Adventures in my Urban Garden

Keeping Hope ..... I Mean Seedlings Alive

2010-05-21T12:39:00.008-04:00

So I picked up my seedlings last Saturday and like clockwork I started to get completely stressed out about how to keep them alive until it was warm enough to plant them.

I negotiated with the farmer from ReVision House and the staff from Allandale farm to try to get someone to tell me it was safe to just put them in the ground even though it was only mid-May. No dice. The seedlings usually get good and sad looking over the two weeks and I wanted to do better this year. I'm not expecting real growth, I just want them to stay healthy. I put the collards and brussel sprouts in the ground right away, but the cukes, tomatoes, basil, eggplant and pepper were not ready for that.

Also, my house is being painted, so I couldn't leave them out on my porch which is my usual routine. What on earth was I going to do? Not to count my chickens before they hatch, but the inaccessibility of the porch may have turned out to be a blessing in disguise.

As an aside, those of you urban dwellers know the unique challenges of growing things when you live in an apartment without a lot of space (indoor, but especially outdoor) and where all of that space is divvied up very carefully by all parties. There's no sunny growing spot out in the world that you don't work damn hard to get in Boston, that's for sure.

So I decided to ask my first floor neighbor if I could leave the seedlings in their yard (this is the yard that is in the back of the house I live in, but it is not mine) and put them in their covered "outdoor-shed/porch/living-room-type-thing" at night or if it looked to be bad weather. Given the house painting situation, they agreed. It turns out, this is way better treatment than they usually get on my own porch for a few reasons:

1) I usually put the seedlings on my front porch, which isn't as sunny during the day as the back of the house. I do have a back porch, but up until now it's been the "crappier" of my two porches because the paint in back was peeling so badly and because it's a little bit less convenient to get to than the front. Also both of these porches are covered on top, in typical triple-decker fashion.

2) Because they are on the porch and covered, I don't usually move them inside when it's going to rain. Also I have a cat (used to have two until this year, RIP my sweet Umbrella, but that is not what this blog is about so..... moving on) and the cat/s in my house have free reign and like to munch on vulnerable seedlings like nobody's business. So the long and short of it is that unless it was going to be freezing, the seedlings were outside for the duration with nothing more than a roof over their heads. Rain and wind could easily fly at them from the sides. Sometimes I'd cover them with plastic if the weather was particularly nasty, and only very rarely would they get to come all the way indoors.

3) In the past I kept the seedlings in the containers they came in. I knew this was wrong, but I just didn't have a plan for transplanting them. Again, where does a city kid keep all of the supplies needed for excellent gardening? It's a challenge. This year I was determined to do better. I found enough milk jugs, soy milk, oj and yogurt containers to give most of the seedlings a larger home. I still didn't have a great plan, because I was clinging to the delusional hope that global warming (tragic though it is) was going to work in my favor this year and I'd just plop all the seedlings in the ground.

Why I think this set up is better:

First of all, the seedlings look pretty good!

With the back yard set-up the seedlings get a lot more sunlight for more of the day and they are babied a little bit better ie: I've been bringing them in every night that it looks to get into the 40s and I keep them inside when it rains. Inside is pretty darn close to outside temperature-wise so I'm not sure what I'll do if the weather turns very cold, but so far I haven't had to worry about it and the forecast for next week seems even better. I think the complete absence of wind at night and the small temperature difference, probably helped a bit. In fact the subtle temperature difference probably works a lot better for them than going from low 50s in the evening to my cozy apartment which is probably in the high 60s. I mean they'd prefer it much warmer than that I know, but still gradual might be better.

The containers aren't perfect, but they still seem to help. I mean I totally screwed up on the water holes. I used a knife and ran it through the bottom of the containers leaving a few small slanty cuts (barely holes) for drainage. I was pretty sure I waterlogged some cucumbers this way, but they haven't died yet. I tried to fix the holes after planting in a couple places, but I don't think I got it. I learned my lesson with the yogurt containers and made larger holes which I think are better. Also, some of my containers are clear. I am sure that's not good since every planting vessel I have ever seen is a dark color. I assume this is to keep the roots away from the light. I'm hoping it'll still be ok because the containers are big enough that I don't think the roots will grow out to the edges all that quickly, but who knows.

The porches are due to be finished this weekend, but I really want to keep the seedlings where they are. It's just another week and I live all the way up on the 3rd floor.

Also, as luck would have it, I've realized that the back porch is likely the superior one for seedlings, but my current roommate is a smoker and she smokes back there. Cigarette smoke is not good for plants, especially tomatoes, so that's not a risk I'm willing to take.

Perhaps this porch-painting business is just the kind of bonding experience my neighbors and I need to make the back porch the permanent home for my spring seedlings. Who wants to stand in the way of a good garden produce, especially if you're a neighbor and might get some?

P.S. If things work out I'll have more seedlings than I'll be able to plant, so let me know if you are in the Boston area and might want some seedlings.

Early May Garden Worries

2010-05-08T14:05:00.012-04:00

So far so good in terms of the "old" seeds sprouting to life. I am quite pleased. The beets, arugula and radishes have all come up nicely. I'm pretty sure that carrots, cilantro, dill, shallots, onions and parsley all take a bit longer so I'm not too worried that I haven't seen signs of life in those rows yet.

Meanwhile, I've got a new/old pest to contend with: flea beetles. I don't think there's much I can do. Frankly, I'm amazed at the lengths I go to (or at least consider) to keep the pests at bay and the minimal impact my efforts actually seem to have on the pest population. Let's run down the assorted critters and issues I've got on my mind in these early planting days of May:

1) Cutworms - these are my enemies from way back. I try to make a habit of turning over the soil as late as I can in the fall to expose any larvae to the elements and then again in early spring. That seems to have worked the past few years, but if it's not that cold (like now) I worry.

2) Bunnies - I am not sure it's rabbits, but in the past, something has gotten to my lettuce and chomped off a whole lot of it in the early growth stages. Same as last year, I brushed the dog living in my house (new roommate = new dog) and tied a bunch of his hair together with a string and hung it over where the lettuce is growing. I have no idea if this will really work, but it's easy enough to do.

3) Flea Beetles - I am honestly shocked at how quickly they started eating little holes through my teeny tiny arugula seedlings. I really haven't figured out anything to keep them away and I can still eat the holey arugula, but it's infuriating to see the damage and feel powerless to stop it. I suppose I could try some really thin sheets of fabric that allows the sun through, but it seems so large-scale farm-like for a little plot in a community garden.

4) Cucumber Beetles - I always get them and I definitely hate them. They don't come until later in the season, but I'm growing at least 2 things just for them: radishes (supposedly repel them) and dill (supposedly attract helpful bugs that eat cucumber beetles)

5) Leaf Miners - These guys REALLY piss me off. I've never actually seen one of the bugs, but they spend their time eating through the middle of beet leaves (and chard and other leafy greens) making them ugly and inedible. I can usually eat the beets, but it doesn't make me hate the Leaf Miners any less. I mentioned this problem to one of the staff at Allandale farm last year who suggested taking a year off the beets, but I just couldn't do it. This year I'm planting them in a new spot, in between rows of radishes and onions and hoping for the best.

6) Wasps - these are new for me, and they've been back since my last post. I don't know if I really want to go to all the trouble of installing a fake wasp nest to deter them, but I am not pleased to have wasps hanging out right in my plot. Flying around in general is ok, but within easy stinging distance all the time....I'm not into that.

The pick up for Revision House seedlings is next weekend, so I'm excited to get a lot more in the ground. It's been so warm, it might even be safe to put in tomatoes!

old seeds, new tricks?

2010-05-03T07:33:00.006-04:00

This Saturday I finally managed to get into the garden to work. I did a pretty good job of weeding and turning over some of the soil in only 3 and 1/2 hours. It's been a while though and I guess I'm a bit rusty, because I also got a really stupid sunburn (the kind that makes it look like I'm still wearing a flesh colored t -shirt) and I planted cilantro (which I had already planted) instead of planting parsley. They really look alike!!

Overall I'm pleased with my accomplishment and feeling good about my work. I did plant old seeds though. This is not an encouraged practice since the seeds may not be alive anymore. I didn't store them in the fridge or take special care of them like you're supposed to, I just figured: "I have all these year old seeds, so what the hell?!" They had been in a drawer, away from extreme heat and sunlight, so I'm hoping I'll be lucky.

The real motivation was the fact that I don't have a car and didn't feel like biking over to Allandale farm. Partly because I just didn't feel like biking, but mostly because I knew I'd see things I wanted that were NOT seeds and that I would be unable to take back home on my basketless bicycle.

After I was done for the day, my favorite census taker drove me over to Allandale anyway. It was then that I bought some rosemary and "parsley" seedlings...that turned out to be cilantro. I was also on the hunt for something that might repel wasps. It turns out, my totally awesome cucumber trellis is attracting them. It appears to be the dry cracked wood that they like, but I am nervous that they'll try to make a nest which would completely suck. Wasps sting!! I mean, I've been stung a lot, but I'd rather not risk it every time I garden not to mention the fact that this is a community garden and there are 50 or so other gardeners and kids in the area all the time, some of whom might be allergic. I found a few comments online that mention installing a fake wasp nest to keep the wasps away. Apparently they are territorial and won't come near the nest.

The didn't have one at Allandale and I'm tempted to try it, but even looking at that giant (fake) wasp nest is a bit scary to me.

I think I'll keep checking the trellis for a few more days before I fork out the money for a giant, fear-inducing nest "waspinator" nest of my own.

General Garden Update

2009-07-28T10:10:00.010-04:00

I've been feeling like the world's worst gardener lately. June and most of July were so rainy and cool that I hardly had to water. I all but completely ignored the garden and let the weeds take over. This week I turned a corner though. I got up at 5AM on Monday to reign in the wild arms of the tomato plants and harvest a few things. Today again, I was up at 6AM to give the garden a good soaking now that it's actually hot out. The weeds are taunting me, but perhaps I will deal with them tomorrow. I'm quite pleased with the harvest this week: more collards, several beautiful cucumbers, beets and celery (first time ever!)

There are some good things happening despite my neglect. Yhe cucumber plants really did climb up the trellis and the cukes are dangling well above the ground, just like I had hoped. Unfortunately, all of the lower leaves seem to have rust colored spots on them. I assume it's some sort of fungus from all the rain, but I've been too lazy to even get to the bottom of it.

The leafminers chewed the hell out of my beets and my aggressive defoliating didn't seem to make much of a difference. I can still eat the beets though, and they look pretty good. Sad to say it, but I think for the next year or two I'm going to skip the beets and see if I can chase these pests away.

The best thing the garden is doing now though is donating produce to a local food pantry. We set out a cooler over the weekend so gardeners can drop off their harvest, and then someone picks it up early on Monday to take the bounty. I gave up some collard greens and cucumbers, but I think we're going to need a bigger cooler once the tomatoes get going!

Beet it!

2009-06-29T10:55:00.007-04:00

I was away in California and then NJ for about 10 days and, as is the norm when traveling during the season, I worried about my garden while I was away.

Luckily it rained almost the entire time I was gone and all of the next week. Unluckily, that meant I had a lot of weeding to do this weekend.

So, like many young Americans of my generation this past weekend, I let Michael Jackson be the soundtrack to my day. I popped on the headphones, put Off the Wall and Thriller into one playlist on the ipod and got to work. I was never a die hard fan, and I pretty much stopped paying attention by the time I got to high school, but especially when I was about 12 or 13 his music was very very important to me. The garden wasn't too crowded, so not too many people saw my "moves" as I boogied to the music.

It took about 2 hours and I got MOST of the weeding done.

After being away for so long, things looked pretty different. Mostly in good ways: cucumbers have almost started climbing, the collards and celery and brussel sprouts look huge and the tomato plants look to be disease free, despite all the rain. The big blow was evidence of my two most hated (after cut worms of course) bugs: beet leafminers and cucumber beetles.

I found a few things online that said that radishes repel cucumber beetles, so even though it's way too hot for 'em. I planted some seeds next to the cukes. I only saw one teeny tiny beetle in the California Poppies (which look great!), but it's early and I'm anticipating a swarm.

I'm feeling at a loss in terms of the leafminers though. I removed one of the leaves that seemed the worst and will probably go back and remove more if necessary. You can see from the top photo that the injuries from these evil pests are really really ugly. Even though I'll still be able to eat the beets, I want the greens too AND I definitely don't want them to infect other plants.

We've got a 3 day weekend coming up though and it's supposed to be sunny, so I'm hoping I'll have some more time to be in the garden and do battles against the evil bugs who plan my plants harm.

My Vegetables are not Vegetarian

2009-05-27T11:17:00.014-04:00

This Saturday I planted just about everything. It's a bit earlier than the dude where I picked up my seedlings suggested, but I feel certain that the plants have a better chance of surviving in the roomy, sunny and compost-ful environment of the garden than they would cramped in their seedling containers on my porch.

I had a fantastic time planting and am very excited to see how it all works out. It has turned colder in the past few days so I'm a bit worried about the cucumbers, but I think everything else should be able to handle it. Ah yes, I did have to get new cucumber plants at the farm, so it would be a shame to kill another set.

I also started the "summerizing" of my front porch with a few planted flowers and an overall clean up from the dirt and mess of the winter. Once again, you can see my cat in the photo if you look carefully. She loves the porch.

As part of all this prep however, I realized that as I've moved from a flat out beginner to a slightly more experienced novice, there are things that no longer shock me. One such example is the fact that I routinely (and gleefully) treat my seedlings to a diet of dead animal parts to help them grow.

Do vegetarians know about this? What about Jews who keep Kosher?

What the best organic gardeners advise for a healthy, thriving garden, are small amounts of things like Pro Gro or Neptune's Harvest which is essentially a bunch of nutrients including blood and crab meal in the case of the former and liquified fresh fish in the case of the latter. Ew right?

On the big planting day on Saturday I added a few handfuls of compost to the soil in, around and next to every one of the seedlings and then this Tuesday I added a handful of Pro-Gro to everyone as well. The fish will go on this weekend and then I'll be repeating all of those steps a few times throughout the summer.

But I'm wondering....is this "Kosher?" How are vegetables grown with animal parts classified? It's not like you're eating the animals, but it sure is a part of the process. I recently read a detailed article in the New Yorker about certifying Kosher products in China so I feel certain that someone must have thought about this. I am sure there are non-animal alternatives, especially in conventional, non-organic growing, but there is very little labeling in American produce aisles and I can't imagine that your average vegatarian even thinks about what might have been added to the lovely "vegetarian" foods they may be selecting. I know that I never did.

I was a vegetarian for 13 years and I slowly started bringing meat and fish back a few years ago...right around the time I started gardening. It's all part of the cycle of life and quite poignant that something dying makes life possible for something else, but still, I wonder how those who vow not to consume animals (or at least keep them separate from dairy or not eat certain kinds) draw the line. I also wonder if I would agree with the way said animals might be treated if I knew. As those who've been reading this blog may know, I have toyed with the idea of buying fox urine to keep the bunnies away, but I have no idea how they collect it and my guess is, its not a friendly method. So while it may be "natural," I don't know that it's something I really want to support.

Going down this road too far is a bit much for me. I/we live in an industrialized world and where we get our food and what goes into it is a touchy and politically charged subject. I like to think that by growing an organic garden and mostly eating organic food that I can identify as an actual plant or animal means I'm on the right side of most of these issues. Really though, I think it's more of a spectrum, as with lots of things in our modern world, there is a little "blood meal" on quite a lot of us.

No answers here, just questions.

Meanwhile, the garden is looking good and I really hope the seedlings make it through the cold and rain this week, but at least I don't have to water.

Daisy in the Garden

2009-05-22T13:13:00.009-04:00

My community garden is pretty amazing. In addition to the fenced off area that has all the garden plots, there are a few other open areas where neighbors can hang out. One of the important rules of the garden however is that no dogs are allowed in the area with the plots. And it's a darn good rule in my opinion.

And yet, sometimes a dog is exactly what you need.

Several weeks ago I planted some lettuce seeds and they seemed to be coming up nicely until I noticed them disappearing... apparently chewed to the ground. I've seen rabbits in the garden so I assume it's them, though I suppose it could be something else.

Last year, I had tried putting some Irish Spring Soap (or drugstore knock-off) next to the lettuce after I noticed a lot of greenery disappearing. It seemed to work, but with the bright green color and the STRONG perfume smell I'm still not sure if this was a smart idea - especially in a garden designed to grow food. Once I saw the damage to the lettuce again this year though, I went out and bought some "Emerald Mist" and planned to set to work. It's actually supposed to be the Sodium Tallowate in the soap that scares off the bunnies due to it smelling like a dead animal and not all that perfume.

Luckily I was chatting with a co-worker who said that his mom always used dog hair in the garden to keep away rabbits. Eureka! It just so happens that I live with a dog. Her name is Daisy and she is very cute and VERY hairy (see pic above.)

That very night I did some strange stuff with twine and dog hair that looks like some sort of ancient sacred symbol or sacrifice. Maybe voo doo? It's basically puff-balls of dog hair tied to the end of the twine and hanging a few inches above the lettuce. Oh the lengths we'll go to for the garden! So far I haven't seen any new damage, so we'll see if this works. I sure hope so, since dog hair seems way better than stinky chemical-filled soap.

Meanwhile I am fairly confident that the cucumber seedlings on my porch are toast. They look awful. I had to cut off many leaves because they were dry and discolored and the ones that are still left don't look too terrific either. I'm not sure if I should even try planting them or just pick up some new ones. The tomatoes actually look ok. Not quite as good as they did when I picked them up, but not terrible either.

The big highlight is that the San Marzano seedlings look terrific!

Big Mid-May Garden Day

2009-05-18T09:25:00.006-04:00

I arrived at Re-vision House at around 10:15AM on Saturday and there was already a line to pick up seedlings. After a bit of waiting around and some chit-chat, one of the staff led me around to collect my bounty. These were the seedlings I had ordered way back in February and I could hardly remember what I selected. Since all the plants come in 6 packs I arranged to share the order with a friend who is also another gardener in my garden. She hates brussel sprouts and I'm not that into trying to grow broccoli again, but the plan was to split just about everything else...I think.

Back to the seedling collection: first, my farmer-guide and I went to the cooler temp crops that were already in flats on the ground and picked up collard greens, brussel sprouts, and broccoli. Then we headed into the greenhouse. I forgot to bring my camera, but the seedlings all looked huge and lush and amazing. I got 2 mixed packs of tomatoes - 2 each of 3 types of cherry tomatoes and 2 each of three other types of heirlooms (I think brandywine, striped german and pruden's purple) plus another 2 six packs of brandywine and black prince tomatoes, black beauty eggplant and marketmore cucumbers.

And then the stress-out started. I asked the farm dude in 3 different ways how to take care of the plants that were in the green house. He said in no uncertain terms to plant them on June 1st and until then water them, keep them on the porch and cover them at night. He said I didn't need to replant into another container because being on the porch they would pretty much stop growing. I KNOW this is what he said, but I am still so afraid that I am going to ruin the poor seedlings and end up with crappy crops because of it.

Last year I decided to skip the Re-vision house seedlings and just buy everything at Allandale farm to avoid this very problem and now that I'm back doing the Re-vision House thing, I remember why I did that. It is so damn stressful keeping the seedlings alive and well cared for on the porch.

Anyway, when I got home I stared at my plot for a loooong time and then finally made some decisions about layout which you can see in the photo of the entire plot. I created a few planting areas and a bunch of paths to get around and get to them which I hope will work pretty well.

