guys that attack fruit trees. Sounds like a win/win to me!

I want to get my bucket garden back in good repair and fully operational and make use of all that planting space.

I want to add several more fairly long lasagna beds.

AND

I want to dig up the baby blueberry plants from under my huge one and transplant them over by the new, younger blueberry further out in the yard. And transplant baby camellias that have popped up under the big ones, too.

[Valerie]

Great day! I just read all that again! I better get busy!

[BigM]

Wow Val!! Sounds like a regular oasis!! Good for you!

How is your aquaponics (sp?) garden doing?

[Valerie]

M, it's doing good! I made a mistake putting it on the porch, on the darker side of the house, though. So I have to provide it with light, which doesn't lead to the kind of growth I'd really like to see. Stuff grows good in it, though. I have some herbs, parsley, oregano, and garlic that are really going great. The fruiting plants didn't do as well, though, with the limited light. The fish are pretty happy, too! I have a heat lamp on them when it's this cold. It seems to help them be a little more lively. They're not thrilled with temps in the 40s.

I got this book at TSC called Mini-Farming, Self-sufficiency on 1/4 acre. It was a pretty good read. At least the guy is honest enough to say to not bother with trying to grow cereal grains and all that, like some say to do, because their yield per 1000 square feet is so small. His point is grow as much of what you eat as you can, including lots of potatoes and dry beans, and then grow extra to sell. The income from what you sell helps offset the cost of the food you buy that you can't raise yourself.

It will definitely take some tweaking to work here, though. He relies heavily on cover crops during the off seasons, but we don't really have an off season here. Winter is prime time for us! I know I can't jump in with the 700 ft of raised beds per person like he recommends, but he does say to start small (300 sq ft total) and I've already got about 100 sq ft of that. It just takes careful management with starting seedlings so their ready to go in as soon as something else comes out, and rotation, and adding compost, and all that.

I'd like to get it where we're growing enough of anything to actually put up. I haven't had luck with that in the past, for one reason or another, but we always keep trying again!

[Cyngbaeld]

No garden unless I get moved.

[Valerie]

And I certainly hope you do get moved, Kim, as soon as things thaw out where you want to go!

[Cyngbaeld]

Thanks, Val. I don't even care if it is froze over in the new place as long as I'm out of here before it gets hot again.

[BigM]

I have a book that gives layouts for being self sufficient based on your lot size. Problem is that it's in a box somewhere in the barn where we are storing most of our stuff. I wish I had it so I could start planning a lay out.

[Valerie]

Sounds like a handy book! The book I just read doesn't have any layouts or anything like that.

[michelle]

No garden for me this year again. We're planning on adding a patio out back and changing the deck on the side to just a landing and stairs. Until I can figure out what effect that's going to have on sun and shade, I'm not going to attempt to grow anything.

[Valerie]

Smart, Michelle!

[susan]

I'm in the thinking stage, but I haven't pulled my garden planning notebook out yet. Need to get going on that pretty soon.
For those who saw the little video I posted on fb about growing the sweet potatoes, well, I'm a little bummed about that. Our composter is full with over half of the compost ready to use and I'll have to just dump it. For those that don't know what I'm talking about, they are now spraying a chemical on our veggies we buy in the stores that inhibit sprouting. Some of what is listed is potatoes, sweet potatoes, carrots, snap beans, sugar beets. So all of the peels from carrots, potatoes and such that I buy goes into my compost. So that chemical is in my compost I put on my potatoes and sweet potatoes I grew last year. I'm now wondering if that is why I had such a stunted harvest even with the soil amended. I try to grow organic to keep away from pesticides and herbicides and I've unknowingly put a herbicide in my garden by way of the compost. Geez! and here I was worrying about the GMOs. Thank goodness I will have all the chicken manure mixed with old straw to use when we clean the coop this spring.

Susan

[Granny Smith]

Susan, I'm glad you told what that video was about. I tried to watch it, but it has been so noisy here all day that I couldn't hear what that little girl was saying. Now you've got me wondering if it's safe to feed those veggies and peels to the animals or even to eat it ourselves. Does it wash off? I guess I'll be growing my own potatoes and sweets this year. Good grief!

I am planning on putting in a garden this year, but haven't started planning it yet. I think the only thing I'll need to buy for it is seed potatoes and sweet potato slips. I would start my own slips, but the sweets I have are from the store and now I don't trust them.

[joanfromzonesix]

i guess the best alternative is to restrict buying to produce at local farmer's markets - the stuff out of home gardens is least likely to have been adulterated with any kind of mass-marketing chemicals -

[Cyngbaeld]

I'm trying to hang on to some small sweet potatoes a friend gave me from an organic CSA near her. Maybe I'll be moved in time to plant them.

Bummer about your compost, Susan.