Fresh-from-the-garden salad

There is NOTHING like a salad of fresh greens.  I've been enjoying them for a week now.

So today was a gorgeous day to work and we have a weekend of impending thunderstorms, so I worked outside for more than 5 hours today.  The garden looks great.  I finally decided the mystery plant is a weed -- if one's definition of weed is "anything which is growing in the wrong place." -- so I pulled it.

Pole Beans

The Giant Caesar lettuce I planted didn't sprout -- perhaps old seed -- so I replanted one square and planted an additional square of it -- I love the taste and texture of it.  The pole beans have sprouted, but I lost two of the cherry tomato plants.  I may just plant 2 more beans on that tower instead.

The surviving cherry tomatoes look great!

Speaking of tomatoes, I have my tomato tower and bed set up.  I need to add a layer of composted cow manure on top of the grass clippings, and I make a well of soil for each plant.  Since I took this picture, I have planted 3 "Hungarian Heart" heirloom tomato plants from Cook's Garden.  I will plant three "Pink Brandywine" plants, and I'm not sure what I'll put on the two remaining poles.




I also planted one blackberry and one raspberry plant.  And the strawberries are looking really good:





I planted a watermelon "Sugar Baby" plant.  It's a small, seedless watermelon.  I'm experimenting with something different with it.  I put up a something for the plant to grow on to and to support the melon.  I used the wire grids from an old compost bin, and lashed it onto a bamboo pole support.  In the background are a number of different types of iris, including Louisiana Bog Iris and flags, in my rain detention bed.

I also got the rest of the lawn mowed today, and  used the grass clippings to mulch around a lot of stuff.  I planted an azalea to replace a butterfly bush that didn't survive.  In fact none of my butterfly bushes made it through the winter -- I have two dwarf bushes I need to replace.

And....just because.....more pictures of the garden:

More pictures of the garden

First of all, here's my mystery plant.  I have no idea what this is.  I don't know if this is weed, or a volunteer of something worth keeping.  If anyone out there in the blogosphere knows what this is, please let me know!

AAANNNNNDDDD..... Here's the garden.  On the left are cauliflower plants and baby beet plants.  Next is kale and red romaine, interspersed with onions.  The second picture has broccoli in front and tennisball lettuce and baby carrot plants. The third picture has my Winter Marvel butter crunch and the mystery plant/weed.  The open space to the right of the Winter Marvel will be Giant Caesar lettuce -- one of my favorites.  The fouth and final picture shows my bean/tomato tower which will have pole beans on two sides and cherry tomatoes on the other two.  Behind the tower are 2 squash plants (two stils protect by cut out milk jugs), and there are baby radishes around the milk jug furthest away from you in the pictures.

Those are grass clippings around the broccoli and in the base of the tower.  Great mulch/weed barrier.

A close-up of the rasdish seedlings around the squash plant.  They'll be harvested well before the squash takes over the space.

I've been a bit frustrated with the bell peppers I've started from seed.  All germinated, but keeping the seedlings alive long enough to grow a few more pairs of leaves has not been easy for some reason.  I don't remember having this trouble in the past, but.....   Here's one of the Purple Belle pepper plants that is doing well.

Here's my new project -- a new bed for tomatoes!  18 cinder blocks loaded on to a cart, then into the car, then out of the car and around the back of the house.  I broke down one of the compost piles and partially filled the bed.  I need to get some composted cow manure, and then I'm building my tomato frame out of bamboo poles a la Kevin Lee Jacob's technique.

I'm not a big tomato fan -- there's a mild allergy which runs in the family, and I suspect that's part of it.  But my husband and my youngest like tomatoes.  I'm going to plant Pink Brandywine heirlooms, and Hungarian Heart.  I already have the cherry tomatoes on the tower, so I haven't decided what other varieties I'm going to plant  I'll have room for 8 plants.

I'm also going to put in a smaller bed for one raspberry and one blackberry plant.  I'll let you know how that goes!

First Day of Spring --Planting Day!

The last few weeks have been hectic and frustrating.  I managed to get the respiratory garbage that has been going around, to the point that I've spent the last 10 days or so on antibiotics and steroids.  Not my favorite thing to do, as the steroids make me jittery, and also make me crave salty foods.  Fortunately this past week has been Spring Break, and I have taken full advantage of that to sleep, relax, and (I hope) get healthy.

Monday was gorgeous -- in the 70s, but I had absolutely no inclination to do ANYTHING except sit on the couch. Today, it's in the 50s and overcast, but otherwise was a great day to work outside.  So I took the dogs out and hooked them up to the leads so they could run around, and to work I went.

I was out there yesterday to check on things, and guess what!  I have sprouts!  It's the kale I planted back in early February.  No sign of the red romane or the onions yet -- I may have to replant those.

See those tiny dots of green?  Just two little seed leaves.  But they sprouted!

Buoyed by those little bits of green, I got to work with some planting.  I've been reading up on what I intended to plant in the vegetable gardening book I found while cleaning out bookshelves.  According to that book, when planting cruciforms like cauliflower, cabbage and broccoli, one should use a cabbage collar to deter cabbage fly, etc.   The book recommended using carpet padding or something of the like.  Well, I have some left over heavy polar fleece, so I'm going to try that.  I may put a double layer -- I'm going to see how what I put down holds up in the next week or so.  It certainly adds a bit of color.

Inside each square of polar fleece is a cauliflower plant that has been hardening off in the cold frame for the last 10 days.  Along the edge, with plastic bottle cloches, are cucumber plants -- Brown Russians in the picture above.  The lemon cucumbers are in the two squares to the right of the ones in the picture above.  Once it is warm enough to take the cloches off, I'll start training the cucumbers up on the trellis.

I also planted two of each variety of broccoli I started --Waltham and Romanesco.  I have 2-4 more starts of each of them still in the cold frame.  I need to adjust my garden plan now that I've actually planted a few more things, and see what I have to work with.  I may put the rest of the broccoli in the raised bed where the peppers will eventually go, as the peppers won't be ready to plant for a while.

I started some winter buttercrunch lettuce indoors -- I haven't transplanted lettuce seedlings before -- I usually just seed directly.  But I hoped to get a head start on some lettuce, and this is a cold weather variety, so.....we'll see how it goes!

As you can also see, I've been moving the hoops around.  Still not sure how that will evolve.

After I planted everything, I covered it with the garden fabric to give it a bit of protection as the nights are still a bit chilly.

Winter Sowing Jugs Update:

I am thrilled to report the first evidence of seeds sprouting in my winter sowing jugs!  A few seedlings have begun to pop in a couple of the jugs:

There are a myriad of other signs a spring all over the yard -- daylilies are beginning to send up fans, and the daffodils have poked up their leaves.  A few of the tulip leaves have a emerged, as well, and the Autumn Joy sedum has emerged from its winter hibernation.  That means I have a lot of winter dead to get trimming!