As sometimes happens in a community garden, I started planting right around the same time that another gardener happened by....and she offered me 3 celery plants. I've never grown celery and always wanted to, so in they went. This is part of the reason I never make set plans for what I'm going to plant until I actually start, something always comes up....in a good way.

So here's what we've got in the ground:

4 brussel sprouts
3 collard greens
3 celery
a few small rows of beet seeds
1 more additional row each of cilantro, red lettuce and arugula behind the trellis

The rest of the seedlings are on the porch along with the san marzanos (which look ok!) and the basil (looks only so-so) the marigolds (eh) the shallots and parsley (also eh) and more arugula which looks bad enough that I might just toss. I cut open a plastic trash bag to make a sheet of sorts and have been using that to cover up the seedlings at night. It's cold today though, but I took off the "blanket" to let them get some sun. I really hope this works.

Oh and the mint is not yet coming up in the sink, but I'm hoping that't just a matter of time.

P.S.: Special thanks to my two friends who came to visit during my 4 hours of gardening to help plant some of the seeds and keep me company!

San Marzano Seedlings

2009-05-14T11:19:00.010-04:00

This past weekend a friend from Vermont, who seems preternaturally gifted in the gardening department, gave me 4 lovely san marzano tomato seedlings that she started on the windowsill of her office. Seriously, she hasn't been gardening that long and she seems so good at it!

I was thrilled to get them and yet, almost as soon as they were handed over, I felt panicked.

I had ridden my bike to bowling (yes, I'm on a bowling team, but this is about gardening so...moving right along) so I had to have a friend take the seedlings in her car for me. By the time I got them, they were HOT and a little bit wilty from the stress of the car.

I brought them inside, but I wasn't really sure what to do next because these little guys were born indoors and I didn't really want to stress them by taking them straight outside. I knew they needed sun, but I had already decided that my sunlamps were making my seedlings too hot so I couldn't risk putting them under those either. My friend told me that they should be transplanted pretty soon, like in the next few days. All I really have are some leftover plastic soda bottles to replant them into and not that many at that.

So here's what I've done:

The first night I gave them a little water and left the plants on the windowsill and kept them there all of the next day. I knew this wasn't enough sun, but I didn't want to stress them with the wind and cold of the porch.

The next day I put the existing pot inside one of the soda bottle greenhouses I had made and put this out on the porch during the day. At night I took the whole thing inside and put it back on the windowsill.

The day after that I left it on the windowsill again, because I knew I wouldn't be home that night and I didn't want to risk the plants getting too cold overnight.

When I checked them this morning they looked pretty good. They were upright and a little bit taller, bigger and greener than when I first got them.

So...this morning I replanted 2 seedlings each inside soda bottle greenhouses. Unfortunately I don't have enough bottles to do the whole self watering system like I did with the basil seeds, so I just cut some holes in the bottom for drainage and will need to water regularly. I'm hoping that the plastic cover will be enough protection from the wind and cold. The problem is, the leaves are pressing right up against the plastic which I am guessing is not a good thing. I'm not sure what to do about this because I think without the plastic it could be too cold and windy for the little guys.

So I think the sun and the additional growing room is good. I think the protection from the wind and cold is good and I think the claustrophobia-inducing bottle top is bad.

I'm hoping to slowly get them used to the outside temperatures with the plastic cover and then start removing it (just during the day) until they seem strong enough to manage without it. I still might bring them inside at night if the temps look to be cold.

While I was at it I took my two healthiest looking basil seedlings and transplanted them to larger containers too (picture is at the top). I think I should do this with all of the seedlings that look ok, but I definitely don't have enough plastic bottles and containers for that.

Boston friends...can you help me out? Send me your yogurt, sour cream and cottage cheese containers and your 1 and 2 liter soda bottles yearning for a new purpose in life.

I should mention that I planted all of this in the leftover coir that I had already re-hydrated and stuck in a plastic bag on the porch. This isn't potting soil, but I think and hope it's ok.

Stay tuned for more stress inducing adventures. I am picking up my seedlings from Re-Vision House this weekend and will definitely be planting a few things and looking for ways to keep those that are not yet ready to go into the ground protected.

As always, advice in the comments section is enthusiastically encouraged!

Seedling Update

2009-05-05T14:52:00.006-04:00

Well I got back from Oregon and the seedlings are still alive.

They don't exactly seem to be thriving (ie: still a bit leggy, not much bigger), but not too terrible. I think my roommate kind of flooded them instead of just watering, but I guess they managed. I'm a little concerned because they are still on the porch and now a bit too tall to fit under the egg container cover. It's in the low 50s outside so I'm worried that the cold (plus the flooding) might all end up having been too much for the little suckers.

I might try to replant a few in larger containers this weekend and hope for the best.

The seeds I planted underneath the trellis seem to be doing great and I thinned the seedlings a bit. The flea beetles are already all over the arugula though and I'm not sure there's anything I can do about that. Holey arugula is pretty much what I've gotten used to.

Seedling Experiment - Week 1

2009-04-26T09:49:00.007-04:00

So far it's not an abject failure, but I feel sure that my end could be right around the corner.

The marigolds sprouted first and looked to be doing pretty well. Then came the arugula and the basil. All looked ok UNTIL after a few days all the seedlings seemed quite tall. This is (from what I hear and read) a sign that the seedlings aren't getting enough light.

I had the light SUPER close and was leaving it on all day. In fact, I was worried that it might actually be sizzling the soil and seeds. It felt quite warm to the touch. That's probably not good right?

Anyway, yesterday was 80 degrees and sunny here so I took a gamble and put all the seedlings out onto my porch to get some sun. I kept the covers closed though, so they didn't also have to brave any wind and so they might stay warm if the temperature dropped. Nothing seems to have died, so that's good.

I brought all the seedlings back in last night to "sleep" and then refilled the water trays, thinned a few so only one little sprout is in each egg cup and brought them all back out this morning. 2 little shallot sprouts showed up, but the parsley is still dormant.

Meanwhile the soda bottle green house, that was always on the porch, has two teeny tiny basil sprouts that showed up this morning. I think this could be more promising.

So while I'm struggling mightily (mostly in my own mind I realize) with the "indoor" seedlings, all the arugula and lettuce I planted behind the trellis has sprouted! No sign of cilantro yet, but I'm optimistic.

I leave for a week in Oregon tomorrow though so I'm not sure if I should leave the seedlings on the porch (and maybe ask my roommate to check on them) or inside. The temps should be warm enough for them to stay outside and I think they may appreciate the light, but I just don't know how fast they'll dry out and if I really want to saddle my roommate with the chore of checking on them in addition to taking care of my insane, geriatric cats.

Are you Jealous of this Trellis?

2009-04-20T17:57:00.011-04:00

Growing vertically and mastering the use of space in a small urban plot, seem to me to be a sign of someone who knows what they're doing in a community garden.

I have long viewed myself as more of a newbie, lacking the skills and expertise to try anything as ambitious as a trellis, let alone planting things near each other in a way that one plant can help the other.

I guess that's not entirely true. I've planted basil and marigold with tomatoes and those are supposed to help each other, and my arugula always seems to attract flea beetles which I think helps keep them away from my eggplant, but this plan, is far more ambitious.

Let me start at the beginning:

Last year I grew cucumbers and I really liked it. They attracted a lot of cucumber beetles though and took up a lot of space. The cucumbers also tended to hide underneath the leaves such that I could miss a cuke one day and show up a day later to find a baseball-bat-sized cucumber the next. I had heard, and seen others growing them UP and wanted to try it. In my internet searching I came across this cool design for a cucumber trellis that basically allows the cucumber vines to climb upward, but also leaves some room behind for lettuce which likes cooler temperatures.

I didn't really think I could build something like this myself. I'm easily intimidated by things like this. Luckily, I am fortunate enough have an in with Captain Awesome. He is pretty handy and agreed to build me a trellis.

So this Saturday ( a few hours after the seedling adventure) we headed out to Home Depot to get the supplies and make my garden dream a reality. We had a general sense of the items we needed and after I woke up from my "overwhelmed-by-the-choices-trance" in the nail aisle, we got it together enough to get our stuff and leave.

We bought 3 2x4s, some long nails, vinyl coated chicken wire, and a bag of plastic zip ties. Captain Awesome already had all the tools so we didn't need to get any of those. He built the whole thing right in the bed of his truck, with no power, or anything.

So now the trellis is all set up in all it's glory in my garden plot. I went ahead and used this opportunity to begin to figure out the layout for the garden this year. I dug up the black-eyed susan and moved it closer to the other perennials (and gave 75% of it to another gardener for her yard ) and moved the bee balm closer too. Now I've got only one area, by the sink, for flowers. I think this will work better and give me more room for veggies in the rest of the plot.

I've asked a few other gardeners if they think the stuff I plan to grow behind the trellis will work or get too shaded. Honestly, I'm too excited about this idea to even hear it when a few of them have said "maybe" or "I dunno." In this spirit, I went ahead and planted some lettuce, arugula and cilantro seeds behind the trellis. Sure, it might be too early, but I'm feeling bold and experimental at the moment.

I know that I can be very insecure about my gardening abilities, but at the core, I'm an optimist and a believer in my own ability to make things happen. Also, I do know SOME things. I haven't planted the cucumbers yet and I know I won't do that for at least another month.

I know I'm dealing with the natural world here and wanting something to work may not make it happen, but for now, I'll keep hope alive!

So it begins...

2009-04-20T14:44:00.014-04:00

Early Saturday morning, I got up and planted my seedlings.

As you may recall, I've been talking about doing this for a while, but it took longer than I expected to pull together all the necessary materials and then find the time to do it. Here's the play by play of the plan.

Step 1 - Potting Medium
First I had to take the coir and add 1 and 1/4 gallons of water to it to turn it from a rock hard brick to something resembling a potting medium. I had purchased 2 bricks because I didn't know how much it would turn into once I added water and the bricks looked pretty small. I definitely only needed one, I now have a plastic grocery bag full of the stuff sitting on my porch, plus the unopened brick that I didn't even use. Anyone in the Boston area need this?

Step 2 - Something to plant in
Next, I prepared the plastic egg cartons. I'd been holding onto plastic soda bottles and plastic egg containers for a while, with the intention of making some seedling trays and mini-greenhouses so I had a ton on hand. The ones I have include a ton of excess packaging: bottom egg cups, top egg cups and top flat lid, all made of clear plastic. I used some scissors to cut off the top egg cup part and used those for a water tray at the bottom. I used a steak knife to puncture the bottom egg cups so that water from the bottom tray could get to the potting soil to keep the seedlings and soil moist.
Step 3 - Assembly
I pressed the coir (which was thoroughly water soaked at this point) into the egg cups and then used a pencil to create a small indentation in each "cup." I decided to devote each tray to a different type of seed: shallot, marigold, arugula, parsley and basil. This is not the most ambitious assortment of seeds, but given the fact that I have yet to do this successfully I wanted to start small.
I tried to drop 3 seeds into each indentation (though I am sure I ended up with 4 or 5 in a few.) I marked each tray with some coffee stirrers and then filled the bottom (formerly top) egg cups 1/2 way with water and placed the covered coir-filled cups on top.

Step 4 - Location and lighting
I borrowed a small table and set it up with 2 grow lights by the window. The grow lights are REALLY close to the seedlings which I think is how you're supposed to do it. For now, they're mostly keeping the soil a bit warm, but soon they'll provide the light the seedlings need to grow. The grow lights don't cover every single seedling in light evenly, but I'm hoping it'll work out. If anyone out there with more experience than me looking at these photos sees a problem with how I'm doing this PLEASE let me know. I really really really want this to work!

Step 5 - Care and Maintenance
My plan is to turn the lights on when I leave in the morning and off when I get home from work each day. I'm sure I'll need to thin the seedlings eventually and maybe turn the trays around if it seems like the light is hitting some more than others. I'm also planning to check the water in the bottom tray every day and just refill those when they seem lower. I think this should be the right amount of water, but who knows?

List of Worries:

1) Is the light enough, too much, too close, too uneven?
2) Is turning the lights on and off bad in terms of the temperature during germination?
3) Is it too much water? They're basically sitting in water all the time right now.
4) Everything is covered up greenhouse style right now. I assume that at some point I'll want to uncover them. When should I do this and how do I keep my cats from eating them?
5) If this works, how do I harden them off and get them ready for the garden? Do I need to transplant to something larger first? I've kept a bunch of soda bottles with the idea that I might transplant some of the seedlings to these at some point.

Extra Credit

As suggested, I did create one larger soda bottle greenhouse with basil seeds and stuck it on my porch. It seems way too cold outside for this to work, but I'm hopeful.

Believe it or not, this was only the FIRST major garden related project of the day. More to come shortly.....

Setting up for Seedlings

2009-03-23T10:41:00.006-04:00

It's March 23rd and in the temperature is in the twenties!!

I've had about enough of winter and I'm ready for it to be warm enough to garden. In the meantime, I've been collecting the supplies I'll need for this year's seedling growing extravaganza. I'm still not convinced it's going to work and in the end I may have to spend more money than I normally would just to try. I figure it's still cheaper because I rarely buy any produce at any store once the garden is in full swing.

So far I've amassed an impressive number of plastic containers including lots of plastic egg cartons and an array of soda and juice bottles. I ordered some seeds from Johnny's Seeds in Maine and borrowed a small table from Captain Awesome. I still need to get some coir or other sustainable growing medium, some milk crates and a grow light from my pal Ms. Knapsack. I also got a soil thermometer...mostly because I've been wanting one for a while. I'm not sure it will even work for the seedling growing because the depth is so shallow.

Here's my thinking:
If I want to start planting around mid-May I should start the seedlings in the next couple of weeks. The small table is up next to the radiator which should keep them warm enough, although they're also near a window which could make them cold. The table will keep them elevated as a deterrent to my lovable, but evil cats who might like to snack on the tender greens.

The egg cartons have so much extra plastic, that I should be able to cut off the top flap and put it underneath and then poke holes in the bottoms of each of the egg cups and water only from the bottom.

Once the seedlings are big enough I can transfer the healthy ones to the soda bottle green houses, keep them inside at first and then eventually transfer them to the porch to toughen up before they go in the garden.

At this point it seems hard to believe I'll really be able to pull this off, but I am definitely going to try.

A few seeds I'm planning to start with:

Dill - I don't actually like dill, but I grew it last year because it attracts some good bugs, this is a good choice because I won't be crushed if the seedlings don't work out.
Basil
Marigolds
Parsley

A few things I think I can direct seed, but might try to do seedlings as well:
Cilantro
Arugula
Shallots - never grown these, but I'll be thrilled if I can.

You'll notice that I don't have any of the big-ticket veggies in here. I think I need to build my confidence slowly. If this works out I can always get more seeds to try more things a few weeks after I start. I've got the seedling from Re-Vision House ordered and I can always pick up more at the farm.

I've got the first draft of the whole garden plan done, but I need to review it in person to see if the spacing works.

I'm not planning to grow anything I've never grown before (at this point) except for shallots, just building on my skills with the stuff I've tried before.

Gardening Freedom?

2009-01-27T16:15:00.012-05:00

I would really like to grow my own seedlings. For a while now I've put growing seedlings on a pedestal, thinking of it as an "advanced" gardening skill that is "out of my league," but that's some seriously pessimistic thinking and I need to get past it.

Let's face it, I'm getting to the point in my gardening career where I am no longer a complete beginner. I know a thing or two and it's time to try (again or for the first time) things that I have considered to be out of my reach. Growing my own seedlings is definitely one of these things. I did try this once before.... but all the seedlings died. That was 3 years ago though.

In my mind, I feel that If I can master the whole seedling thing I can pretty much grow whatever I want on whatever time-line makes sense. That's real freedom.

What I do now is spend a lot of time planning when I'll go to Allandale farm. I go with a vague sense of what I want to grow, but then I always find that some things aren't there so I end up making decisions on the spot. I find the whole thing a little bit stressful, in part because I don't own a car so dropping by the farm whenever I get the urge is not an option. I can't to go to the farm too late in May because a lot of the plants will be snatched up so I usually end up making two trips, one for "early" stuff like greens and one for "later" plants like tomatoes and eggplant. Similarly, when I've ordered from Re-Vision House, the plant pick-up is in the middle of May which is a little bit too early for most things to go in the ground. You see my predicament. I'm beholden to the whims and caprices of others. I want gardening independence!

Towards this end, the 2 ideas I've been toying with are as follows:

1) Soda Bottle Greenhouse.
I got this idea from a post by Mr. Brown Thumb. The basic gist is you take a regular 2 liter soda bottle, cut it in half and then plant the seeds in the bottom half. Terrific right? He seems like a very competent gardener and suggested just "trying it out" on my porch so I think that's what I'll do. I find it hard to believe that a greenhouse could really be that warm, but I know this is an old and tested way to grow things and people do it all the time.

2) Figure out how to set up a good indoor growing system in my apartment.
I live in the city. I don't have a ton of space and the space I do have is shared with animals and a roommate. I think my set up last time was ok. I purchased little soil pellets in a plastic container with a removable clear top and stuck the seeds in there. The idea is to stick the whole contraption in a sunny spot, water occasionally and watch your future garden grow. My future garden struggled and eventually died but I think the problems boiled down to heat and light.

I spent a lot of time moving the seedlings to spots far from my plant-munching cats. My best windows in terms of sunlight happen to be in places they love to go. But how expensive could it be to get a little lamp for a few seedlings? I've got to really think about this, but I would love growing my own seedlings so much that the idea of getting a "sun" lamp for them seems completely reasonable. I do have a bit of an outlet shortage too, but I think I can make it work.

Oh and I've recently learned that usually the pellets in these seedling kits are made of peat which, as it turns out, is not a very sustainable soil. This time I'll need to look for coir pellets or something similar.

Come to think of it, maybe I should try the soda bottle greenhouses INDOORS. The cats might still try to get to them, but it would be a lot harder.

Escaping the cold

2009-01-16T04:17:00.005-05:00

The current temperature here in Boston is -8 degrees Farenheit. That's pretty cold. I haven't actually looked at my garden in a few months even though it's just on my corner. It's been freezing all week and I'm finding that my response to the cold is to think about my garden a lot. In the past few days I have thought about or done the following:

1) Drawn a little map of how I might lay out the plot this year - I'm ready for a change!
2) Talked or e mailed with no less than 4 people (including my Dad!) about whether or not I should try brussel sprouts again, make room for asparagus or order from the women's shelter that is also a farm with a seedling coop this year. Answers: maybe, probably not, yes, but I'll order only things I can plant right on the pick-up day.
3) Searched on the internet for designs for cucumber trellises and even bookmarked a few.
4) Contemplated the fact that this cold weather is probably good for the garden in that it may be killing some of the bad bugs that I hate. I also wondered what it does to the good bugs like worms and lacewings. Relatedly...
5) Will I plant dill again to attrack parasitic wasps to kill the leafminers? Still not sure on this one.
6) Thought about a few garden gadgets I might like to splurge on this year like a soil thermometer, better/sharper garden shears and a weeding tool like a friend has.

The colder it gets the more my mind wanders to warmth and the day when I'll first be able to turn over all the soil. By September the garden can seem like a chore, but in the middle of January, when I know I have at least 3 more months of winter, it seems like heaven.

