Drowning and Pests

Well.  I was so excited that I had got my garden in so early and quickly this year, unlike last year.  But, this has not proved to be a good thing.  We have gotten SO MUCH RAIN!  There are puddles and pools in my garden, which has increased the amount of slugs and other bugs that eat my plants.  So not only are they drowning, but they have to fight off the chompers as well.  And I can't get in the garden to get the bugs b/c they are so soft.  I did notice a lot more spiders in the garden this year, so hopefully they will fight for me and eat the bugs! :)
The blueberries are looking good though!

The new ones I planted last fall look great despite all the plowing that knocked some of them down.

I used Straw this year to keep the weeds down, and it's helping a lot!  But I think it may be attracting some bugs.

The zucchini and cukes are looked really bad due to the rain and the squash bugs.

The tomato plant that Jay's coworker gave me is looking pretty pitiful.  A bunch of the leaves got bent off from high winds. 

But there are a few flowers on it already!

My tomatoes and peppers are starting to look good with the little bit of sun we've gotten today!

My peas are loving the weather.  But no beans yet.

Onyx wants me to pay attention to him, but I'm busy. 

My radishes also love the rain.  Some of them ended up 1 foot away due to the hard rain, but it's ok.

And a few of the marigolds are starting to form flowers which will hopefully keep away some of these pest bugs.

Not many of  my mom's flowers popped up this year, but these globe ones look really nice. 

The weather is looking up for the rest of the week!

Have a Good Memorial Day!  Thank you to ALL our troops!

Keeping an Eye on the Weather

It's almost April 15th and I'm getting really antsy about getting outside.  Depending on the weather today, I may rake rather than go to the gym!

The weather is looking good until Saturday night/Sunday.  The maple festival is this weekend!  That means CRAFT FAIR and lots of ideas and good food!  We attend every year.
I always look for jewelry and food at these things. 

Well, my seedlings are looking stunted since they exploded the other day.  I have 2 cucumbers growing in one pod but there are plenty of pods that didn't grow anything.  I am really struggling with my herbs!  I think that's what I'll study this summer. 
Things to Do this Spring:
1. Find out when to mulch my blueberry bushes and what type to get. (Will cut grass/leaves suffice?)
2. Get the rota til guy from my church to come and do the garden.
3. Get fertilizer from Jay's parents (they own horses).
4. Rake the stones off the yard before the flowers start popping up.
5. Plant the garden at the end of April.


OOOO!!! I'm so excited!!!  :)

How to make moss shakes-not for eating :)

I read about moss shakes and making living art with it in the Studio G blog (love this blog by the way, I highly suggest following it).
Here's the link:
Studio G

Seeds Started

I started my seeds last Tues! So hopefully I will actually get some peppers and red tomatoes this year!
This year, I'm trying some new plants; the garden has this year:
tomatoes (regular)
tiny tim tomatoes
Blushing Beauty bell peppers
Banana peppers
jalapeno peppers
onions
scallions
radish
pumpkins
zucchini
cucumbers
garlic
basil
carrots
spinach
lettuce

This is a lot.  Some of it, the lettuce and spinach and scallions, will be in containers (since it worked so well last year) and will help with weeding. 
I'm also going to plant the plants closer than last year to help cut down on weeding. I think that black paper REALLY helped last year, so I'm going to definitely buy that again.  It's worth the money to save my back and time. 

I also started sprouts successfully, so those will be ready in a few days!

In Honor of the Presidents (Past, Present, and Future)

So basically this is a re-post from Studio G's blog.  I do love this blog because they post so many beautiful gardens!  The Thomas Jefferson historic gardens are so beautiful and well organized and cared for, I thought it was re-post worthy.

So then I started wondering about other historic gardens in America and decided to post some of the links I found:

1. George Washington's Mount Vernon: here is a quote from the website for people who enjoy a bit of history too: "George Washington built and arranged the Upper Garden in 1763. In 1775, he expanded and redesigned much of his estate – including the Upper Garden."

2. Michelle Obama's vegetable garden:  This is such a great way to spread knowledge to adults and kids about where their food comes from, and I think she sets a great example for what schools could do in health class.  In elementary school, I vaguely remember having a garden that we got to help build and it was very exciting!  But most of my knowledge comes from helping my mom every summer. 


These were the only two I found, but I only did a quick search.  Do you know of any others?


ps.
I'm having issues with the links breaking, so below is the list of links, respectively:
1. http://www.studiogblog.com/
2. http://www.monticello.org/
3. http://www.mountvernon.org/index.cfm?
4. http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/09/03/20/Spring-Gardening/

Seed Starting Time Approaches

I was debating with myself on when to start my seeds this year since last season I kind of blew it with my peppers and tomatoes because they got started so late.  This year I am prepared though!  I already have the seeds that I bought from last year (seeds last up to 3 years if stored in a dark, cool space) and I just need to get carrot seeds.  Well the problem was solved on when to start through the Gardener's Supply website "How-To" pages:
http://www.gardeners.com/When-to-Start-Your-Seeds/5215,default,pg.html

They are very helpful people over there!

I also did some research at my college's library on companion planting and came up with this layout:

I did made this in Photoshop CS3 to make it look pretty!  :)   So it isn't to scale, but the general layout is correct.  The garlic and marigolds are key pest control players, the radish are pest control and filler plants (because they grow faster than some of the larger plants, you can use them to fill up empty space and pull them out when the bigger plant will take over).  I read in Carrots Love Tomatoes that you should plant 3 radish in with your squash and cuke hills and LEAVE them there; this way they act as a natural repellent.
I surrounded my tomatoes by garlic, basil, carrots and scallions because tomatoes grow well with all these plants.  Beans, cukes and peas also benefit from each other.  And bell peppers also love basil.
So that was the reasoning and thought process behind the layout.
You can make your own layout easily using the Gardener's Supply designer tool: 

http://www.gardeners.com/on/demandware.store/Sites-Gardeners-Site/default/Page-KGPJS#clearbed

I think that's it for now! I'm going to start planting in a few weeks! yay!

:)

Carrots Love Tomatoes

I saw "Carrots Love Tomatoes" online, and decided to borrowed it from my school library.  I finished reading it last night and I highly recommend it! 

http://www.amazon.com/Carrots-Love-Tomatoes-Companion-Successful/dp/1580170277

She lists a wide variety of vegetables, fruit and nut trees, and herbs and their companion plants.  I found it to be a quick read because it is so well laid out.  She includes a few garden plans and a glossary of gardening terms/techniques at the back.  The garden plans are pretty rough and are hard to read, but they help you kind of get an idea of how to start planning your own.  I think this book is a great companion to the square foot gardening book by Mel Bartholomew.

http://www.amazon.com/Square-Foot-Gardening-Garden-Space/dp/1579548563/ref=pd_cp_b_2

The SFG talks about how to organize your plants and all the basics you need to know about gardening, and CLT talks about which plants pair well together.  I think I may buy CLT next time I get a coupon from Barnes and Noble, but for now I took notes in my garden journal.  

As a side note, my ginger growing experiment didn't work.  I got distracted last semester and didn't pay attention to the soil dampness and it got dried out a few too many times.  May be I'll try it again next winter!

Cheers!

Katie   :)