Garden State

The garden is off an running for the season! This past year, we added 5 more raised beds for more planting real estate. We have really compact, thick, mucky, red clay here and the easiest thing to do was go up, plus we had two large maple trees removed from this very spot and there are some serious roots still in the ground.

I tried winter sowing this past winter, which was surprisingly successful; however, I used styrofoam cups to plant within my mini greenhouse containers and I think next year I will just fill the containers with potting soil and plant in that. We are growing a lot of tomatoes and I am happy about that!

There are 10 beds total, which will be rotated with planting as the season carries on.

We planted 3 rhubarb starts at the front of the garden and they are spending their first season sending out roots versus foliage (I hope). A gardening friend says they do better from seed, but we'll see. When the greens and garlic are done next month, I will fill those two beds up with bush beans, and when the peas are done, I will plant malabar spinach.

I plan to plant that raspberry bush (it's in a pot now) where those PVC pipes are for my hoop house. It's a Bristol Black raspberry and I'm hoping I'll at least get to try a berry this year before the squirrels get to them. It sent out several runners last year that I dug up and grew in pots, so now I have enough raspberry plants to plant a small row!

I know you are thinking, "Hey Kathy, you have your tomato cages upside down!" Not so! I purposely turned those things upside down for more stability and to get the true height of the support cage. I know the tomatoes will grow taller than those cages and I'm not sure what I will do after that. I need a better system.

Big changes from last year, huh? We love our new garden shed too!