A New Leaf for 2009

2009-01-09T17:15:00.013-05:00

In the past I've paused this blog because I felt too busy or because I had nothing new to say.The reason I put a stop to my "mostly weekly" garden updates back in August was my discovery that my little anonymous haven was in fact, not so anonymous.

I was in the garden back on that fateful day in the middle of the summer. My lovely garden plot neighbor and I were chatting, when she said, in a tone that I interpreted as a mix of apologetic and disappointed -- with a hint of quietness like that reserved for talking about other people's terrible misfortunes as in "divorce" or "cancer" -- something along the lines of:

"You know you could have told me that our tomatoes were growing too close to yours." She then went on to describe that she and her husband were new to gardening and would have appreciated the advice about needing to corral their tomatoes and that another gardener had found my blog and mentioned my concerns to her. I was caught. I had in fact blogged about her tomato plants creeping over to my side.

It is hard to describe my feelings in that moment. Horror, shame, embarrassment. The pit in my stomach lasted at least 2 weeks and I still feel kind of ill when I think of it. I walked around, scanning people's faces, trying to figure out if they knew about my blog when I talked to them. I mean, I am also pretty new to gardening and I would have loved to help them instead of make them feel like crap, not to mention make myself look like a petty, two-faced gossiper. Dammit!

She then went on to say that she had noticed that some of her tomato plants had been pushed way over (back towards her side) and that the stakes really looked as if someone had physically pushed them. She mentioned this to another gardener who told her about my blog. Oy vey! I told her that I really really hadn't done it and that all I had done was walk through between our two plots and try to push the branches that had grown over to my side over to hers. My stakes had been moving around a lot too actually. I didn't expect her to believe me. After all, I'm the kind of person who, rather than directly and maturely speaking to this lovely person about the issue I had with her tomato plants, just complained to the entire world on the INTERNET! This blog established motive.

I honestly never imagined that anyone in my neighborhood would find this blog. Somehow, thinking that no one would find it made me think of it as a sort of diary or at least a private conversation that I was having mostly with myself. Myself and a bunch of other gardeners I didn't know plus a few friends that I have mentioned this blog to and with whom I am comfortable telling my inner feelings (about gardening.)

I apologized right away and have probably apologized since then about 5 times everytime I see her. I'd also like to take this moment to apologize to anyone and everyone in my little neighborhood for anything I have expressed in this blog that was the slightest bit hurtful in any way to anyone. It's not what I intended and really not who I am most of the time. In fact, I think the thing that bothers me most is when I think of the kind of person I might seem like to my neighbors after all of this. It makes me cringe.

I do realize that this is also funny. Most of my friends have laughed heartily at the whole thing. I mean, who in this day and age actually thinks their blogs are really anonymous?! Come on!!

The long and the short of it is that I seriously considered taking the whole thing down, but I decided it was better to come clean. In fact, I was encouraged NOT to take it down first by the same lovely woman who I blabbed about and then a few friends who also garden and actually like my blog for the tips. Special thanks to my friend in Vermont who grows excellent brussel sprouts and whose asparagus I hope survived all the construction.

I'm not quite to the point where I'm ready to make it easier for people to figure out who I am, but I'll just be writing now with the knowledge and assumption that anyone I might have hoped isn't reading this probably is and I should get comfortable with that and act accordingly. I might loosen up a little bit on the code names and other "masking" tactics, but maybe I won't.

Thanks to all for reading and feel free to forward to anyone you want!

Tomatoes!!

2008-08-06T07:39:00.006-04:00

It seems that the rash of blossom end rot was short lived. I do have one tomato plant that looks pretty awful and which I don't expect to make it. Other than that, things seem to be doing ok. Tomatoes of all shapes and colors are coming out of my garden, ripe and healthy, every few days now.

My plot is weedy and messy and every time I walk over to it I feel pangs of guilt (mixed with joy at the great bounty I am getting of course.)

I hate to admit it, but as the season wears on, I find that I get a little tired of the labor part of gardening. I know that I could be planting fall crops now...or soon, but I just feel tired of the battles with bugs and diseases at the moment. And I am not sure I'm up for the daily watering for seeds. I look at the bolted lettuce towers and think " I don't know if I have the energy to start from scratch right now."

I think next year I really need to do a better job of thinking through the things I could do earlier in the season to make August - October easier. Mostly I need to mulch A LOT better and more often in June and July. Other than that I'm not really sure what else I can do. Pace myself? Chill out so I don't run out of steam? Maybe it's just that work is getting busier now (and it usually does in August and September) so I feel more torn.

In fact, I feel almost flooded with ideas for NEXT spring (I think I need to try growing cucumbers UP), but the idea of doing much more than maintenance and clean up in the fall THIS year seems very unlikely.

Either way, I am thrilled to have all the wonderful food even if I feel too lazy to cook anything really amazing with it.

Not again!!

2008-07-28T12:23:00.004-04:00

I was out of town for about a week so I had someone water the garden and agree to harvest anything that looked ready to go ie: orange cherry tomatoes, lettuce, an eggplant.

They did a great job. Nonetheless I came back to an assortment of good and bad things:

The Good:
a) tons of ripe and ENORMOUS food: all 3 types of eggplant, cherry tomatoes, jalapenos, cucumbers and beets.
b) the Blackeyed Susans now blooming
c) Purple Coneflowers going absolutely crazy and bees going crazy for them.
d) The mint really taking over in the sink
e) A mostly healthy looking garden

The Bad (and often ugly):

1) one tomato plant and stake leaning waaaaay over. Sincere thanks to Captain Awesome for hammering the stake back down with a brick!
2) tons of weeds
3) a very ugly and decrepit looking cucumber plant with icky, moldy-looking (but dry!) black shriveled leaves. I don't think I'll be getting anymore cucumbers this summer.
4) Swiss Chard that has not grown at all due to the leafminer!
5) 2 tomato plants with blossom end rot! How!?

The blossom end rot really pisses me off! I had blossom end rot a few years ago when I didn't quite understand how often you needed to water when it rains, but since then I have been so good about watering. I mulch, I track the rainfall and my own watering and I'm really really careful. Plus I don't understand why some plants would have it and others don't...although the two plants that have it are next to each other...have I been neglecting a corner? I really don't think so.

I guess it could also be the soil in that one spot, but that seems so unlikely.

So I'm feeling annoyed about the leafminer and the blossom end rot and my mysterious cucumber ailment and the weeds that are everywhere and the fact that my neat plot layout is no longer visible, but I love how crazy it is, and I love that it was only from weeding that I "found" the huge eggplants and cucumbers hiding under leaves and that it's getting to be the time of year where I bring something I grew to any BBQ, birthday or picnic I get invited to. I also love that my camera managed to take one glorious shot of bees on the purple coneflower.

A new bug to hate

2008-07-11T12:21:00.005-04:00

Beet Leafminers suck.

As you all know I really really hate cutworms. That has not changed, but I am realizing that compared to other bad bugs like cucumber beetles and leafminers, they are much easier to tackle.

Here is the deal with the leafminer: They are larvae, they live in the soil, they are hard to see, and get rid of. They eat through the middle of the leaves of beets, chard, spinach and a few other things forming squiggly lines that eventually connect and form big whitish/brownish blotches. The only thing to really do is try to disturb them in the soil by scratching into it and to cut off the affected leaves to prevent them from reinhabiting. Leafminers pretty much go for the leaves which means the beets growing below ground are usually ok. That's ok for the beets, but ya can't eat the greens. Grrr.

I spent about 30 minutes on Tuesday night hacking away at my chard and beets, removing any leaves that looked "mined." The result was a huge pile of food-I-never-got-to eat which I threw in the trash. You can't compost the buggy stuff. That would be evil since the bugs will totally reproduce. I am now the proud owner of a small chard plant with three puny leaves.

I'm really not that mad at the moment because I also made about 4 jars of pesto last weekend, got to eat one lovely sungold cherry tomato Tuesday and harvested an asian eggplant Wednesday night. Things are never perfect, but they could definitely be worse.

Good Fences Make Good Neighbors

2008-07-06T19:51:00.003-04:00

Deep down I know that some of my practices in the garden may not actually impact the health of my plants, but are simply garden myths passed down through the ages. I grow marigolds because they are supposed to keep pests away and basil near tomatoes because they are supposed to be good companions. Most gardeners do these things too. We're a superstitious bunch I think.

One of the other "rules" I try to follow is to keep my tomato leaves dry when I water and space the plants far enough apart so that the tomato leaves don't touch each other. Both of these practices are to prevent the spread of diseases and I have seen plenty of sad, spotty tomato leaves after a lot of rain to believe that they're a good idea.

Now I'm not perfect. My garden plot is a little bit more than 100 square feet and It's simply not possible to plant 6 tomato plants and have none of them touch, but I do a pretty good job for the most part. I water at the base of the plant. I cage AND stake and prune (at least a little) to keep the branches moderately under control.

Okay, so the plot right behind mine has some new occupants. They are a lovely couple with a toddler. They are absolute beginner gardeners and magically have strong, healthy looking plants with no signs of bad bugs or diseases. I'm pretty impressed -- beginner's luck for sure! They also planted all of their tomatoes right behind mine in a big row. They put in stakes, but don't seem to be tying the plants to the stakes at all and they haven't pruned anything. As you might imagine, their big, leafy, crazy tomato plants are all over mine. This is not good. For a week or so now I've been feeling pretty helpless. I rarely see the couple and I don't know what I would say to them if I did. Community gardening is supposed to be about community building and getting along. Yeah, ok, but it is ALSO about growing some awesome tomatoes right and fighting against the calamaties that could prevent this? What am I supposed to do?

Two days ago, after pruning and tying up my own tomatoes, I walked around the back of my plot, through the tomato thicket, and sort of pushed (gently I swear) all the branches I could, back over to their side. I was amazed at how well this seemed to work (see the photo.) I just went back today though and all their tomatoes are back over, cuddling up to mine. Grrrrr.

I don't wanna be a jerk or unneighborly and, as I've said, I'm not 100% sure that their tomato plants touching mine is absolutely, definitely a bad thing, but I don't like it -- at all. I also don't like the fact that I don't know how they're watering and my guess is they're just spraying that whole row of tomatoes with a hose from above. Which means that they are spraying MY tomatoes too. So all of my careful watering at the base of the plant so as not to get the leaves wet might be for nothing. Geez, I know I sound uptight here, but c'mon!!

I honestly don't know what I will say if I see them. I like them and I want to be nice : "Heeeey, hiiii, so I wanted to give you some advice about your tomatoes over here." I just don't know how to say it without it coming out snarky. So far everything looks ok though, so perhaps there is nothing to worry about.

Anyway, perhaps I will really try peas next year...as a fence.

If you don't like the weather....get a garden

2008-07-01T09:25:00.004-04:00

Gardening has changed my perspective in a number of ways, including my appreciation for "weather." If all I was concerned about was my own comfort, I might not ever want it to be anything other than warm, breezy and in the 70s.

Now that I am a gardener though, I really need a lot more "weather" to make things go my way. In the winter I want it to be really cold and snowy to kill bad insect larvae and protect the soil. If the winter is too warm I know the spring will be much more challenging.

For about the past week we've had crazy thunderstorms where it rains, and hard, every other day or so. This is not what we're used to in this part of the country in June, and normally I would be super cranky about a) carrying an umbrella everywhere b) making all of my "outdoor" plans tentative c) the damn humidity. But the garden is loving it AND I haven't had to water in more than a week. This means I can sleep just a little bit later in the mornings and that is really nice.

I feel like one of those super zen sorta folks who are just at peace with the world. When my friends complain about the weather I really only agree with a lame "yeah" so as not to draw attention to myself. The truth is, I think the rain is fine, so long as it doesn't turn cold or rain non stop. That would be bad. Sunshine and warmth with an occasional downpour is actually perfect right now.

I guess that's the other piece of it: I pay a lot more attention to the weather in general and some turns are really not good for the garden and I get annoyed. But again, it's no longer just about my own comfort anymore. The garden has changed how I think about "good" and "bad" days and given me more of a range to appreciate and that is fantastic.

Alright, enough of all that. I have two important flower updates:

1) I HAVE BEE BALM!!! Finally, after 3 years, I really have it (see top photo.) Interestingly, the bee balm I purchased, which is supposed to be purple/magenta (my true favorite) hasn't bloomed yet, but the red that my neighbors gave me -- after they heard how excited I was about it and, unfortunately, after I bought the other plant -- is going in full force.

2) A long time ago, just about when I first started to learn to garden, a friend came to visit and brought me a plant. After a while the blooms died and, in my former life, I definitely would have thrown it away once it started looking unhappy. With my newfound skills however, I decided to try to keep it alive. For three years I've been watering it and trying to make it happy, but it never bloomed again....until now!! I'm not entirely sure what I did right this time, but the plant is called Gloxinia, and is somehow related to the african violet. I now have, in my apartment, one beautiful, fuzzy, large, purple flower and about 3 or 4 more buds. I can hardly believe it's really happening.

Progress

2008-06-23T17:37:00.006-04:00

I don't want to jinx myself so I am crossing my fingers as I type these words: I think this is my best garden season so far.

The poppies look great, the mint seems to be doing ok in the sink, the bee balm looks as though it's about to bloom and I've managed to survive the early bunny attacks. I'm already starting to get a few green tomatoes and its still just June!

For a while there the cucumber seemed to be getting eaten by some kind of bug, but even that looks improved.

I'm sure some unforseen calamity or obstacle is around the corner (there's always something) but for now I'm feeling very proud. Sadly, I think the secret really is buying the plants a little bit later from the farm as I did this year instead of from the non-profit like I used to.

It is true that the arugula has all pretty much bolted and the arugula, cilantro and basil I planted on my porch is going very slowly and doesn't look that great, but the plot itself seems pretty healthy.

I'm still a bit tentative (vs. ruthless) about pruning the tomato plants and removing suckers and "extra branches" even though I know that's really the way to go. I just worry about hurting the plant when a new shoot seems "established." I don't want to get too cocky. I think recognizing that I am doing well while seeing how much better I could be is a good place to pause and celebrate.

Garden Sitting Ethics

2008-06-16T09:53:00.002-04:00

From June 12th - June 20th I have agreed to water another gardener's plot while they are away in California. That is really all they asked me to do, except for trying to keep their strawberry plants contained in the the little bricked in area they have for them and to encourage their tomato plants to stay in the cages. All of this probably takes about 15 - 20 minutes every other day unless it rains.

I've only had to water a few times so far, but I've already noticed a few things to feel torn about in terms of my moral obligations as a garden sitter.

1) When I first arrived at their plot, they had a big half-full bag of straw mulch sitting in it. It's gone now. I know they're on vacation so I don't want to bother them, but is it safe to assume that someone else was authorized to take the bag or should I be emailing them about the missing mulch?

2) When I water my own tomatoes I always water just the base of the plant so the water will get to the roots and not the leaves under the theory that tomato plants prefer dry leaves and the water can spread diseases. They didn't specify how to water the tomato plants and it does take longer. Obviously the rain gets everything wet so maybe this whole idea of carefully watering only the ground is a dumb one or a superstition, but I am clearly superstitious and I feel bad treating their tomato plants less well than I would treat my own. How far should I go with this? Prune the suckers? Add fish emulsion?

3) Weeding. I haven't done any weeding in their plot, but it could really use it. I think weeding is going above and beyond, but maybe I'll weed a little bit because of my guilt about their strawberries.....

4) They have all of these ripe strawberries! They're just going to rot out there or attract pests if they aren't harvested so...I've decided that it is ok to take them. I feel mostly like it's the right thing to do, but I am a tiny bit worried that they already promised them to someone else without my knowledge and I am essentially stealing them. I could e mail them, but who wants to be bothered on vacation right?

For now I'll water carefully and keep "stealing" the berries.

Soap, Hay, Heat

2008-06-09T12:21:00.006-04:00

Saturday was insanely hot and muggy. It is likely a sign of my own gardening insanity that I decided to spend a couple of hours in the garden right in the middle of the day. I really had to. I needed to put in the dill and...sadly, plant some swiss chard to replace the final kale plant that the bunnies destroyed.

Physically, I felt 85% totally and completely awful (hot, sweaty, tired, light headed, eyes stinging from the sweat and sunscreen combo dripping in them) and 15% divinely transported, as I always do while gardening.

I am not quite sure what brings on this gardening euphoria and I think at least part of it is the satisfaction of putting in work and getting tangible (and edible)results. On this particular day my gardening glee was due to the following:

1) My California poppies are starting to bloom. These were my favorite flower to see when I lived in Los Angeles and I find it so wonderful that I can grow them here. Plus, they're orange.
2) All of the perennials around the sink (bee balm, purple coneflower, yarrow, chives etc.) look amazing.
3) The tomatoes look better than they ever have at this time during the year (knock on wood)
4) The cucumbers seem to be growing really fast and to have gotten over whatever was making some of the leaves have white spots.
5) Because I had run out of mulch a few weeks ago, I decided to buy a combination of hay and straw called Mainely Mulch. As soon as I started laying it out I thought it looked really pretty next to the dark mulch that I already had and it smelled incredible. It also made me really dirty which, in gardening, makes me really happy. The bag it comes in is a very full cube of hay which also provided an excellent seat for the breaks I had to take while working out there.

I finally made it back inside and slowly labored up the stairs to my apartment and then sat still for a very long time.

Yesterday I waited until after 6PM to get back out in the garden to water...deeply (today is another scorcher) and try out the Irish Spring to fight bunnies. I saw that fox urine was $18 at the farm which seemed VERY STEEP to me. I figured I'd try the soap and then move up from there if need be. The CVS knock off of Irish Spring was only 89 cents!

I wasn't sure what to do to apply the soap, but I took a knife and shaved off some pieces around the lettuce and chard. We'll see how it goes.
I'm just a little concerned about the fact that it has artificial fragrance and color. That can't be too good for the soil. It's just a little bit though so...hopefully it'll be ok...AND work!

Make room for Dill

2008-06-02T14:09:00.003-04:00

I don't really like dill. I've got nothing against it per se, but it's not really a favorite of mine. In my worry about the dreaded cucumber beetle however, I've decided that dill might just be the herb for me...I just need to find some space for it.

You see, dill attracts parasitic wasps and lacewings which go after cucumber beetles. As my dad astutely commented: I need a thief to catch a thief. Really it's more like I need a killer to catch a killer (as in plant chewer and disease spreader.)

Either way I might take advantage of the sad hole left by the kale the bunny ate and try to put some dill in there.

One site I found even claims that growing dill near cucumber promotes better flavor in the cukes. Sounds good to me.

Fox Urine or Irish Spring?

2008-05-28T17:25:00.004-04:00

So far this spring I have lost 2 lettuce seedlings and 2 kale seedlings. I believe the culprits are rabbits for the following reasons:

1) I have seen bunnies in and around the garden (they're damn cute by the way, for evil things)
2) The entire top of the plant gets lopped off with a tiny bit of the stem sticking out of the ground.
3) Some of my garden neighbors have had similar problems and noticed teeth marks.

My first fear was that it was cutworms since I have had problems with these before, but when it was the cutworms they usually left the top of the plant lying on the ground and seemed to just eat straight through the middle.

Anyway, I was looking for something to guard against the critters and have found some interesting ideas that I'd like to share. Special thanks to my pal Hockey Lover who used to do landscaping and helped.

Things to prevent bunnies from ruining your life..er garden:

1) Predator Urine -- Fox seems to be the one that is most recommended for bunnies. I found a few websites that sell it. Supposedly the rabbits won't go near things that smell like something that will eat them. Makes sense to me. You can buy urine of Mountain Lions, Coyote, Wolf and Bobcat too! You can even buy little plastic containers with stakes to stick them in the ground. You stick a cottonball in the container and soak it with the fox pee for a slow and steady release of bunny-killer smell.

