How Does Your Garden Grow?

I’ve been planting up a storm lately-and I’m still not done.

We decided to experiment with a CSA share this year (which I will write on in depth soon) so I am concentrating the vegetable garden mostly on items that I want to can for the winter.

My square foot garden (remember that from last year?) has some pretty healthy looking peas along the back edge. I spent a good chunk of time on Sunday and Tuesday running new cotton twine for the trellis that they peas can use, and then the scarlet runner beans which I planted right in front of them on Friday will eventual take over. (Note: My idea to grow runner beans in deck planters last year and have them trail down was a failure. They only want to grow UP. Ah, it is all a learning process. . .. )

I planted 9 tomato plants Tuesday as well, which took up a large portion of the remaining space. Half are Roma tomatoes, which will hopefully produce enough for some canning this fall. The rest are Brandywine, a nice slicing tomato. A neat tip for planting tomatoes-if you plant them deep enough to cover the stem additional roots will grow out from it, making a healthier plant! I planted the tomato starts as deep as I could and simply pinched off any leaves that would wind up below the soil level. I also made a sort of depression or dish around the plant so that rainwater and water from my watering can would stay right around the plant instead of running all over the garden.

Sprinkled here and there over the rest of the garden are some Swiss Chard (purposely planted too densely-the “extras” will be replanted in other places once they are a few inches tall), Dill (which is looking very pitiful), Kale and Basil. I still have a few squares un-planted-but have yet to decide what will fill them up.

On the flower front I have much work left to do.I only got a few winter sowing containers done this winter-so I have a few snapdragons, a bunch of Forget Me Not and a measly single container of Alyssum to transplant somewhere, probably along the side foundation of the house. I also got some volunteers from the Candytuft that I planted out front last year. Once they are slightly larger I will be transferring some of those to other spots around the yard as well. ..

Our load of mulch was delivered today ($81 for a truckload which will cover every inch of garden space I have with at least 2 inches of mulch with plenty left over). Knowing the price of those individual bags of mulch, I think that buying by the truckload is quite a savings. If we had taken the trailer and hauled it ourselves we would have only paid $36-but we have an open mesh trailer and the sawmill was too far away to use that for transport.

I think you could make a case for mulch being frugal in that it reduces your watering needs by preventing evaporation of the water in the soil. It also is a savings of time once it is down because, if applied thickly enough, it keeps the weeds down.

Before I spread the mulch on the flower beds, I want to spread a layer of our homemade compost. We have two piles-the main pile we stared 3 summers ago when we moved here. After 2 years of adding things to it, I decided last year to start a new pile and let the initial one “finish”. I don’t know if you could really call it “finished”-there are still recognizable bits in it. But it is to the level that one book I read called “almost compost” and I feel confident using it. Especially since there will be a 2 inch layer of mulch on top keeping it moist and helping it finish decomposing. This “almost compost” is very frugal. It is completely made of garden and household refuse. That makes it totally and utterly free.

All these flowers are a lot of work, and of course I readily admit that they are in no way shape or form a necessity. However, we are doing much better than barely scraping by. We pay for our necessities, we are not in debt, and we have both short term and retirement savings. Having attractive flowers is very pleasing to me-so we chose to spend the money on it. It isn’t even a case of keeping up with the Jones’. Our neighbors on the one side use plastic flowers in their window boxes, and the ones on the opposite side just planted 4 shrubs after living in the house for 2 years with no plantings at all. I just plain like mucking around with the plants

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More posts on gardening:
Start Your Garden in the Winter
Winter Sowing Success (2006)
June Garden Tour (2006)
July Garden Tour (2006)
Garden Daze (2006)
Quick Tip-Frugal Garden Labels
The Dead of Winter is the Time to Think of Spring
Sprouting, the Easy Way to Grow Veggies