6.15.10

Let's Talk Dirt

Today I went to our local nursery and pick up my usual concoction to fill the raised beds with. I was so early that the staff had to rip the bags open from the crates they were delivered in.


8 bags of humus (organic compost) and 1 cubic foot of peat moss.


First I pour in the bags of humus (black colored underneath the brown). It's black in color which tells you that it's really rich. Break up any large clumps. Then when it's 2/3 full add the peat moss and mix it together. Because this is next to the house, I need it to drain really well so I added some vermiculite as well.


The mixture should have a consistency like this where you can make it into a ball but then it breaks up really easily. *Keep in mind the soil type that your plants need. Some herbs and vegetables thrive in poor soil (such as carrots), so a rich soil like this won't work. To make it "more poor", stir in more peat moss and use top soil or dirty from your yard as opposed to organic humus or what stores call garden soil.


Evenly mixed. It's supposed to rain tomorrow so after it rains I'm going to cast some seeds in the bed. This bed is 1.5'x16'. I am going to sketch/note where I want each herb. The left of the bed is really rich and the right is less rich for the different types of herbs.

We also put together a raised garden bed for the main crops which I'll post soon.

Spring Cleaning

It's the end of March and I'm taking advantage of the warmth this weekend.

• New garden bed - I finally made the decision to put a small (4'x12') raised bed along the North fence. It gets 6-8 hours of morning sun and then it's all shade. I was hesitant about this, but I don't like working on the South side (my neighbor's dog poos and pees all over the fence). 6-8 hours is just enough and if my plants aren't AS successful as previous years it would still be fine with me since I feel confident that I will still get veggies out of it. Also, it's shade by the time I get home from work which would actually be better for me so that I don't have to work in the blazing heat. My dream would be to have a large round bed in the middle of the yard. Basically I would take up the whole yard and lay flagstone paths and such. Some day.
  
• Raised herb bed - I'm looking forward to this! I'm going to start a variety of herbs and lots of basil!
  
• Added bone meal to the soil around my Irises.
• Added Epsom salt around my roses.
• Added ashes (from my neighbor's fire pit) around my Peonies.
  
• Raked up all the leaves and sticks from the fall and winter. I broke them up with my hands and sprinkled them along the back garden bed as mulch to keep the weeds at bay. Every bit helps.
  
• Repotted my tomato seedlings to the next level up. I used some store bought garden soil this time and mixed in a tiny bit of the seed starting mix that I had leftover to make a loose soil. I have 4 grape tomatoes, 4 black krim, 6 persimmon, and 4 roma tomatoes. The roma tomatoes fruit all at once so I'm going to scale it back to 2 roma tomato plants and then start 2 more later in the season.
  

Planting spring bulbs

I've been naughty. I bought all these bulbs and hid them from my husband. Then, I forgot all about them. It's cutting it a little slim to plant them now. Fortunately, we've had some warmer temperatures since there needs to be enough time for them to get acclimated before it gets to freezing temperatures.


I love sorbet colored tulips. I planted those in "bunches" around the yard. The peach colored double daffodil, I planted around the crab apple tree and kansas peony. The red tulips, I planted around the rhododendron in the front to go with our red door.


The yellow mixed daffodils, I planted around the japanese maple and around the azalea in front. Rake the mulch off the surface, dig a 6" hole, plop your bulb in right side up, cover back up and firm. Rake mulch back over it. Hopefully, the squirrels will leave them alone.


I cut back the chilli peppers and cleaned up the herb garden. It's a mess. I'm thinking about putting some stones down and raising the garden bed. It will give the herbs more sunlight if they are elevated and keep the herbs from getting all dirty.


The oregano is doing really well here so I"m going to keep it here. The sage needs a lot more sun so I think elevating it will do some good. Can you believe this plant started out like this? If it stays warm enough, I might raise the bed soon.



Happily waiting for spring to come.

It's food!

I picked some raspberries and as I ate them, I felt like Survivor Man. :D Lots happened last week. I already harvested handfuls of peas 3 times last week, 3 summer squashes, and lots of herbs and arugula.



More Summer Squash


Genovese Basil and carrots in my "test garden" container. I can't believe that early this month, these looked like this.


Do you remember the herb garden that I started in May?


Here it is now!


Here's a close up of the Sage (left) and Lemon Basil (right) I'm surprised at how well the basil did since I thought I was going to lose them when I planted them initially during the cold, rainy spring.


I need to start making some pesto very soon!

My Herb Garden

How sweet does this look?



Who doesn't love herbs? And a garden devoted to herbs sounds heavenly.



Now that we mulched the garden beds, I can't plant herbs randomly as I did before. You shouldn't ingest anything that has had mulch on it due to the chemicals. So I chose the small area on the north side of our house. It's near the kitchen which makes it convenient. It's an area that I could maintain and control the conditions of the soil easily.


(left to right: Silver Thyme, Variegated Sage, Red Chili Peppers, Lemon Basil, Climbing Nasturtiums, Violas, Jalapeno Peppers, Italian Oregano, Dill, and Mint) The little fence is to keep the squirrels out for now. The neighborhood squirrels love to hide their peanuts here so they dig here ALOT! If my plants haven't set in yet, the big fat squirrel will turn the whole thing upside down.


I started by amending the soil with lots of compost. One end of the garden bed is dry and the other is wet, so I planted each herb based on their needs. I alternated perennial herbs and annuals, so that there would always be something growing. Also, I chose variegated sage over regular kitchen sage (all green) and a silver thyme to change up the green colors in the leaves. I added some climbing Nasturtiums and red chilli peppers for color.



The final touch were these porcelain markers from Fishs Eddy that I bought a while ago. I love them and they are so much more durable than the plastic markers. I'm so excited about my herb garden. I hope it works out. Herbs can be finicky sometimes. Just one more thing: I potted the mint (because it gets out of control), arugula for control, and cilantro (so it can reseed itself).

What is your favorite herb(s)?