2) Soap with Sodium Tallowate - Attention Vegetarians! Soaps like Irish Spring, Zest, Safeguard etc. contain animal fat. I assume this works for the same reasons that predator pee works. The basic idea is that you chip it off and leave the little pieces around the plant. I did see one review that said that the smell was annoying (some people don't like Irish Spring fresh scent I gather) and that the little soap pieces melt and look like mold.

3) Blood Meal - Lo and behold I just added some Pro-Gro to all of my seedlings on Monday and one of the ingredients is blood meal. We did have a heavy rain though so I might try some soap next. Again, I think anything that smells like danger to the scared little bunny will keep it away.

4) Motion Sensor Toad that "croaks" - This is just ridiculous and would probably annoy the hell out of me AND keep kids loitering in my garden plot even more than they do now with my sink. You see its a little statue of a toad that croaks when it detects movement. I am sure that the bunnies would run away from this thing, but seriously, no thanks!

Big Garden Day on Cucumber Hill

2008-05-26T20:57:00.008-04:00

It finally warmed up enough to feel like a real Memorial Day Weekend, ie: the weekend when it is safe to plant tomatoes. So that's what I did.

Here's how the weekend looked:

I woke up on Saturday morning raring to go, but made myself wait until 10AM when Ms. Knapsack -- a new gardener who was joining me for the day -- arrived. She and I hopped in Murphy's Mom's car and headed to the farm. I ran around like a crazy (excited) person and tried really hard to calm down at least a few times. After about an hour I had $90 worth of stuff including 5 tomato plants, flat leaf parsley, 2 six packs of different types of eggplant, basil, 4 bags of enriching mulch, jalapeno peppers and "dwarf" cucumbers. A few hours after getting home my garden plot went from "just ok" to "kinda awesome." Thanks again to Ms. Knapsack who helped a ton. I'm also sorry that I accidentally planted her tomato seedling thinking it was mine. Wooops! Now I have 6 tomato plants. Hopefully the extra seedlings I gave her will earn me forgiveness.

I've never grown jalapenos or cucumbers before but...I figured I might as well try. I am nervous about the cucumber since I've had cucumber beetles in my plot for the past two years without even growing cucmber, but the fact that it won't need to climb on anything (I believe the word "dwarf" is referring to the size of the plant not the size of the cucumbers) I figured I could give it a shot. I had given up on peppers as well, but my community garden neighbors have said that the "hot" peppers are easier to grow than the ones I've tried before.

Cucumbers like a mound to grow on so I created one, stuck the seedlings in the middle and called it Cucumber Hill. Now I just have to hope that the evil critters that have now consumed 2 lettuce seedlings and 2 kale seedlings leave the cucumber alone... otherwise the hill name will make no sense at all.

I'm pretty sure the evil munchers are bunnies and not cutworms and if they weren't so adorable, work when I am asleep, and FAST I think I might kill them. They are darn cute and speedy AND impossible to catch in the act, so I think they're quite safe.

In terms of layout I kept tomato lane as last year and moved the eggplant to a new locale. It's hard to do much crop rotation with a 100 something square foot garden plot and a layout I already like.

Oh and I got to eat some of my holey (thanks to flea beetles) arugula for dinner tonight. That's my first food from the garden so far this year which made it all the more delicious!

Sage success and failure

2008-05-21T09:14:00.007-04:00

I broke down and got some new sage. The old, dead stuff just wasn't coming back and it was starting to depress me.

I think this is one of the things I need to get better at now that I am not really a "novice" anymore -- even though I still feel like one. That is, I need to figure out how to keep "tender perennials" alive over the winter in New England. I know it can be done because some of the other gardeners around have sage and rosemary that I know they didn't just buy at a store.

I also think it might be time for me to grow something that requires a little bit of vertical construction. Other than tomatoes, I've never tried anything that needs to grow "up" like peas or even cucumbers that like to climb. I'm scared though....and sometimes that is the best time to do something.

I still have time to do it this year since it's been so cold and I still don't have much in the ground ie: I still have the space. It's too late for peas, but maybe cukes. Memorial Day weekend is coming up and the idea that it would be time for tomatoes to go in the ground seems ridiculous given the temperature even though I see that other gardeners have everything in already. They clearly know how to do things that I don't. I mean, I've already lost two lettuce seedlings and one kale seedling to who knows what calamity (bugs, bunnies, what?) so I'm not feeling super confident.

That said, I can see that my beet seeds are coming up nicely. No carrot action yet but I really think I dumped too many seeds in that row. I think I need to re-plant those AND find something to fill in the holes created by my kale and lettuce vacancies.

I'll be headed to the farm again this weekend so maybe I'll get some ideas.

PS: Shed photo as promised

Back in Business

2008-05-12T13:15:00.011-04:00

Let's set aside the fact that I am probably the worst blogger ever. I'm back now and I have garden-related things to tell you. The biggest problem -- much like when you haven't spoken to a friend or a family member in a long time -- is that I'm not sure where to begin.

Let's start with the Steering Committee political stuff, move on to "garden year resolution" and talk about the work I've done so far.

There are a few really good community garden developments since I last posted including the fact that we finally built a shed! It's not totally and completely finished yet (ie: we need to build an interior wall to separate the dangerous stuff (rider mower, fuel, etc.) from the safer stuff that we want gardeners to have access to. Once we get that done we can put a combination lock on it so that all the gardeners will be able to access things like tools, trash bags etc. plus we can probably invest in smaller things like hand tools and gloves and even store abandoned and useful items like leftover tomato stakes or cages. I think it's going to be great. It also looks lovely. Photo of the shed in progress is here but I will get one of the finished product (a lovely pale blue) to post soon.

The entire 7 person steering committee is up for re-election this Spring and so far I know 3 current members aren't running. Nominations are due in the next week or so and except for the existing members no one else has nominated anyone for the committee. This is not encouraging. I can only guess that this is either because a) the garden seems well run and so no one is dying to get on the committee and whip us into shape or b) something about it seems like an awful lot of trouble and not much fun. I think both are sort of true, but I plan to beat the bushes for some nominees!!

We also have some really good compost this year from a local landscaping business. In the past we got the compost from the city, but this year we paid this company to come and cart off all of our dead plant matter in the Fall and then they delivered (and will keep delivering) this really dark, gorgeous looking compost this Spring. So far no little bits of metal or plastic like we've had the past two years. Ew. Don't worry we tested the city stuff last year (when we saw the icky bits) and it was fine. It's still better not to see it.

My garden year resolution is NOT to buy seedlings from the womens shelter this year. I like the idea but getting the plants in mid-may and trying to keep them alive on the porch for 3 weeks just wasn't working. I feel like it was the right call since I'm pretty sure the pick up would have been this past Saturday and it's in the 40s today. Brrrrr. The only real risk, I think, is that all of the best tomato seedlings could be gone from the farm if I don't get there early enough and then I might need to venture to new parts of town to find plants.

I've already turned everything over and added about 5 wheelbarrows of the gorgeous compost to my plot. I've decided to keep the layout pretty much the same although I have this idea that I might upgrade my big brick and rock scenario -- which never lies flat enough to walk on really well -- for some nice flat terracotta tiles that I see people have in their plots. I don't know where to get them though so the bricks and rocks will stay for now. I also decided to add another place to walk along the right edge of the plot (where I share the divider with a neighbor) to make things easier. I still don't feel like I've got the best, coolest, most efficient layout of my dreams but I think it works.

Yesterday I very sloppily planted carrot, beet (red and golden) and carrot seeds. I have some cilantro seeds starting to sprout and I finally got myself some bee balm. In fact I spend a lot (like $15 which is a lot for a garden plant) to get some and then of course a neighbor was horrified because he had so much and it was threatening to take over his yard and he wished I had just asked him first. The bee balm I purchased seemed (from the label) to be the purple kind and I was so bummed about ending up with lemon balm (thinking it was bee balm) last year that I still took some of his (that he says is red) off his hands. I hope they both grow well and that I end up with so much bee balm and attract so many bees that I can hear my plot buzzing from yards away. This will also be my 2nd attempt at flowers that are not yellow or orange so that's exciting.

In addition to all of that I have:

Moved things around: the lavender is away from the shadow of the sink

Gotten rid of things: divided the black eyed susan and the yarrow and got rid of the yellow coreopsis and lemon balm.

Tried to revive things: I had the most beautiful purple sage last year and it doesn't seem to be coming back. I keep watering the twiggy ends and saying encouraging things but I don't think it's working.

Planted: Kale, Lettuce and Arugula seedlings. The flea beetles are already all over my Arugula which now, after a couple of years of experience, gives me great hope for my future eggplant.

And finally, I planted some mint in the sink (plus some more california poppy seeds.) It grows like a weed around here so I'm hoping this will be the thing that finally helps my sink fulfill it's garden destiny.

I think that's pretty much it for now. More to come soon. I promise.

Garden Update

2007-07-16T10:16:00.000-04:00

I had a good weekend garden-wise and completed the following tasks:

1) Harvested most of the beets - including the golden beets. I can't believe they worked out.
2) Pulled up all the arugula which bolted long ago.
3) Planted lima bean seeds and new Beet seeds where the arugula and Beets used to be.
4) Weeded (of course)
5) Watered
6) Cooked all the beets and the beet greens - I put the red ones and golden ones in a container together with a paper towel in between so that the golden ones wouldn't get red but, that worked for about 5 minutes.
7) Made my first small jar of pesto for the season (from basil given to me from someone elses farm share though)

I have also made the following discoveries and decisions:

1) The "bee balm" that was given to me isn't bee balm but, lemon balm. It smells good but, has no crazy, fun flowers on it.
2) The general layout of the garden seems to be working and I am very pleased.
3) The seedlings from the women's shelter really were just so-so this year. The basil is just now starting to look ok. The eggplant didn't grow at all and the tomato plants look healthy and are growing now but, I've only just started to get flowers while most of my garden neighbors have big, green tomatoes on their plants and they're about twice as big as mine.
4) The sink needs something new in it. It's basically a bunch of weeds now with one california poppy. I'm thinking it might be the perfect place for mint (or maybe the lemon balm) actually.
5)Some of the plants near the sink -- like the lavender -- are too crowded and shaded. I need to move things around a bit.
6) The purple coneflower looks great and the black-eyed susan is enormous and should be blooming very soon. I need to remember to divide it though otherwise it's likely to take over completely.

Beets!

2007-06-30T20:30:00.000-04:00

Once again I am amazed at the fact that I can grow real food from seeds! Check out these beets!
I celebrated the accomplishment by making a sandwich conceived at a cafe near my house:

Whole grain bread
Goat Cheese
Steamed Beets
Arugula with a little bit of olive oil, balsamic vinegar, salt and pepper.

They call it "The goat in the garden."

The cafe uses pretty bland arugula (no spice!) nor does it have the tell-tale signs of being homegrown in the form of tiny holes from flea beetles. The beets I grew were sweeter too. It's actually a great cafe but, there's just no comparison. I plan to keep the house stocked with good bread and goat cheese until I've harvested all the beets.

Delicious!

kid, flowers, rampage

2007-06-18T12:26:00.000-04:00

I walked into the garden at about 7:30PM on Saturday evening after being out of town for a week. As I approached my plot I was stopped by a neighbor and gardener who is a very nice guy and who has 3 young children that spend a lot of time in the garden. He let me know that he saw a kid over by my plot earlier in the day doing something not very nice to my flowers. He also let me know that:

1) He was not in the garden but, in his yard so unable to yell or stop her.
2) It wasn't his kids........he wanted me to know.
3) He know's whose kid it was, that her dad was in the garden and nearby at the time but, not paying attention (obviously!) and wasn't sure what I or he should do but, he was very sorry.

When I got to my plot I saw lots of mutilated california poppies and lots of bright orange petals on the ground. As I surveyed the scene more carefully I noticed a kid-sized watering can filled with more flower petals. Now, had these been tomato blossoms or something else more "important" I might have really lost it but, as it was, I was able to use my good sense of humor to overcome any anger or disappointment. It's pretty funny to think of this little kid going to work on my flowers while her Dad just worked about 20 feet away.

I assured the nice neighbor who tattled that this experience would note turn me "anti-kid."

I'll probably shoot the oblivious dad an e mail just so he can try not to let it happen again but, it is a little awkward and I don't want him to feel accused. I guess this is all part of sharing space with neighbors right?

Tomato "Do-Over"

2007-06-10T18:58:00.000-04:00

Two of my tomato plants (ciudad and striped green german) were looking pretty terrible so I picked up some more seedlings to replace them. The best I could find were some non-heirloom roma's. A little less exciting but, I was feeling like I needed to have a couple of "safety" tomatoes.

I'm thinking that maybe the women's shelter is not the best bet for seedlings. I love the idea and last year was fine but, pretty much everyone else in the garden seems to have larger and healthier tomato plants than I do right now. Some of that may also be the tp rolls I used. Although I haven't seen any cutworm damage, the plants don't seem to be growing that much bigger. It didn't seem like a great idea to cram the roots in there but, I wasn't sure what else to do. I decided to plant the new tomatoes sans toilet paper rolls. We'll see how it goes. Maybe next year I'll try newspaper instead. I watered with fish emulsion which I'm thinking of as "plant vitamins" so I'm hoping that will help.

I also got my first garlic scape. I had read that I should cut them off once they start to turn - even though I think they look super cool growing like that -- so that the plant will put more energy into the garlic in the ground. I was really nervous about cutting it because I wasn't sure where on the plant to cut but, I just took a guess and cooked it up with some mushrooms and butter. Delicious.

Oh and the california poppies next to the sink are out. Still no real flower activity IN the sink but, I'm hopeful that I'll see some action pretty soon.

In the weeds

2007-06-03T17:29:00.000-04:00

Weeding really sucks. It's incredibly tedious and my back and legs start to ache almost right away. I'm sure that part of the problem is that I pull things out by hand instead of digging up weedy areas with some sort of tool. Most of the time though, I lean over thinking "let me just get this one weed, it'll just take a sec" and then realize there's more down there that needs to be pulled.

The things I think about while weeding are similar to the things I think about while running or at the gym ie: I'm talking myself into continuing and telling myself a) that its not that bad and won't last that much longer....I'm "almost there" b) that the work I put in now will be worth it in the end because it will make the next time that much easier and c) that this is something I can and will be proud of once I'm done.

Ok I'm done complaining.

I did a good job today. I weeded and then added a bunch of mulch to keep future invaders at bay. I know that even though there will be a zillion new little weeds in a few days the weeds I pulled today would have grown much larger and be stealing precious sun, water and nutrients from the plants I really care about. Check out the garlic above!

In fact, I really like weeding or rather I feel good about the fact that I do it dutifully. It seems to me that a big part of being a good gardener is just a willingness to do a lot of tedious work. Knowing what work to do and how to do it correctly and the timing, spacing and needs and wants of things is the rest and I'm getting better at all of that but, those things are trickier. Weeding I can definitely do.

Plus, it gives me something to do in the garden pretty much every time I go out there. Even if I don't need to water. In June, I always have to weed.

Overall I'm feeling really good about the garden layout this year. There are lots of things going in different directions and the plants look organized but, not so orderly that they're boring. I can get to everything and everybody seems to have enough space to grow.......except maybe the zucchini. Frankly, I'm a little terrified of the zucchini.

The sink continues to be a challenge but, now that I've gotten the person who was putting cigarette butts in it to stop, I've planted some seeds and will hopefully have some new flowers growing out of it.

Safety First

2007-05-29T19:45:00.000-04:00

Memorial Day Weekend is the unoffical tomato planting weekend for my area but, since I was away for a wedding in D.C. I had to wait until today. The wedding was lovely and congrats to the happy couple by the way!

My flight landed and less than 2 hours later I was in the garden getting the seedlings, that had been pretty much just surviving on my porch, into the ground. These included 6 tomato plants (5 varieties), 4 eggplants (2 varieties), zucchini, and basil. I also borrowed my brother's car and got marigolds and rosemary.

Since all my seedlings came in six-packs I selected a few healthy ones and gave the rest to a friend who gardens in a nearby community garden and a new gardener who happened to be clearing out her plot while I was working.

I might have gone a little overboard but, here's what I did for maximum seedling survival:

1) I staked AND caged the tomatoes. I know that everything I read says that if you do one you don't need to do the other but, my experience last year (with just staking) was that everything just got out of control and ended up on the ground. I only had 5 stakes and 5 cages so two of the plants only have one support thingy but, I'm planning to add the extra reinforcements as soon as I can get to a home depot. Most of the time I'm glad I don't own a car just every once in a while it would be pretty handy.

2) I planted everything inside toilet paper rolls as a defense against cutworms. This was kinda tricky since the soil and roots for the seedlings was often bigger than the width of the cardboard roll so I really had to cram them in there. I'm worried that this will be a little suffocating for the plants although I know that the roots can grow through the bottom of the roll, it just seems like a long way to go at first. Hopefully it will all work. I will say that the chard I planted a few weeks ago seems to be doing ok in the tp rolls so I suppose that's encouraging.

3) I layed out Enriching Mulch around all the seedlings that I planted (not in the photos) which will help retain moisture, prevent splashing and keep the weeds down a bit. I assume the "enriching" aspect of the mulch is a good idea. I sure hope so.

4) I watered with diluted fish emulsion which is supposed to provide really good nutrients for seedlings -- especially tomatoes.

By the end I was really filthy, smelled like fish and had a really bad and funny looking sunburn (due to my racerback tank top). I stupidly ran outside and stayed in the sun for hours without applying sunscreen -- pretty dumb move I know. Safety is important for plants and gardeners alike.

No Pineapple!

2007-05-14T07:50:00.000-04:00

I picked up all my seedlings from the shelter/farm on Saturday. Although I was excited to get them, I was a bit disapppointed because:

1) I was really excited about getting the Pineapple tomato seedlings that I ordered but, when I got there the farm dude said they weren't able to get the seeds or something and he had to give me something else . We had a nice bonding moment over the fact that the Pineapple are THE BEST TOMATOES EVER and an even better moment (for me) when he mentioned how hard they were to grow and how you're lucky if you get one from a whole plant. That was exactly my experience last year but, seriously that one was huge and beautiful and the most delicious tomato I have ever tasted in my life. It would be worth it to try again. It's nice when the experts agree with you. It makes me feel like I know what I'm doing. Still, being denied the Pineapple is yet another reason why I need to figure out how to grow my own seedlings.

2) They didn't have the marigolds I ordered either. They let me switch them out for some other herbs or veggies ( I chose leeks) but, I'll still need to get marigolds from someplace.

3) Overall the seedlings didn't look that great compared to last year. I'm not sure why since the weather last year was MUCH worse but, c'est la vie I suppose. Some of my "six packs" had only 3 or 4 viable seedlings. Still, the price is right (most of the six packs were about $3) and it's a good organization.

I planted the parsley, leeks and chard so far and I got some purple sage and planted that too. I'm trying to baby the rest of the seedlings on the porch. I hope they can survive until it's warm enough to get them in the ground.

PS: Very special thanks to my cousin Darth Green Thumb to whom all the credit is due if I end up with carrots in about 55 days.

