Garden Update

I haven't posted on the garden's progress since July, as, after that, I had a lot of produce from the garden to preserve. Just to give you an idea, I froze 4 cups of peas, 2 cups of raspberries, 6 cups of rhubarb, 4 cups of zucchini,  20 cups of green beans, 7 cups of pureed pumpkin, 10 cups of tomatoes, 12 cups of broccoli, and 16 cups of carrots.  I canned 2 pints of peas, 24 pints of green beans, 10 quarts of pumpkin, 7 pints of salsa, 16 half-pints of pizza sauce, 3 pints of pasta sauce, 8 half-pints of pumpkin butter, 5 half-pints of grape jelly, and 37 quarts of grape juice.  This was all from my yard.  As you'll recall, I live on less than a tenth of an acre.  I have a tiny, tiny yard.  And this list doesn't even get into all the drying I did.  I dried mostly herbs, and onions, rhubarb, sunflower seeds, and dandelion root.

A lot of the stuff I put up is gone.  We're down to the last bag of carrots and our beans are nearly half-gone, as is our broccoli.  Going to have to start shopping for produce in the grocery store pretty soon.

The garden plans for next year are coming along very well.  I have nearly all the seeds I'll need in May.  I have more specific plans drawn up to best utilize the space in the garden.  My patches of grass are going to be a bit smaller this year than they were last year.

My blueberry bushes should be bearing some fruit, and we've made big improvements in the strawberry patch, so hopefully we'll have a lot of fruit this year.  I'm hoping for a modest five pounds from the blueberry bushes, but we shall see.  I'm hoping the strawberries will hit their stride this year.  I'm considering using some of the grapes to make wine.  I'm also hoping to barter the chestnuts, as we don't much care for them.

I'll be making a list of the annual plants I plan to grow in a later post.

Garlic Woes

I pulled up my garlic today. It was time. But boy, was it disappointing! I planted twice the amount of garlic than what actually grew, and from what grew, I ended up with half of those bulbs reaching maturity. I say maturity a little tongue-in-cheek, because these bulbs are tiny! I suspect my problem was I planted the bulbs themselves too deep to begin with last autumn.

I had planned on using my garlic in a variety of ways, including adding it to cans of pizza sauce, spaghetti sauce, and salsa, drying it into powder, and of coarse using the bulbs themselves in fresh cooking. Doesn't look like all that is going to happen. I've decided to try my hand at "dilly beans" for the girls, so I think I'll use my home-grown garlic for that. Beyond what I've got, I'll have to buy my garlic at the farmer's market.

This autumn I'm going to read up on garlic again and plant double what I had planted last year and be sure to take better care of it. I WILL grow garlic in my yard!

Garden Season!

Unfortunately, I think I'll have to cut back on my blog writing to about once per week because of the garden season starting. I am, as always, way under prepared this year. Every year around this time I start to panic because not everything is just so. This year I have a lot more in place than last year as far as the bones of the garden, but I also have bigger plans. I was able last fall to dig some beds that were not previously there, so at least I've got that going for me.

When we first moved in, the yard was a few hostas and a bunch of 4-foot tall weeds. I kick myself all the time that I didn't take pictures right away. Instead I just dug right in! Considering all the weeds, all we started with were some overgrown grape vines, some straggly raspberry canes, and a chestnut tree. Oh, and a climbing rose bush, too. That's about it.

Right now the yard is about 35% usable garden space. By the end of the growing season, I plan to have dug about 50% or so, and by the time I'm done altogether, I'm planning on having about 70% of the yard to be usable growing space. Oh, and I should probably mention that last year we went from 15% usable space, covered in weeds, to the 35% we have now. I'll continue to keep you all posted throughout the season. For now, time to plant more seeds!

Ice Storm

Here it is, the end of the first week of March, and we got hit with an ice storm. It was nasty all day yesterday, starting with rain, ending with freezing rain and snow. We're not without power, and I think the kids will be going to school, but it just sucks. I was working outside in the garden Saturday, preparing to do more yesterday. I don't think it would have mattered much whether I actually put down newspaper before the storm or not. I just wish I had gotten to it. Now it's too cold for me to go out and do it.

On a brighter note, we're making soap today! I'm going to put calendula leaves in it to help my daughter's eczema. I think I'll scent it lavender mint. My daughters like to help me make soap, so it should be fun. I'll write late in the week to let y'all know how it goes!

A List of Plans

Well, everyone, you asked for it, you got it! The following is a list of plants I grow/am planning to grow this season. I am not completely set on my herbs yet, so I will not be listing those right now. I don't grow too many ornamental flower-type plants, except if they will be beneficial to my soap-making. In that case, I consider them herbs, even if they are not technically in that category. This list will comprise of fruit and vegetable plants I am planning on growing this season. Keep in mind, when you read the list, I am growing all this in a space of less than a quarter acre, and that I am, in most cases, not growing one or two plants of a particular kind.

Plants to Grow (fruit and veg)
Peas, sweet-36
Peas, shelled-36
Beans, Bush~40
Beans, Pole~40
Carrots-80+
Broccoli-2-4
Tomatoes-9
Potatoes-10
Sunflowers-12-16
Pumpkins-4
Lettuce
Spinach
Peppers, green-2+
Peppers, Cayenne-2+
Peppers, chili-2+
Blueberries-2 (one high, one half-high)
Onions~20
Asparagus-20
Garlic~15
Rhubarb-1
Grapes-15+
Raspberries-12
Strawberries
Zucchini-2

I will explain my choices of edibles in an upcoming post.

Seeds!

I finally got to count my seeds over the weekend. I estimate I have at least 50 different kinds of seeds. The only two kinds of seeds I was missing, so far as I could tell after preliminary checks, were large pumpkins (for making pies) and zucchini. I'll probably have to buy more peas, too.

As far as the garden planning goes, I'm just about set...I think. Every time I come up with a new plan, I end up changing it in a month or so. This cycle repeats itself all winter till Springtime when I have to make the final decision of what to plant where. A great panic ensues until my friend B convinces me this stuff is only going to be planted here one year (the perrenials I always know one year in advance where I'll plant them- I won't even consider them until I already have a specific spot lined up). So if I plant bean seeds in soil with less-than-ideal pH, they won't suffer too badly. Then I just have to try to get them in a better position next year.

My plan this year is just about complete (at least, this revision is) aside from a few herbs. I have everything planned down to the square foot or less of where it will go. I just have to match a few square feet to a few herbs.