Soil Temperature Maps

2007-05-10T14:44:00.000-04:00

I've been dreaming of a soil thermometer lately and I still might get one but, I just found a link with current and 5-day soil temperature maps by region!! Should I trust this? Its been really warm the past 3 days, will the soil cool off again?

Looks like its warm enough to plant my snap bean seeds and maybe even tomatoes but....probably better not to push it.

Moving Day

2007-05-05T19:33:00.000-04:00

Today (Saturday) was amazing!!!
I worked in the garden from 10AM to 3:30PM today. It was a scheduled workday so most of that time was working on community projects like digging holes and pounding in borders for new plots. I also spent a lot of time asking for advice on the layout of my plot and talking about the garden shed. I think we're close to a resolution on the shed issue. Fingers crossed.

I did settle on a new layout though and got it all set up. This involved some aggressive hawking of plants to assuage my guilt over giving them the boot. A few plants got tossed in a heap, a few were "adopted" and a few got moved around. The biggest victims were the daylillies (tossed) and the strawberries (half and half).

I moved the coreopsis, blackeyed susan, and purple coneflower out of their respective corners to concentrate all the perennials into just 2 areas. Oh and I got some free bee balm from a vacated garden plot. It pays to tell your friends the plants you want so they keep an eye out for ya!

I also created a back row that will become "Tomato Lane" to hopefully keep the tomatoes from shading everyone else while giving them enough room to get air and be happy. I still haven't figured out exactly where everything else goes but, I'm getting closer.

The garlic I planted in the fall is coming up! See the photo to the left. Not all of it made it but, I have at least 4 potential bulbs making their way in my little garden plot.

I haven't included a picture but, for those of you following along, its safe to say my porch composting experiment was a big fat flop. It just looks like dried leaves now. Luckily we got some of the good stuff delivered and I added about 5 wheelbarrows full into my plot today.
I feel sure that this will be my best gardening season yet!!

Cutworm War: Pre-Battle

2007-04-07T18:02:00.000-04:00

Today I took my first real step towards fighting cutworms in my garden this spring. Regular readers may recall my troubles last year and I've been collecting toilet paper rolls for a few months now so I think I'm set for planting. That won't happen until late May though and I had heard that one good technique is to turn over the soil while its still sort of cold out but, the ground is no longer frozen. The idea is to expose the cutworm eggs (is it larva? pupa? I know I should know this) to the harsh elements before they grow into their next, most damaging stage. The high temp today was 40 and tonight's low should be about 33 degrees so I'm hoping that will be cold enough to freeze them to death - literally.

I'm not entirely sure if I've got the timing right - so it could be too soon or too late but, I figure there's no harm in trying. Also, it was GREAT to get back out there digging in the dirt. Technically, by turning over my garden in the fall last year I ALSO did some damage to the cutworms but, given the seedling carnage last year I figure it's better to be safe than sorry.

Over the past few days I've come up with a few ideas for layout. I feel like last year was functional but, not very inspiring. This year I have an idea of a path through the garden that vaguely resembles a question mark. To pull this off and make room for all the plants I have in mind it might be time to give up on the strawberries. I didn't really get more than a tiny handful last year so I can't really say that I grew strawberries as much as I grew strawberry potential.

Meanwhile my order of seeds arrived and I got 2 kinds of beets: Golden and Red Ace. I'm most excited about golden beets but, red ace is my "safety" since they're supposed to be easy to grow.

I expect the blogging to pick back up again now that I'll actually be out there although right now true gardening weather still seems like a loooong way away.

City Natives

2007-03-09T12:16:00.000-05:00

Update on the Garden Meeting: The meeting went surprisingly well. There were about 30 people there which was more than I was expecting given the cooooold weather.

1) Natives vs. a "Rose Garden" - I am pleased to announce that natives won hands down. There was virtually no one who was interested in any other idea. Yippee. We agreed on a general shape and size for the area and now we need a committee to help figure out the details.

2) Garden Shed - This was the most controversial aspect of the meeting. The Steering Commitee had started to worry about the initial idea of building something from scratch due to the cost and specialized skill needed to pull it off and one member started looking into "compromise" options so that we could still do some sort of community "barn raising"but, maybe not need to spend as much time or money to get what we need. Heck, we need a shed already. There was some concern about this option and how sad it is if we really can't do it from scratch. The group was split over just getting it done at a lower cost with some community input vs. doing it from scratch. I just don't know that we have anyone in the neighborhood with the skills required who is willing to put in the time we'd need. Regardless we are gonna have a shed (and it will be made of wood and designed just for us) and that is exciting.

There were a few angry neighbors at the meeting but, we managed to appease them after a while and there were lots of new people who seem very willing to help out.

Welcome to the Neighborhood

2007-03-06T07:51:00.000-05:00

Tonight is a big Community Garden meeting where we will discuss some pretty controversial topics like work hours, a garden shed, a natural plantings area and dog poo.

Our garden has a lot of space beyond the garden plots and was designed as a "multi-use" area for the community. Its basically like a small park in the middle of the neighborhood and everyone has some opinion about how it should look. The natural plantings area caused a stir last year (with a petition and everything) so it could be an eventful night. The issue is about the look and height of what we plant. Native plants and flowers tend not to be as pretty and neat as a rose garden but, they are a really cool thing to have in an urban area. The battle will likely be among the "lovely manicured garden" camp and the "wild and natural" camp. Plus there will be a contingent who just want it all to be grass so they can kick a ball and run around unencumbered.

It is amazing how heated this stuff can get. Before last summer there was all out war over whether or not to have a designated dog park in the garden - thus the controversy over the dog poo that's been littering the perimeter. I have agreed to run the meeting. Most of my co-Committee members think I'm crazy to volunteer for such a job. Its a good kind of crazy I think. I'm up for it.

Honestly though, its about 4 degrees outside and feels like -17 so there's a good chance that very few people will come to the meeting which means we won't get input but, also means we can't (in theory) be blamed for going forward with the best options available since we invited people to participate. It's seriously hard to get people to think about gardening when its dark and cold outside.

Give me your toilet paper rolls!

2007-02-14T10:58:00.000-05:00

I placed my order for seedlings and ended up spending the exact same amount of money as last year: $33.50. That's a pretty good deal for 66 individual plants. I actually e mailed a friend to see if she wanted to share the order since I definitely won't have room for all of it in my garden plot.

They didn't have beets so I ordered:
Tomatoes: Brandywine, Green Zebra and Pineapple (loved these last year even though I didn't get many) Sun Gold, Sweet Olive, Ciudad Victoria, Peacevine and Super Sweet 100s. I'll definitely need to narrow these down.

Eggplant: Nadia (same as last year) and Fairy Tale which are supposed to be purple with white stripes.

Basil
Parsley
Zucchini (just for the flowers so my brother can have a reason to buy a deep fryer)
Swiss Chard
and Marigolds

So I still have a lot of seeds to get: snap beans, lima beans, carrots and beets for sure! I think I have finally given up on peppers, at least for this year. I think 2 years of failure in a row means I should take a break. Perhaps this year I will really map out the whole plot and stick to the paper plan.

I also started collecting empty toilet paper rolls to ward off cut worms when I plant the seedlings. If you live in my area please feel free to save a few and hand them over next time you see me. I'm serious. I figure I'll need at least 20 or even 30 by May and I'm not quite sure how long it takes to go through TP in my house.

The Long Winter

2007-02-06T15:19:00.000-05:00

I have been gone for a long time and for those of you who got used to my weekly posts I am sorry to have left and I hope you come back to read this. All of a sudden I am panicking at all of the garden related stuff I need to do. The deadline for ordering seedlings from the women's shelter that is also an organic farm is February 10th and I haven't even looked at the list yet!! Beets though, I definitely want to grow beets.

I am still enrolled in the Master Urban Gardener Program and planning to go to all of the classes that I can this Winter but, I've already missed 2. One, I had a good excuse for and the other...well...I had been out of town a lot and had just flown home the day before. I was really intending to go but, then it was insanely cold out and I just couldn't do it. I need to get back in the habit. They sent me a nice list of all of the classes I still need to make up and almost the whole list is highlighted. I'll be taking this free, weekly, class for 4 years at this rate.

Oh and can we talk about this weather? It's finally really cold but, I am sure that all of the warm weather for so long was not good for the garden. I had planted garlic bulbs in the fall and I don't think they were supposed to have sprouted anything green until the spring but, if you walk over to my garden plot now there are these little garlic shoots coming up. That's probably bad. I have learned some things since last year though. I'll be beginning my stash of toilet paper rolls (aka: cutworm protection) shortly.

Alright well more on the weather and classes and the porch compost and the Garden Steering Committee and my seedling selections next time.

I am glad to be back.

C'mon compost!

2006-11-09T07:54:00.000-05:00

My compost doesn't seem to be doing much. Everything looks about the same as when I first put it in. I still haven't added a cup of soil as some of my garden-blogger friends have suggested because it's been so rainy but, I will definitely do that this weekend. Also, I've added a lot of water but, things still look pretty dry. Do I need to just drench it all? Any ideas?

I found a big stick to use as a "stirrer" while walking home from work last night and I collected another trash bag full of leaves for my reserve. I'm a little worried though because some of the leaves have big round black spots on them. Is that ok? I have avoided any diseased plant material and I don't really know if big black spots on dried leaves are a disease but....if they could be does that mean I shouldn't use them?

Since the first day I've added a few tea bags, some dryer lint, the skin and seeds of a spaghetti squash and a few more eggshells and apple cores. I feel like I have a little rabbit in the back that I'm "feeding."

My little compost bin

2006-10-29T20:39:00.000-05:00

I'm not too handy, which is why my homemade "city" compost bin has some very ugly looking holes in the top. I can't believe this is really going to work but, its worth a shot. I didn't really think that sticking tiny specks into the ground would result in the carrots and beans and lettuce that I've grown from them either though and things decomposing seems much more logical.

I followed the instructions I had pretty closely but, I am still not sure I got the right type and quantity of "greens." Here's what I did:

1) I cut holes in the top of the lid of my big plastic tub. The knife was crappy and kept folding a little so its a miracle that I didn't get a bad cut. This part took about 45 minutes if you can believe it.

2) I cut 8 slits (2 in each corner) in the bottom of the tub for drainage.

3) I filled the tub with 1 ripped up egg carton, a few inches of newspaper that I ripped into strips and 1 and 1/2 shopping bags of my out-of-state dried leaves. Once it was about 3/4 full I added some weeds and other fresh plant material from the garden (mostly kale that had too many dead aphids to be appetizing and weeds) plus some eggshells and an apple core and some tea leaves.

4) I watered the whole thing until the top layer seemed pretty wet.

I think I'll add more "browns" and "greens" in a few days since after all the water went in everything shrunk down a bit and the bin is not yet completely full. Plus, I still need to go leaf hunting so I'll have a good supply of dried leaves through the winter.

I know I'll never be able to just throw my kitchen waste into the compost bin like some people do simply because I won't have the room but, its still exciting to try this.

I probably have enough space for one more bin on the back porch if I really wanted it so, we'll see how this goes and play it by ear.

"Leaving" the City

2006-10-26T09:32:00.001-04:00

I've been wanting to try composting in a plastic bin on my backporch since I read about it here.
The trouble is, I didn't have any dried leaves or "browns" to get started. So, I was very excited for fall although........ I knew there would be challenges given my urban environment.

My street is paved and I don't have a backyard so I wasn't quite sure how to go about picking up the leaves that I do see on the street. Plus, I don't really trust the "cleanliness" of the gutter if you know what I mean. My apartment is near a highschool and a gas station and a few bars and there are plenty of people around who never pick up after their dogs. I can only imagine what is down there with the leaves. Ew.

So, I was planning to pick a weekend day to go to a nearby park and just fill a few trash bags with dried leaves. I was prepared to feel a little self conscious about it because, heck, it probably looks weird for a non-employee to be picking up bagfuls of dried leaves at the park right? But I'm ok with that. Its all for a good cause.

Anyway, this past weekend I went on vacation to a rural area of New York State and although I hadn't planned on it I realized that this was the perfect spot to start collecting. I had hit the fall leaf jackpot! On the day I was leaving I filled 3 shopping bags ( sadly, I hadn't come prepared with big trash bags.) I know its a little bizarre and I felt a little silly doing it but, my friend didn't seem to mind (the one who actually owns the car.) and I was really excited about it. Who would have thought that out-of-state leaves in the trunk of the car could make a person so happy?

I also bought a pocket knife to cut the holes in the plastic tub so, I'm hoping to start my first batch of compost this weekend!!

Garlic!

2006-10-17T09:48:00.000-04:00

I refuse to be sad about the Fall and the end of gardening for the year. Fall is actually my favorite season because the sunny days are so sparkly and I actually hate when it's too hot out. If fall wasn't followed by Winter I would like it even better.

My Nippon Daisies are finally blooming (in fact, they are out of control, does anyone want some?) and this past Sunday I planted garlic!!

Garlic was one of those things that I was really jealous of in other people's garden plots during the spring and summer because it looks so amazing while it's growing. Plus, who doesn't love garlic?!

I pledged to grow garlic this year and, while I'm at it, here is a list of 11 new things I want in my garden for next year. I'll never have the room or the energy since I don't really plan to stop growing much of what I had this year but......a girl can dream.

1.Bee Balm (the butterflies seem to love it and it reminds me of Animal from the Muppet Show) 2.Beets - golden is my hope because the red ones are tasty but very very messy
3.Potatoes (maybe)
4.Different kinds of lettuce - to be determined
5.Some other kind of peppers (that will actually grow!)
6.White eggplant
7. Chard
8. Cucumbers (but they take up a lot of room so we'll see)
9. Squash (this is mostly for my brother who wants to cook the blossoms)
10.Some kind of purple flower that I know grows with California Poppies but I don't yet know the name of.
11. Maybe one more flower that blooms in early spring although I'm not sure I'm willing to give up the veggie space.

Special thanks to the Gardener/Chef who helped me with the beginnings of a garden plan and held the garlic for the photo above.

October Clean Up

2006-10-10T07:01:00.000-04:00

I was embarrassed about how much time I spent ignoring the garden over the past two weeks but, after just a couple hours of work I feel a lot better about the state of things in the garden.

It's getting colder which means I had to pull out a lot of plants and cut things back. We no longer have a compost pile which is a major pain in the butt. I had to bag up all the plant material and then on Wedensday night I'll put it out in the trash because 1) I don't have my own compost bin and 2) even if I did it probably wouldn't be hot enough to deal with the various diseases that are likely on the plant remains that I have.

I probably have another 1-2 clean up days to do before it gets too cold and I need to start thinking about layout for next year and planting bulbs which I've never done. I really want to try garlic but, since I am not sure how I want to lay out the garden for next spring I am not sure where to plant it.

I was actually surprised to see that the basil is still alive (I made 2 jars of pesto with it in addition to 4 bottles of rosemary oil that should be ready in time for gift giving in December.)
The biggest surprise of this past Saturday was the carrots! I really thought I had failed with those because they seemed to be too shaded and to be taking way too long. I'm like a proud mama. They're pretty and "garden-y" and taste good too. I left a few in for another week or so and I've still got some kale and perhaps even more basil.

I do love the fall but, I'm sad to see it all wrapping up. The garden still looks really nice but, I know the days of brown scraggly sadness are just around the corner.

Generic Garden Update

2006-09-18T10:08:00.000-04:00

I came back from my trip very late Friday night and I would have headed straight to the garden on Saturday morning except for the fact that my poor cat's ear was swollen to 4 times its normal size and I had to get her to the vet. Now she has to wear one of those plastic cones around her neck -- how uncool.

I did manage to get out there on Sunday morning and the place looked like a total disaster. I asked a friend to water and take all the ripe tomatoes she could handle while I was away but, it still wasn't much care for a 10 day period. I ended up putting more tomatoes into the trash than I took home with me. The biggest excitement was the lima beans. I have always wanted to grow them and I failed last year. They're still sitting in the pods on my counter because when you wish for something for so long its hard to see it come to an end. Luckily I can attempt to grow them again next year.

I think next weekend I'll be spending a few hours pulling up all the tomato plants and all the weeds that I ignored through the month of August. The garden is seriously looking scraggly.

After that I'll be doing some reading on what to do now to prepare for next season. If anyone out there has any tips please send em my way.

I've been a bad bad blogger

2006-09-05T13:51:00.000-04:00

Jeez Louise I can't believe how much updating I have to do. I pretty much stopped tracking the rainfall for all of August and I don't even have a photo of MY garden for this post. I need to sit down with my camera (and my conscience) when I get back from my trip to the Pacific Northwest (I leave in about 2 hours) and write a proper blog entry. Bad bad bad.

Meanwhile.....I have more tomatoes than I know what to do with. I AM very happy and pleased and all that. They taste good and I feel like a very generous friend these days (offering enormous heirloom tomatoes, grown with love, to everyone around) BUT.....I still see all the flaws:

The tomatoes are all splitting because of uneven watering and the plants are all toppled over and brushing the ground because I was wimpy at tying the branches to the stakes. I thought they were secure but really, I left them too much room to work with. I must be more stern next time. Oh and I never got a handle on the various diseases (wilt, spot, etc.) so I spent about an hour yesterday trying to clear out all the brown, dried and diseased leaves before they drop on the ground. Have I ruined the soil for next year? Honestly, I think I might just be worrying for nothing because, just about everyone elses tomato plants look about the same but, it sure does seem bad. Someone also told me that the tomato leaves getting wet is part of the problem. How do you prevent THAT? Even if I watered really carefully just at the soil line wouldn't the rain get them wet?

August is a busy month workwise for me and it always is so I just need a better plan for next year. Yes, I am already thinking about next year. I need a whole new layout. My poor parsley got completely shaded out and all my neat paths are pretty much invisible now. Do they have makeover shows for gardener's? "What not to plant?" Oh and I think I need to grow white eggplant. Someone else is growing some nearby and it looks so cool and spooky. I am so jealous.....I must have some.

More on plans for next year later.......

New Bugs, Politics and Tomatoes

2006-08-22T10:28:00.000-04:00

Ah, life as a public official. The drama of the community garden has begun and someone is now going around with a petition to demand that the Steering Committe (which I am on) have a public meeting about the fate of a particular area of the greenspace that is across from all the garden plots. At least it's not boring. I am hesitant to divulge the details since I have recently learned that some of the history of this particular garden is a little shady and involves theft and "hush-hush" reparations.

Suffice it to say that the person complaining was perfectly happy to have the public kept in the dark when he was in charge.

All I really care about is having a lovely garden that the community supports and enjoys but, that is not as easily attainable as you might think.

Meanwhile I have seen a few new bugs and the tomatoes are coming on strong.

Here's the bug update:

I saw two little yellow bugs that are really cute but which I fear are cucumber beetles. They were both tiny and yellow but one had little polka dots (like a lady bug but smaller) and one was striped. I couldn't get my camera to focus so check out the photos in the link. I don't have any cucumbers growing but, they like tomatoes too. FYI - They are damn quick and hard to catch.

The other bug I saw was large and ugly but, possibly a Spined Soldier Bug which would be a good thing since those are beneficial and eat other bad bugs. I'm not completely sure that's what it was though. Once again all my photos came out blurry. This bug is very slow moving and I pretty much had to reason with it to move aside so I could get at one of my ripe tomatoes.

My policy is usually to leave things alone unless I know what it is and know that its bad so that I don't accidentally kill a "good guy."Apparently, sometimes the cute bugs are bad and the ugly one's are good.

As for the tomatoes and eggplant....just look at the photo above. That's just a fraction of what's coming too. Hooray!!

Know when to fold 'em

2006-08-12T07:16:00.000-04:00

Yes, ladies and gentlemen I finally have tomatoes! A few more of the Chadwick's ripened and I managed to harvest them before anyone else got to them. The larger ones are "Pruden's Purple." They look red to me but, what do I know.

I could have waited one more day to let the tomatoes get REALLY red but, after the "theft" I felt like I needed to go for it.

Sadly though, I decided to pack in my sole surviving pepper plant. It isn't losing leaves anymore and it did start to grow one tiny pepper but, even that had a sinister brown streak in it. Sometimes it's better to quit while you're ahead.

STOLEN?!

2006-08-05T08:32:00.000-04:00

I am taking a deep breath and counting to ten and going to my happy place. I'm not angry so much as I am really really disappointed.

On Thursday morning I noticed that my very first tomato of the year was starting to turn red. In fact it was red but, I perceived it to be a little orange and therefore figured it would be ok to wait to pick it. Friday was a little rainy so I waited but then first thing Saturday morning I bounded out there to have the lovely little Chadwick Cherry Tomato that I have worked for for two months. I'm pretty sure I even told my brother about it last night when he asked "what are you doing tomorrow?" That's how excited I was.

Needless to say, my heart sank when I got out there and saw that it was missing. It was taken off so cleanly that its hard for me to believe an animal or bird took it. That, plus the fact that it was easily visible from the front of my garden plot where the pathway is makes me suspect a human being. Its only one little cherry tomato so I don't think it was anything sinister. Here are the two theories I have:

1) Little kid who has just finished harvesting tomatoes in a nearby plot with mommy or daddy wanders off, is attracted to my sink, sees the tomato and swipes it thinking he or she is doing valuable work. Damn Kids!

2) Friend of another gardener (who is somehow clueless about the way someone who works to grow food pays attention to these things) is strolling around, checking out all of the different garden plots, sees my tomato and takes it thinking nothing of it. I know friends of mine have walked around and "innocently" wanted to steal other people's food and I've had to stop them and explain the heartbreak I might feel if the bean I'd been checking on every day for a week just disappeared right before I was planning to pick it.

Its also possible that it just fell off but, I really don't think so and, if that were the case then why wasn't it on the ground along with one of the green ones and a few leaves hmmmm?

I definitely don't think another gardener would just take it. If anything we have the problem that some of the gardener's leave town and their food gets enormous or rots on the vine.

Anyway, I guess I've learned some kind of a lesson and lost some innocence. As a result I went ahead and picked my first Nadia Eggplant. Its gorgeous. I'm not going to use it until Monday though and I was planning to wait until then to pick it but, a little defensive gardening every now and then seems in order at the moment.

Meanwhile there is plenty to be happy about gardenwise. I suspect I'll get my "first tomato" any day now.

Pesto Factory

2006-08-02T20:05:00.000-04:00

It has hit that point in the summer when I feel extremely guilty (and unhappy, to be honest) if I don't spend at least an hour in the garden on the weekend and make at least one jar of basil pesto. Last summer, including all the "pesto parties" I still had about 9 jars left in the freezer by the end of the season. A bit much I know. It was handy in March when I could still whip up a quick dinner for 8 if I needed to but, how often do you need to?

The basil part is pretty easy but keeping the house stocked with garlic, pine nuts, parmesan cheese and lemons or limes (my only addition to the good ol' Joy of Cooking recipe) can be a lot of work. For olive oil I recommend buying one of those 110 ounce cans so you never run out.

Oh and if you have friends with nut allergies, sunflower seeds work really well instead of pine nuts although they don't get that lovely "who's-baking-something-wonderful-in-here" smell when you toast them.

Mmmmmm Pesto.

Beans, Beetles and Eggplant

2006-07-29T18:13:00.000-04:00

You know you've become obsessed with your garden when....2 minutes after arriving home from getting a haircut you do not look in the mirror once but, instead you head straight out to the garden to see what's going on.

I was alarmed when I first got out there because all of the tomato plants looked toppled over and were dragging on the ground. We had some pretty hard rain last night so I'm guessing that was what caused it so I spent 20 minutes tying things back to their stakes and cutting off a few more yellowing disease-y branches. The plants are still covered with about 10 times the number of tomatoes I had last year (although still green) so I think everything is going ok.

Then came the excitment!

I harvested 2 eggplants and lots of greenbeans. The eggplants were from a seedling I got in my seedling class and they were marked as Nadia Eggplant which would make them fat-ish and round-ish and just like the other two plants I have which have nothing harvest-able yet. In fact, these eggplants are long and skinny and I think they might be Ichiban Eggplant. One of them actually sprouted what I can best describe as a "handle." Very strange but, absolutely thrilling! This harvest represents the first non-leaf thing I've harvested since way back when I got a measly handful of strawberries in June!

When picking the greenbeans (which is kind of hard because they really blend right in) I noticed some lacy looking leaves which looked to me (burgeoning bug freak) like evidence of the Mexican Bean Beetle. I found one and after 3 attempts I managed to capture and kill it! Beetles.... it seems drop to the ground when touched, a nifty trick when you're being hunted by a hunched over human being trying to catch you from above. I know they're supposedly look-alikes but it didn't look much like a ladybug to me -- more orange than red. Speaking of which...one of my plot neighbors has this really strange, tall flower in her plot that attracts zillions of ladybugs. She has no idea what the plant is and neither do I but, its amazing to look at it and see all the happy bugs crawling all over it.

Sorry the picture is fuzzy but, anyone know what this plant is?

PS: I'm not holding my breath but the sole pepper plant that I assumed was a goner has a teeny tiny pepper on it.

PPS: My neighbors zucchini grew some little tendrils and was starting to climb up one of my tomato plants. I laughed out loud when I saw it but, seriously, that is not cool. I'm a plant lover but, I had to foil those plans with a scissor and quick. Its survival of the fittest out there....unless your keeper is a crazy garden lady with something sharp.

Lessons of a newbie

2006-07-24T07:34:00.000-04:00

Here are a few things I've learned this summer:

1) California Poppies grow well in crappy soil. That means they grow well in my sink where the dirt is compacted and has a tendency to dry out AND flood. The only question I have to ask myself is: should I try to improve the soil or just grow the poppies there and not worry about it?

2) As plants grow, they really do take up more space than you think. I planted everything in my garden with plenty of room (I thought) but, for most of June I was feeling like my garden was very sparse and boring. Now that it's late July and I can hardly get throught the paths I created I feel better about the space I left. My plot is still lopsided in terms of tall things and short things but, I think I have some ideas for next year.

3) Eggplant and Basil go really well, Red Peppers are a struggle. For two years in a row now my basil and eggplants looked pretty bad in June but look damn good by the end of July. I've already got a few eggplants on the way and a bunch of flowers that should bring even more. Red Peppers are not my forte. Last year it was blossom end rot and this year its some mysterious wilting disease that may or my not be Southern Blight. I still have one plant that I'm hanging onto. Maybe a different type of pepper will go better.

4) Tomato plants are big and demanding and even the "small" ones need to be caged or staked. I feel really good about the staking I did for 5 of my larger tomato plants but, the other 3 really could have used something (they're sprawling around on the ground and spreading over to neighboring plots.) I underestimated how much pruning is needed and how early you have to start doing it.

5)"Bush" Beans do grow easily but they need more space than you think. I planted a row of lima beans next to a row of green beans and basically created a thicket of plants. I'm not even sure I'll be able to find all the beans to harvest them. Next year they either need more room or something to grab onto as they grow. I've yet to build anything in my garden (like a trellis) but, perhaps next year will be the year.

6) Carrots may "love tomatoes" but, if you plant them too close together, the carrots will never see the sun. The jury is still out on my success at companion planting. The tomatoes may be benefiting but, I think the carrots are probably a little annoyed living in the shadows.

Photos below are May 27th, June 27th and July 23rd. AMAZING! (I need more flowers though.)

I take offense

2006-07-20T08:27:00.000-04:00

I have reluctantly accepted the fact that my plants have diseases. I might always get them too, simply because I choose to garden organically and I am confined to a tiny plot with "urban" soil issues. It has also been really rainy and really hot here for a while. So, my tomatoes have both Septoria Leaf Spot and also Early Blight. Big whoop! That said, I do someday hope not to have these problems and this year's tomato plants look waaaaaay better than last years. But this morning, I walked out to snip off some of the diseased branches and I saw another gardener who seems to really know what he's doing. He's definitely more of the "farmer gardener" though -- a young guy who knows how to "train" his plants, uses a black plastic sheet as "mulch" and grows enormous brandywine tomatoes and pretty much no flowers.

Knowing that he knows a thing or two I asked him if he was also having trouble with the lower leaves of his tomato plants (knowing that he is because I can SEE it).

My hope was to:
a) commiserate and b) hopefully get some advice because he has LESS of a problem than I do

His response was something along the lines of "maybe.... but I just look at it as one of the joys of organic gardening." Ouch! I know I'm being sensitive but, the comment struck me as a veiled version of "Dude, this is what gardening is all about and if you want a perfect green lawn and no diseases then move to the suburbs, pile on the chemlawn and be done with it, sheesh."
I felt judged.

I'm sure I'll get over it and he really is a nice person but, maybe a little macho and superior about his gardening. He'll probably have better tomatoes than me but, my plot is cooler to look at.

Another one bites the dust

2006-07-18T07:54:00.000-04:00

I live in the north but somehow Southern Blight got me.

My 2 pepper plants (down from 3 after the friggin cutworms!) have not been looking good lately. They were wilting and some of the leaves have been falling off. I've been looking up all the "wilt" disorders and none of them seemed to fit. This morning I decided that one of the pepper plants was just too sad looking and too close to my eggplant to mess around. I pulled it up and there was this white crystal-y, moldy, fungus looking stuff at the base of the plant. A little googling turned up Southern Blight. I probably need to pull out the other pepper plant too so it doesn't affect my tomatoes and eggplants.

This sucks. For two years in a row now I can't grow red peppers for the life of me!

dang, that's pretty

2006-07-16T12:06:00.000-04:00

Sunday at about 9AM I was still in my PJs but, its been so hot out that I wanted to get out and water the garden while it was still sort of comfortable out. Those of you with a garden in your yard or on your porch might not have these sorts of problems (or maybe you do) but, since I have to walk half a block to get to my garden and about 46 other people could be out there, attire that won't embarrass me is something I try to think about before venturing out. I decided to go for it and of course ran into 4 other people. The people you meet while gardening cannot be ignored. You need to chat and catch up a little and see what their up to. No one seemed to look me up and down so maybe it wasn't obvious that I was in pajamas. Either that or what I normally wear gardening isn't that different.

Anyway, it was a great day to be out and I saw some reeeeeally pretty things. First, I saw a monarch butterfly and a bunch of giant bees chowing down on some purple coneflower and bee balm (gotta get some bee balm next year!) I'm thinking about sending the picture out to all the gardner's since I am on the steering committee now and building enthusiasm for the garden seems like it should be part of my job. In an urban garden setting I feel like that's sort of a "girly" thing to do. I mean, I'm a big environmentalist and I like getting dirty and I use my garden to feed myself (the more serious and noble gardening principles is what I'm thinking) but, sometimes its just the flowers and the birds and pretty sights and smells that get me.

It was very sunny when I was watering too (which I've actually heard is bad because the sun can burn holes through droplets of water on the leaves like a magnifying glass......oh brother!) The combination of the sun and the water created these fantastic rainbows everytime I sprayed the hose. Ooooooooooh. So pretty.

Green with Envy

2006-07-09T09:37:00.000-04:00

There are many things I love about being part of a community garden. Just yesterday we had a "potluck BBQ" where I got to spend a lot of time with all sorts of people and enjoy wonderful, homemade food.

The biggest downside is jealousy. I can occasionally be overcome by strong feelings of gardening inadequacy just walking around and looking at other people's plots.

My coneflower above, someone elses below

I think its a little bit like High School (or even more like the High Schools I see on TV) where people compare themselves to each other and talk about what everyone else is up to. Or maybe caring how you measure up to your peers is just something you do forever. For example, yesterday I had a conversation that went something like this:

Black Eyed Susan: "Do you know if I should be adding something to my tomatoes right now? I didn't do very well with them last year."

Other Gardener #1: "Oh me either! No one did well, everyone had rot, except for Gardener X, he's just amazing, everyone knows that. And Gardener Y too who has the plot right next to his because the worms went over there. Your tomatoes look really good."

Black Eyed Susan: "Oh p'shaw, but, look at Gardener Z's right next to me. Her's are huge."

(Gardener Z walks over a few minutes later)

Black Eyed Susan: "What are you doing with your tomatoes? They look incredible."

Gardener Z: "Oh, (blushing) I really don't know, I think I put mine in after you but, it may be the type."

Other Gardener #1: "Yes, yes look at the type! Maybe that's it."

Anyway, you get the idea. None of it is mean spirited at all but, I do often walk around looking at what other's have done and wonder if I'll ever be as good at this as I want to be.

Here is my tomato plant below and someone elses on the right. I only have one green tomato so far and its sooo tiny.

Their lavender and my lavender. Where are my flowers?!

And then some things I don't even have.
Fabulous and strange looking flowers and onions.

The truth is, I benefit tremendously from all the gardening gurus in my neighborhood. They share their tips and tricks and often their plants too. I spoke to the woman responsible for these onions on the right and she said I can have some so.....its all ok.

A is for Aphid

2006-07-02T08:45:00.000-04:00

Yesterday was a big day bugwise. I already knew I had flea beetles but, another gardener a few plots over mentioned that he had aphids on his zucchini, tomato and pepper plants so I decided to hunt for them on mine. Sure enough, I found a little nasty gathering of them on a tomato plant. You can see in the picture (look closely) that there is also some kind of white bug there too. Anyone know what that is? According to my excellent bug book they look a little like whiteflies but, I don't think whiteflies hang out on the undersides of leaves the way aphids do. I'm a little concerned that they are beneficial and were in the process of making a meal of the aphids and I ruined it. I hope I'm wrong.

Bug stuff is really interesting but, knowing what's good to leave alone is tricky. I tend to err on the side of leaving things alone unless I find it in a menacing cluster or know that its a bad guy. The superhero bugs seem to travel solo.

Speaking of which. I have hardly seen a single bee this summer and I haven't seen ONE ladybug. When are they getting here? Is it too hot? Has there been too much rain? What's the deal? In fact, I am a tiny bit worried now that killing the aphids myself makes my plot less attractive to ladybugs (they eat aphids by the way).

Anyway, I took out my spray bottle, filled it part of the way with water and then added a tiny bit of very mild soap (Dr. Bronner's Peppermint) and then spritzed the heck out of any leaves where I saw aphids.

In my search I also found what I'm pretty sure was a cabbageworm. It was hanging out on a brussel sprout leaf which gave me the tip off. I hesitated for only a second before I removed him from his hiding place BAREHANDED!

I still have those annoying flea beetles. They've mutilated the arugula and are now working on the kale and collard greens so...I spritzed them a couple times too. How much of this spritzing does it take? It seems to me that once the water dries all these bugs will happily carry on as they were. I might go spray again later today but, it might be an exercise in sysiphean futility.

Things still keep getting bigger though and despite the occasional aphid my tomato plants seem very happy. Oh and I now have a daylily!! Its even prettier than I expected!

P.S. All this bug identifying business makes me want a magnifying glass. Yes, I am a geek.

A few of my favorite things

2006-06-27T18:31:00.000-04:00

Today was a beautiful sunny day. The perfect weather for flea beetles. Grrrr.

Luckily I know from last summer that they may riddle my greens with holes but, they won't kill the plant and I can still eat the crops afterwards. You might have to squint to see the little black shiny guy in the photo but, he is definitely there! One thing you can say about my collard greens -- they have character.

For the record, flea beetles hate water so if you're willing to spritz your plants pretty often you can keep them at bay. I guess I'm saying I'm not willing. I've also heard that you can catch them with sticky traps simply by brushing your hands on the edge of the leaves. The beetles hop just like fleas and they'll hop right onto the trap. These bugs aren't very smart.

The fact is, now that things have moved on from teeny tiny seedlings to adolescent plants I feel much more relaxed.

Everything seems to be coming into their own this week and I couldn't be more excited. The kale really looks bumpy and "dinosaur" like. The coreopsis (yay I learned the name) survived the slug infestation and is starting to bloom, the eggplant that seemed on its last legs after the cutworm attack looks really healthy and the whole thing makes me very very happy. I even staked my tomatoes today! I know there will be more frustration down the road --likely one or two steps down -- but today I'm just pleased.

Yellow flowers are my favorite!

How much water?

2006-06-22T09:31:00.000-04:00

Here, as promised is a photo of my fabulous red hose nozzle. I've been using the "shower" setting but, I've got lots of options including "mist", "soaker", "cone" and "jet". It was pretty expensive but, its quite cool.

I am really trying to do a better job of watering this year. Watering may sound like the easiest part but, somehow despite the fact that I think about my garden and how it's doing ALL DAY LONG, I managed to screw up the watering last year. My biggest downfall was confusion about how soon to water after it had rained. I think I just let the soil dry out a little too long when the plants had been soaked by rain and I thought they needed a break. What happened was "blossom-end rot" which basically made half of my tomatoes and peppers turn black on the end and rot (duh). As I understand it, you get this when the plant can't absorb calcium which it can only do when there is enough moisture in the soil.

So this year I'm keeping track of my watering and mother nature's with this calendar. I just look up recorded weather from the National Weather Service and add the average temperature and rainfall for the day. The only thing I'm not sure of is how many inches I'm actually providing when I water with a hose. I water for a good long while but, I still think it's probably only 1/4 inch or so. I'm trying to err on the side of watering when I think it might need it even if rain is in the forecast, I think I'll use the 50% rule -- meaning if the chances of rain are 50% or less I'm watering anyway. Like today, its been really warm and sunny for most of the past week and it's only rained a little so I watered this morning. It might pour later and then I'll feel a little stupid but......what can you do?

Frankly this is all about tomatoes. They can be very picky and I pretty much feel like I'm their bitch -- always trying to please them never knowing if I'm doing it right. I know I'm not alone.
This year I am also going to try "pinching" out the tiny sprouts that grow in the joints of larger branches. This is supposed to give me bigger, better tomatoes and who doesn't want that? Here is a good link on tomatoes that I found. I think I'll go back to it a lot this summer.

PS: The small blue chair makes me happy every time I see it so I thought I'd share it with all of you. I finally saw the kids that use it last night. They are very hardworking so, it makes sense that they would need something to take a break in.

PPS: Please comment! If you are a gardener and you have some advice or even if you just want to vent about how sore your back is from weeding or how your hands already feel like sandpaper or you have no garden but you like to observe crazy people, please say hello.

The Best Breakfast

2006-06-16T09:47:00.000-04:00

They are small and ugly and they taste about the same as other strawberries I've had but, I grew them so to me they are the most beautiful thing in the world.

This morning I went out and watered my garden with a hose for the first time this season. Maybe I coddle a little too much but, up until today I had only watered my seeds and very small or newly planted plants with my watering can because it has one of those gentle rain spouts on it. The hose can be a little STRONG. I have a fancy hose spout that I got last summer (I'll post a photo soon) but, I still have trouble sometimes with the water flow being too rough. I might have used the hose sooner but, then we had all this rain. Finally, it has been warm and sunny for the past 5 days and its supposed to be HOT and sunny for the next 3. I always worry about too much heat without watering so I watered for a good while today. Oh and I should mention, for good measure, how GREAT it is to have water in the community garden. Before I ever lived here, or gardened, people on this same site had to lug their water from home. Progress is good.

When I was done I decided it was time to pick a few strawberries and try them out. Strawberries weren't even in my plan for this year but, another gardener offered some plants and I couldn't refuse. I don't know that much about strawberries but I've learned a lot in the past few weeks:

1) Strawberries are perennials so they keep coming back each year. Amazing!
2) They send out "runners" to form new plants so you're best bet is to plant the strawberries with some room for the runners. Make sure to water those too when you water.
3) After a year or so the "old" strawberry plants don't produce as much so it's best to rely on the "new" plants year to year.
4) You can grow strawberries in a pot and they even make special terra cotta pots for this purpose.
5) They like straw. Most people I've seen put straw around the plants as a mulch.
6) Birds like them too. If you don't grab your berries fast some other critter may beat you to it.

Based on all of this (and my spying in other people's plots with strawberry plants) I think the plants I got from my neighbor were "old" which is why the berries are so small and the plants aren't super-healthy looking. I am not sure I'm right about this though. I might have transplanted them at the wrong time (should be very early spring, I was a little late) or near other plants that they don't like or maybe the soil wasn't ideal for them. All I know is, even though some other people seem to have bigger, healthier strawberry plants these little runts are mine and I love them.

Breakfast this morning was cereal and soy milk with strawberries -- a bowl full of satisfaction!

Click Here for more info on growing strawberries.

Chives

2006-06-12T19:02:00.000-04:00

Thank goodness, the sun has been out for 2 whole days!!

This weekend I hosted a small party for my brother and future sister-in-law. They've just moved to town so I figured a little welcoming was in order. I decided to trim all my chive flowers before they shriveled up. I found a cool recipe and made a chive cheese spread and it was REALLY good!

Here is the recipe:

8oz Goat cheese
4oz Cream Cheese
5 taplespoons chopped chives
1 clove of garlic - minced

Mix it all together and then place a sheet of plastic wrap on a table, use 12 whole chive stems to create a weave pattern, plop the cheese in the middle and lift the plastic wrap up to cover it. Refrigerate for at least 5 hours, cut off the extra "ends" and sprinkle with chive flowers (not necessary but, pretty and edible) and serve with bread or crackers!

I also used up half of my last jar of pesto from last summer. That might have been a bit rash considering how small my basil plants are right now but, you know that Vegas saying: "scared money loses." There really must be a gardener's equivalent.

P.S: I haven't seen a single slug since my dusk killing spree. Ask me if I feel guilty.

P.P.S: The election results are in and I am now a member of the Garden Steering Committee! I am so pleased...... hopefully this will mean my sink is safe!

Waiting.......(is the hardest part)

2006-06-08T17:26:00.000-04:00

Its been raining most of the past few days. In fact, I know, thanks to my web-savvy cousin who found this site for me, that it has rained almost 6 inches in June alone. Not only is it rainy but, its pretty cold for June. 56 degrees yesterday!! It stinks. I can't do anything in the garden except look at it (and believe me I have) and worry about how all the plants are doing (done that too.)

In addition to the rain I am waiting to hear the results of the Garden Steering Committee elections. I had a good feeling about my chances until today when I e mailed the current Garden Coordinator about the results and he said there was a tie and they were "figuring things out." Wouldn't he have said so if I was not involved in the tie? He's told me that he voted for me so you would think he might want to share good news if he had some right? Perhaps he's just being careful. I hate that. Or maybe I didn't win and rather than tell me that (because it might be awkward) he's just waiting to announce the full "Committee Elect." Even an idiot can figure out if their name is on a list or not.

There were 9 names on the ballot, 7 available positions and people could only vote for their top 5 choices. 3 of the 9 were "incumbents" and there were only 3 women (including me) all of which would be new. I'm a friendly, competent person and I think I would do a good job but, there wasn't any real campaigning happening or real opportunities to describe yourself before the vote so I'm not sure how much people who haven't spoken to me really KNOW that I've got some great skills for the job. In a sense it's more of a popularity contest and since I am not home all the time and I've only been living in the neighborhood a few years and, honestly, I don't always stop and chat, I don't think I'm super popular. Don't get me wrong, I'm not disliked (I don't think) but, I'm certainly not the prom queen of the neighborhood.

I guess I'll just have to wait to find out the results.

PS: I went out to the garden at dusk after posting this and found a ton of very tiny pinkish/grayish "snails-with-no-shells" in one of my perennials (I still don't know the name of the plant but, it has yellow flowers). I looked the slimy critters up and discovered what slugs look like. Ick! I got my gloves on and handpicked about 15 of them. Truly disgusting! The fact that it was just turning dark made the whole task a bit less hard to take than it might have otherwise been plus, they were all very small.

Did someone wash their car in my garden?

2006-06-01T17:08:00.000-04:00

The garden is a wild and wacky learning adventure!! This morning I went to check on my plants and noticed what looked like soap suds in about 4 places on my yarrow plant. I saw something similar one plot over on some mint plants. I wasn't sure what it was but, it looked JUST like soap suds. I had a little water left in my watering can so I just sprinkled it until the foam melted (thinking it probably was a bad thing whatever it was.) I saw nothing else but I decided to e mail my Gardening School teacher about it to see if she had any idea what it could be. She wrote back in about 2 minutes that it was probably a "Spittle Bug." I am amazed! It turns out Mr. Spittle doesn't cause much harm unless there are a lot of them but, what a crazy creature. They move around and create this little nest of sudsy bug slime to protect them from the heat and dryness of the sun and to provide camouflage. That second part definitely worked because I saw no bugs...... just suds.

I hate cutworms!!

2006-05-29T08:25:00.000-04:00

Here's the story: I planted my seedlings on Thursday morning. On Friday and again on Saturday when I went to check on them a few looked like someone had taken a teeny tiny machete to them and cut them off at the stem. For a few it was just a severed limb but for at least 4 plants (eggplant, peppers and marigolds) it was a death blow! I had no idea what could be causing this since it seemed far too.....well.....BIG an injury to be a bug.

Then yesterday (Sunday) a friend who was gardening a few plots over brought over a really ugly reddish wormy thing for me to see and asked me if I knew what it was. I didn't but, I went to get my handy bug book from the Brooklyn Botanic Gardens to look it up. After determining that it was the larva of the colorado potato beetle I went back to my plot and her to her's. She came back a few minutes later to show me this blackish/brownish really ugly wormlike thing to look it up in the book as well. I did and as I started to read the description I realized this bug was what was likely hacking my poor, defenseless seedlings. And then I was MAD!!! I wasn't 100% sure though because I hadn't seen any bugs in my plot so I, stupidly, decided to see what happened overnight and then decide. Well, I lost another eggplant and a few kale plants lost limbs last night due to my negligence so, no more messing around. I also found two live cutworms in my plot when I went digging for them in a rage this morning.

It's too bad I hadn't been looking for them when I turned over the soil BEFORE I planted any of the seedlings because I could have nabbed a few then and I could have taken steps earlier on to thwart their sinister plans to kill my plants. If you, reading this at home, want to get a head start you should look for them in the top few inches of soil and get rid of them. You should also put some sort of "collar" on your seedlings when you plant because the cutworms are too stupid to get around those.

For now here is what I'm doing in my personal cutworm war:

1) Nails or Toothpicks next to the stem of the plants -- I guess cutworms sort of make their bodies form a circle around the plant stem and if something like a stick or a nail is in their way they can't do that. I grabbed some nails this morning and stuck them next to most of the plants and I'll get some toothpicks later today. Cutworms feed at night so I have some time.

2) Cornmeal - This is not a proven method but, some people think it works and I figure it can't hurt to try it. The theory is that cutworms like the taste of cormeal so if you sprinkle some around your plants they will eat it but then...... they can't digest it so they die (Bwah Ha Ha Ha Ha!). I did the cormeal thing this morning so we'll see how it goes.

3) Night hunting - Because cutworms come out at night you can find them with a flashlight and get rid of them then. I'm pretty excited to try this one!

As mad as I am about these F***ing cutworms, I suppose it's good to have experiences like this because you learn what to do to prevent them in the future. I will be better prepared next time.

Compost Morning

2006-05-24T09:56:00.000-04:00

A few days ago I got an e mail informing me that my community garden WAS going to get a delivery of compost on May 23rd. This was very unexpected since we didn't last year despite lots of promises to the contrary. You can sort of see the big compost pile in the background of the photo here. It is hard to describe how elated I felt at the news. It was as if I got free tickets to see some amazing band or found out that I won a trip to Paris.

It's supposed to rain again this weekend and I really want to get my struggling seedlings in the ground so this morning I got up at 5:30AM and turned 3 wheelbarrows full of compost into my garden. I basically dumped the compost on the surface and then just used a pitchfork to mush it in a little. Quite a workout!! It looks so good -- like a field of chocolate cake. Tomorrow morning I'll try to plant everything and then the rain can come and welcome my little plants to their new home. I had wanted to get some sort of tiles to create a few more paths to make sure I don't tramp on the soil too much but, that will just have to wait.

In digging things up today, I made the decision to get rid of a giant yarrow plant that I had gotten last spring. Its pretty and I like it but it was just getting too big. I already transplanted part of it over to the sink and I really think I'm going to need the room for vegetables. It was a hard moment there at 6AM, talking to myself, trying to decide what to do but, I think I made the right decision and just a few steps away his/her/it's progeny will live on.

Overall the rain seems to have been a great thing for the garden. All the flowers that I planted in and around the sink are taller and fuller with more flowers and the chives have gone completely crazy.

Oh and I almost forgot. This morning I found a yellow and pink plastic egg hidden in my daisy plant. I didn't open it but, from rattling it a little I can tell there is some kind of toy or candy in there and NOT just rocks. There are a lot of kids who live in the neighborhood and although it could have been a gift for me from them (or maybe the Easter Bunny), I have a feeling that someone else was supposed to find it. I moved it onto the ground where it would be more visible and I'll check back to see if someone claims their prize. Pretty fantastic way to start the day huh?

The best laid plans...

2006-05-14T08:56:00.000-04:00

For months I had been looking forward to the lovely sunny day in mid-may when I would pick up my seedlings at the organic urban farm that is also a women's shelter and spend the whole weekend setting up my garden. This was clearly not meant to be. It has been raining for about 5 days straight and according to weather.com it's going to rain HARD for another 10 days.

I did pick up the plants which was sort of fun and sort of a miserable, drippy, muddy, experience. The setting is truly urban which I find really cool -- a farm in the middle of the 'hood -- but, the weather and the trudging through mud to find my seedlings was not what I was expecting.

The main problems with this weather are:

1) You are not supposed to go in the garden when its wet.
This has to do with the fact that soil will get really compacted if you step on it but, it can also spread diseases and hurt the plants in other ways. For this reason you're always supposed to do whatever weeding or planting or whatever you need to do BEFORE you water. Watering is always the last step. So, for goodness sake, stay out of the garden when its wet! Visiting to observe is ok but do not touch anything!

2) The seedlings really want to be in some warm garden soil.
Right now the seedlings are all on my front porch, under a metal table with a black trash bag over them to keep them warm. Sounds pretty crappy doesn't it? The friendly and competent people at the farm said the plants will be ok but, for how long is what I'm wondering. When plants are small and out of their comfort zone they can die or get attacked by diseases or pests. You know how when you watch those tv shows with lions hunting elk or something. It's always the babies or the sickly, skinny suckers who get killed. That's just how it is with plants so I'm pretty nervous. I want to bring some of the more heat-loving seedlings indoors (tomatoes and eggplants and peppers) but, I don't want to shock their little systems. The temperature in the farm is not at all like the temperature in my house and I don't want them to lose whatever hardiness they've developed in the tough outdoors by introducing them to warmth and American Idol. If I do that then there's a good chance they'll be too weak when it's time to go into the garden. I think I'll bring them in for a little bit and then go back and forth for a while.

On other garden-related news:

I have nominated myself to run for the Steering Committee of my Community Garden. It may be the only way I can keep my sink!! Stay tuned for reports of serious campaigning. I don't think there will be any televised debates but, you never know.

Pitching and Pansies

2006-05-09T12:19:00.000-04:00

For real! According to the New York Times, Pedro Martinez (formerly with the Red Sox now with the Mets) spends 2 hours in his garden, talking to his flowers, before he pitches home games. Go Pedro!! He doesn't appear to be as interested in growing food -- except for the fruit trees he has in the Dominican Republic. His garden seems a little "tidy" for my tastes but.......you can't be too critical of a multimillionaire who likes gardening enough to do it himself.

Here is a link to the full article.

Compost quest

2006-05-03T12:51:00.000-04:00

I have been really frustrated by the fact that my community garden has not been able to get any compost delievered in the past 2 years. This has something to do with finding a place to drive up to in the garden in order to deliver it but, heck, I'd be happy if the truck came by and I just filled up some trash bags myself.

I live in an apartment with small porches in the front and back so I figured it was too small for a compost bin but, I figured there might be something smaller designed for an urban gardener and voila! Here is a really cool link to a really cool website that I am very excited to have found. It describes how to create a compost bin from a rubbermaid container that you can fit in a small outdoor area!

For this year I'll probably just end up buying some at the nearby farm (what a shame to pay right?) and then maybe NEXT year I'll have my very own bucket to brag about.

"there's been talk about your sink..."

2006-04-30T13:43:00.000-04:00

Hello all. Today was a glorious day in the garden. I feel dirty and freckled and I couldn't be happier. In about 2 weeks I'll be picking up my seedlings and start planting in a bigger way but, today was a good first step.

I added lime and organic fertilizer and moved a bunch of perennials around to better spots. You're really supposed to do this in the fall but, whatever. This is the first time I've done that without supervision from someone more experienced but, I think its pretty simple: dig a hole, dig up all or part of the plant you're moving, put the plant in the new hole and then give it lots of water for a few days. The most impressive thing growing right now is the chive plant(first photo). Holy herb! I also met a new neighbor who seems really nice. She has some daylilies that she's going to give me too! I really need to lay off the orange and yellow flowers but, you can't pass up free stuff.... its like being invited over to someone's grandma's and saying no to pie and ice cream.

On Wednesday I went to the first garden meeting of the season but, I had to leave early. I am considering running for the Steering Committe but, I'm not sure that I'm up for the neighborhood-y politics of holding office. My impression is that the people on the committee get a lot of grief from neighbors and gardeners who have a problem with things that are happening but who would rather complain than work. In fact, it seems that I have been the source of some complaints......not me personally but, my sink.

My Friend from Greenbay had a sink in her garden and another one on her porch that she grew plants in. I always thought it was pretty cool and funny so when she left town and offered them to me I took them and put the pink one in my garden plot. I'm not saying its not noticeable but, its definitely not an eyesore or anything like that. Anyway, as I was leaving the meeting and paying my annual plot fee one of the guys on the Steering Committee (who is kind of a cranky guy but, funny and I like him) said to me "there's been talk about your sink" and went on to tell me that some people don't like it and have complained but, that I don't need to worry yet because there haven't been any votes and he actually thinks its cute. I just left but, HELLO!! is my sink seriously the biggest thing to worry about??!! Where is the sense of fun and whimsy and humor PLUS all the little kids in the neighborhood think the sink ROCKS and play with the faucets!

It seems like the dumbest thing in the world to me to care about my sink but, in an effort to pretty it up I put a bunch of large perrennials behind it and a bunch of flower seeds around it. My strategy is to deepen the support of those who like the sink and draw attention to its wonderful-ness for all the haters.

Dibblers and Misters

2006-04-18T21:30:00.000-04:00

I started another gardening class tonight. It is mostly made up of people who were in the other class and with the same teacher but, this time its only 4 sessions and all the lessons are very hands on and about starting things from seed. My assigned partner and I planted so many teensy weensy collard green seeds that our hands started to cramp. Anyway, I learned a few things that I did wrong with my attempt at home and I heard about some new tools that I absolutely must have. Here is a short list:

1) Grease Pencil - first you need someting like a popsicle stick to mark your seeds but then you absolutely must have a grease pencil to write on it with because no matter how "permanent" the marker claims to be, after a while in the sun and the rain the writing is sure to disappear. This, according to my teacher is not so with the grease pencil.

2) Dibbler - a golf pencil is what we used but, its basically a thing that makes the little holes to stick the seeds in.

3) Mister- to make sure you give your little seeds a fighting chance you must give them just enough water but, not too much and a mister is the perfect thing for the job. This is especially good for making sure you don't wash the seeds far from where you planted them with a too-powerful stream of water. This happened to me a lot last summer and my plants ended up halfway down the little mounds I had made for them.

4) Soil Thermometer - I am definitely getting one of these. You see, the temperature outside is NOT the same as the temperature of the soil so if you want to be sure you're planting things at the right time you need to take your garden's temperature. I do not care how nerdy this sounds. I am absolutely getting one!

I have been away for the past week so I have a couple of highlights from the time away.

1) Orca the Orchid is still doing really well. All the flowers are open now and I got some orchid food to use when I water.

2) I was visiting a friend in a nearby state and I helped her plant some flowers and herbs (AND STRAWBERRIES) in pots on her very sunny deck. She's never been able to grow anything so I am excited to coach her through it. I have promised that it will work so...I hope I'm not a liar.

Orca and the Seeds

2006-04-11T12:59:00.000-04:00

Meet Orca. So far so good orchidwise.

The seedlings are another story. Its been cloudier and colder than I had expected/hoped but, I am hopeful that a few days of warmth will make all the difference. Most of them are sleeping and a few seedlings have already sprouted and wilted. Luckily seeds are really cheap.

I also got my results back from the soil test. My lead levels are "low" which I guess is better than "high" but not as good as "none." My soil is slightly too acidic for vegetables but good for flowers so I have to figure out how to add lime in certain spots to get the pH to 6.5. I feel like I've read that there are some things that like more acidic soil though so I plan to check before adding anything.

The Calcium level is good but, I need to add Phosphorous and Potassium. The instructions are actually very specific so I'll need to do some precise shopping and measuring to make sure I add just the right amounts. I am headed out of town again so it will all have to wait a week.

Hopefully the seeds will surprise me when I return.

Starting Seeds Indoors - First Time

2006-04-04T07:50:00.000-04:00

This weekend I started some seeds indoors. I had purchased this funky plastic greenhouse with 25 "pellets" of planting "medium." a while ago and I finally felt comfortable going for it on Sunday. At first they just looked like little disks but, then I added a bunch of water to the bottom of the tray and they puffed up into these columns of soil-like stuff and I was able to put a few seeds into each one. I had to create a little map so I would remember what I planted where and I removed one "pellet" so I would know how the map was supposed to go. I felt like Hansel and Gretel leaving breadcrumbs or something although, that didn't turn out too well for them did it?

I planted marigolds, 2 types of onions, lavender, purple coneflower and arugula. The clear plastic cover is on right now and after the first sign of sprouting I'm supposed to lift the cover slightly and then once they've all sprouted I'm supposed to remove the cover and put the whole thing in a sunny location. Once the little plants seem big enough I need to "harden them off" which is basically getting the little guys to toughen up enough to handle life in the great outdoors.

I'm most worried about the following things:

1) Cats - How do I prevent my cats from turning this whole endeavor into a "salad bar"?
I think I have a plan which involves a high chair next to a window and possibly cutting the top panel off of the cover instead of removing it completely. Those cats are freaks!

2) Sunlight - One of the keys, it seems, is making sure the seedings get enough sun. I think I have a good window in mind but, having never done this I am not positive that any of my windows are sunny enough.

3) Temperature - warmth is one of the other key factors in getting seeds to germinate and although this weekend was warm the temperature is colder today and it is supposed to drop further overnight.

I checked this morning and I think I spied 2 little sproutlets of something. I kept the cover on because I'm worried about the cold but, pretty soon I'll need to take the plunge and put the whole thing closer to a bright window (which is sunnier but colder). Wish me luck.

This was actually a pretty big garden/plant weekend for me, In addition to planting seeds:

I figured out the rest of my garden plan. I decided to drop a few plants I'd had in mind (limas and turnips) and to include some more paths so I can get to everything. I think I am regretting my decision to try to grow zucchini this year because it takes up A LOT of space but......I'll give it a whirl and just ditch it for next year if it doesn't seem worth it.

Oh and I bought an Orchid which I adore and I've been calling it Orca. Its reeeeeeally pretty but, I think it might need to be repotted and I'm nervous about screwing it up. I'll post a photo soon.

About Dirt

2006-03-27T10:51:00.000-05:00

It finally warmed up enough to get a spade into my garden so I decided to send some of my soil away to be tested. For a mere $13 (plus postage) I will get results back that tell me my soil pH as well as the amount of organic matter, if I have lead and how I'm doing in terms of various nutrient levels. The best thing is that the results will include recommendations for what to add to make my soil better.

I mailed my envelope of dirt this morning and I am incredibly excited about it. Every time you read a seed packet, the planting instructions include what kind of soil conditions the plant thrives in. Other gardeners are often talking about what to add to the soil to make it better but, until you (I) know what my soil is actually like I think its hard to know what pieces of advice to take. This is especially important because "over-fertilization" is a problem that can cause all sorts of plant disorders, not to mention water pollution. Its kind of like eating too many carrots (which my dad did once and yes, he turned orange) causing something good for you to become something toxic and overwhelming. I plan to use compost mostly which has fewer risks but, it would be good to know if my soil could really use some extra goodies. "Amendments" is the word I've heard for stuff you add to your soil to improve it but, I'm not enough of a garden geek to start using words like that. First of all it might make me seem like I know more than I do and secondly, no one else would know what I was talking about.

Most people add lime to adjust the pH and just about any garden center sells bags of powdery stuff that add nitrogen, phosphorous and potassium. All organic. I bought a bag last year but, I didn't really know what I was doing so I hardly used it. They come with numbers on them that tell you what amount of each of the nutrients they are adding but, I still haven't figured them out.

Another popular approach to improving your garden soil is to add worm poop. I am not kidding. There were several well attended workshops on this at the gardening event I went to a week ago and the people who practice "Vermiculture" -- as its called -- are dead serious. The pro-worm propaganda (which I basically buy) is that worms have this amazing ability to turn decomposing food and vegetable matter into really wonderful and nutrient-rich stuff that comes out in their poop. So, if you want some exceptional garden soil you should just adopt some worms, feed them and put all their poop in the garden. Does anyone else remember Oscar the Grouch's pet worm Slimey? Its kinda like that. I'm not ready to keep worms but, it is true that the best and most universally admired gardener at my community garden (everyone says so) is a friend of the worm.

Here is some more info on garden soil from PBS if you're interested.

Hanging with the Gardeners

2006-03-20T19:17:00.000-05:00

Life has been a little hectic and I haven't made much progress on my garden plan. I decided to add carrots, turnips, lima beans and onions to my list of plants for the garden and I bought seeds for most of these to start growing them indoors. I even purchased a cheap plastic greenhouse and some little discs of 'growing medium" that grow into columns when you add water.

I spent all day Saturday volunteering at a small citywide gardener's convention (the mayor even came). I got some lettuce seeds out of that and I got to spend a lot of time with some very nice people from my gardening class who were the majority of the volunteers. Some of my fellow students received certificates of completion for the class but, I've got a bunch of classes to make up before I can get one of those. It was really interesting sitting around with a whole crew of people obsessed with gardening. A couple of them were headed straight to the flower show once they were done volunteering and they were sooo glad that it was open until 9PM.

That's Intense!

2006-03-08T11:14:00.000-05:00

in·tense (n-tns)
adj. in·tens·er, in·tens·est

Possessing or displaying a distinctive feature to an extreme degree: the intense sun of the tropics.
Extreme in degree, strength, or size: intense heat.
Involving or showing strain or extreme effort: intense concentration.
1. Deeply felt; profound: intense emotion.
2. Tending to feel deeply: an intense writer

in·ten·sive (n-tnsv)adj.

Of, relating to, or characterized by intensity: intensive training. See Usage Note at intense.
Relating to or being a method especially of land cultivation intended to increase the productivity of a fixed area by means of an increase in capital and labor.

Just when I think I am starting to know what I'm doing/talking about with this gardening thing something new presents itself and my brain aches with lack of understanding. Sometimes I feel like an alien on a new planet.

I wasn't able to attend Gardening School this past Saturday but, I knew they were going to talk about how to plan a vegetable garden so I tried to read the manual. The manual for the class is really designed to be a supplement to the classes so although its an enormous looseleaf binder that appears to be chock full of info, it doesn't tend to answer all my questions or explain things very thoroughly. While reading I came across the concept of intensive gardening. The basic gist is to get more out of a small space. All at once I realized that one of the things that really made my garden less impressive and less productive than some of my community garden neighbor's last summer is the fact that they were carefully employing these methods and I wasn't. The big eye opener for me was the fact that the space requirements listed on the backs of seed packages are designed for some kind of professional grower with lots of space and a need for neat rows of crops that you can water and fertilize and weed with machines! If you're like me and gardening in a little trapezoidal plot in a community garden you really should be squishing things as much as you possibly can and its not wrong to do that....its just intense!

This is actually very exciting news! The challenge now is that I have to re-do the garden planning I've done based on these new "intensive methods" which include things like companion planting, interplanting, vertical planting, succession planting and so forth (square foot gardening is one of these too). That means I need to know what these techniques are first and then how to use them. It probably won't be as hard as I am thinking because I've been dutifully ogling other people's garden plots for 2 years now but, I am a little intimidated.

Basically, I need to re-figure how much space everything really needs and then see if I have room for more stuff. The manual sort of implies that intensive gardening isn't really for everyone and it might be best to start slowly. Why would that be? Will I screw something up if I do it wrong? The manual also makes it sound like you need to either use one of these methods or not, as if halfway is not an option. Why is that? Is this extreme gardening, as in not for the weak willed or faint of heart? What's the big deal? Clearly, I am confused. I guess I'll just try to do some reading and see what I can figure out.

Homemade Rosemary Oil

2006-02-28T21:56:00.000-05:00

When I left for work this morning it was 11 degrees outside. Nothing seems to be growing anywhere but, I'm still enjoying the fruits of last season's labor.

Way back in early November I stuck a bunch of rosemary and garlic in a bottle and poured olive oil in to cover it. I always have one of those big tins of olive oil around so once I had the bottle (from balsamic vinegar) it was really easy. I marked the bottle with the date and put it in the back of my cupboard and left it alone until this week. Its amazing! This weekend I had it with some really good bread to try it out and tonight I made salmon with it. Its delicious. I'm absolutely doing this again maybe with a little black pepper next time. If you have any pretty glass bottles lying around you should definitely do this...or send the bottles to me so I can. I suppose this would work in any old jar too but it looks so nice in a cool bottle.

Does anyone ever get anything done at these meetings?

2006-02-27T06:27:00.000-05:00

Except for about 20 minutes, this Saturday's gardening class was all about the planning and politics part of community gardening. We broke up into groups, played roles and hammered out meeting agendas and appropriate dues for a fictitious community garden. It was fine although it made me think twice about trying to get more involved in the leadership of my own community garden -- what a slow and frustrating process.

Unfortunately my work schedule is such that I won't be attending any more classes until next year. Its too bad because next week is all about planning for a vegetable garden. I've got a first draft of my own plan done but, I don't think it leaves me enough room to get around for weeding and stuff. I'm not sure if you can see it in the photo too well but, advice is welcome. The empty spot on the left is for whatever I decide to grow from seed.

In a few weeks I'll be volunteering at this citywide Urban Gardening Event which I think will be pretty cool and probably have lots of pamphlets and workshops. Later that same night there is a bagpipe event at the bar around the corner from my house!! They're not related but, it should be a pretty fantastic day.

Damn Zipcar!

2006-02-23T09:48:00.000-05:00

I don't own a car which is not a problem because I have Zipcar -- which means I can get "wheels when I want them." The problem is, Zipcar has made some changes that will make some of the driving and hauling of stuff that I need to do for the garden a bit harder.

Honestly, I think Zipcar is brilliant and a good deal. In the late spring last year when I was hauling myself to the farm every week for more plants and supplies (and my super-cool red hose nozzle thingy that I paid $20 for) it was great to have cars that 1) were close to my house and 2) fun to drive. My favorite is the Scion XA (above). For some reason though, Zipcar has removed 6 of the cars that used to be closest to me and replaced some of the best cars with less cool ones. That means I'll have more competition for fewer cars and they'll be a further walk away. Let me tell you, a smallish car around 10AM on a Saturday when its warm and dry is what EVERYONE wants. Dammit!

I think the reason the cars were removed may have something to do with theft which I guess I sort of understand but, its just such an inconvenience for ME that I feel unreasonably mad about it. I decided to reserve a car for May 13th already because that's the day I have to pick up my seedlings at the cool women's shelter/urban farm but....its a ford focus wagon....waaaaah!

So if you have a car and you want to drive me around for garden supplies in the spring and summer please let me know. I'll hook you up with some zucchini or eggplant or something.

Beetlemania

2006-02-19T12:35:00.000-05:00

I am finally back home after 2 weeks away. Despite a nasty cold and jetlag the very first thing I did when I got up on Saturday was to run off to Garden School. The lesson was all about insects. It turns out that most insects are either beneficial or benign (in the garden at least). Still, you need to know the difference lest you leave an evil predator napping in your perennials or accidentally kill a true garden warrior. In addition to learning how to tell the difference between an insect and an arachnid we also leaned what they do and how to deal with them.

This is a lady bug:

After a lot of note-taking, we broke up into groups of 6 and traveled to 6 stations where we had puzzlers and guidebooks to help us identify and make recommendations for the various critter problems we were presented with. We also learned some stuff about the side effects of pesticides and how to read labels as well as more info on weeds and diseases. I assume its obvious but, I have no intention of ever using anything non-organic nor would this class encourage that but, there are some organic pesticides that are pretty dangerous.

The clues would go something like this: "I am a gardener and I have some bean plants that aren't doing so well but, the plant is covered with lady bugs so....should I just not worry about it since the ladybugs will probably eat whatever it is?" A HA! Said the group.... and we turned to our handy field guides and discovered the sinister Mexican Bean Beetle that is not a friend of the garden AND is a lady bug look-a-like.

This is a Mexican Bean Beetle:
The biggest highlight for me was realizing how great the books were. The best books were from the Brooklyn Botanic Garden (yeah, that's right, P.S. 206 is in Da House) and they are really small and easy to use. You just look up some info and you can pretty much figure out what you've got and what to do about it. I got up this morning and ordered all three of them online.

Here are a few more interesting things that I learned:

1) Only female Mosquitos bite
2) The Praying Mantis isn't so great. They do eat insects but, they eat ALL insects including ones you might want to keep around.
3) Ladybugs totally rock-- they eat aphids which are some bad bad bugs (er.. I mean insects)
4) More than half the world's creatures are Beetles and my state has somewhere between 25 and 50 THOUSAND species of insects.
5) In additon to shears I need to get a magnifying glass to identify insects. Every once in a while (says my instructor) I might want to catch one and toss it in the freezer so I can examine it more closely. I am sure my roommate will love that!

The Flying Tomato

2006-02-13T14:35:00.000-05:00

This is barely related to gardening but, heck its the Winter Olympics and Shaun White is "totally rad." If you haven't been paying attention, this is the red headed kid from San Diego who just won the gold medal for snowboarding. The Italians call him "Il Pomodoro Volante. " Everybody loves tomatoes.

Bode came in 5th in the Downhill yesterday and poor Apolo Anton Ohno missed his shot at the finals.

I suppose I can say that I aspire to be a very good gardener and so people who are talented at what they do, especially under pressure, and seem to really enjoy it are an inspiration to me.

Nice weather we've been having...

2006-02-09T12:55:00.000-05:00

What to blog about when you are not at home and not shopping for plants or seeds? I am in the Northwest right now which is surprisingly sunny. The most amazing thing I've noticed recently is that lots of people garden or at least think about plants and flowers a fair amount. Its practically like the weather in how universal it is. I was talking to one woman yesterday about her clear memories of killing all her friend's tomato plants by smoking near them. A coworker emailed me about his failed attempts to grow berries on his porch, another friend and I talked for a while about orchids. In fact, I was so inspired that now I'm considering getting one and trying to keep it alive -- anyone know if I can do that successfully in New England? I always figured orchids were "out of my league."

So clearly a lot of the charm here is how we STRUGGLE to succeed at growing things and care a lot about that success. I think its because the urge to nurture something and not kill it is innate. Its a pretty comforting thought in this fast-paced, pre-packaged, age of technology (and blogging). Alright, enough with the philosophical mumbo jumbo, I gotta get an Americano and check my e mail.

I've added some more garden resources links to the side here. If you've got suggestions feel free to send them my way.

Red Knights, Dinosaurs and Oliver

2006-02-06T10:16:00.000-05:00

I decided to place an order for seedlings with the organic urban farm. All in all I'll be getting about 66 starter plants for $33.50. That's a good deal if you consider what I get out of them -- lots of enjoyment, plus a freezer full of pesto. The plants have some crazy names. Red Knights are peppers (red ones), Dinosaurs are a type of blue-ish bumpy Kale and Oliver is a Brussel Sprout. I'll also be getting some eggplants (named Nadia) Zucchini (Costata Romanesco) and a variety of tomatoes - Rose de Barnes, Purple Cherokee, Green Zebra, Brandywine, Pineapple, Sweet Olive and a few others.

I have also decided to plant a few things from seed inside and to plant some seeds directly in the garden like I did last year since that seemed to work pretty well. The big development though is that I am going to try to actually PLAN the whole garden before I even start. My plot is not a perfect rectangle but, I went outside and walked the edges to estimate the shape and size. Trapezoid? I think I've got it. Right now, as you can see, my plan is blank.

The next step will be to look up all the plants I've ordered and figure out how much space they need and how tall they'll get. After that I need to think about what to grow from seed and then FLOWERS! I'm excited to think about what kinds of colors I want and when they'll bloom and where to put them.

I can already tell that I'm running out of room though. Some of those 66 plants are going to have to go to friend's gardens. Who needs 6 parsley plants anyway?

Its been unseasonably warm here and I have a feeling that's not good. I'm not sure about this but I get the sense that "typical" is always best for gardening. Too much or too little of something (rain, heat, etc.) seems to benefit the garden bad guys that I learned about like fungus and bacteria. We shall see. I'll be out of town for the next two weeks but, I should be able to keep up with the planning.

Seeds or Seedlings?

2006-02-01T09:44:00.000-05:00

seed or seeds

A ripened plant ovule containing an embryo.
The seed-bearing stage of a plant.
A source or beginning; a germ.

seed·ling
n.
A young plant that is grown from a seed.

It is now February which is a good time to start planning your garden. I'm a little overwhelmed by the idea of plotting things out. I need to know 1)what I want to grow 2) the estimated height of things 3) when they get big and how much space they need and 4) how I want the garden to look but...that's a lot of stuff. Last summer I did pretty well without a ton of planning although I think I had too many yellow and orange flowers and I probably didn't use the space as well as I could have. There are simply some decisions one needs to make in advance. Plus, I had a lot of "plot envy" when I walked around my community garden and saw some of the things people did. Although, I did get compliments on my plot too, I want to improve on what I did last year. Stagnation is not an option.

I tried to set myself up for this year by keeping the little plastic tags from last year's plants so I can remember what worked and what didn't. I need to figure out if I'm going to try to grow seedlings indoors this year. Another option is to buy seedlings that have been grown by professionals or at a cool women's shelter that is also an urban farm. The deadline for ordering from the women's shelter is February 11th!

Last year I got plants for just about everything except for a few herbs, greens and flowers which I sowed directly in the garden in April. My biggest success was with California Poppies which, of course, are NOT native to my area which makes me a bad bad gardener but, I love them and they were easy to grow. I promise to try to think more about native plants this year.

I believe the pros and cons of growing seedlings myself are as follows:

Pro:
1) Starting seeds indoors means starting gardening early and since I like to do it, early is good.
2) I will feel more accomplished if I grow something from its very beginning stages as a teeny tiny seed all the way to its grown-up stage as a flower, fruit or whatever its supposed to be. It also seems like what "real" gardeners do so...it just seems right.
3) Seeds are less expensive than plants so it makes the whole endeavor cheaper -- especially if I plan to buy crap like real gardening shears.

Con:
1) I might fail and end up buying plants anyway which will be depressing and NOT less expensive. Also, there is a chance my plants just won't do as well because of my amateur ways and I won't find out until its too late to buy something grown by people with more experience.
2) I am not sure I have a perfect place in my apartment for this in terms of light and I am not sure that I can prevent my cats from taking a curious nibble while I am away.
3) I get the impression that its a lot of transferring things to bigger containers along the way which could make a big mess and I'd have to get all the containers. When its all in the garden the mess tends to be concentrated out there.

Luckily I have at least 11 days to decide!

Garden blogging begins

2006-01-30T18:26:00.000-05:00

nov·ice

A person new to a field or activity; a beginner.
A person who has entered a religious order but has not yet taken final vows. Also called novitiate.

Welcome to my first ever blog. I'm not sure how long it will take me to master the art of sticking links in the messages like all the fancy people do but, hopefully I will keep you entertained. First a little background: I am a city kid. I love the outdoors but, I wouldn't say I know much about the natural world and how things work "out there." Somehow, I have become obsessed with gardening. I don't know much about what I am doing but, amazingly, I can make things grow anyway. I love it. Much of the credit (and thanks) goes to my Friend from Green Bay who let me work as her apprentice two summers ago. Last summer I got my very own plot in a community garden on my corner and I am excited and afraid of all the things I will succeed and fail at in the world of gardening in the months to come.

Its the end of January and you might think that its way too early to start freaking out about my garden but....you are wrong. I just started "gardening school" which is a volunteer master urban gardening program. I go to class every Saturday from 10 - 3:30 and learn what I like to call "advanced garden basics."For example, this weekend I took 11 pages of hand written notes on "plant pathology" and the differences between a virus a nematode and a fungus. Pretty nasty stuff. We looked at lots of pictures and had to raise our hands and say "sick" or "normal" based on the photo. Sometimes things that look sick are perfectly healthy (like some friggin ugly striped flowers we saw) and sometimes things that look healthy are sick and dying. The only trouble I have is that everybody seems to be talking about things that I haven't yet learned like "you'll get this when you don't prune correctly" or "you have probably seen this in your milkweed or roses." My what? Among other things I learned that I really need to clean my "shears" with a bleach solution to guard against all manner of garden evil. All I own are scissors and as I recall I didn't even wash them with water all summer. I might have to pick and choose the information I take seriously in this class I mean...to hear them talk my germy, fungal, non-shears make me a walking garden hazard!