Week 26: Spring Garden

I thought I'd share some pictures of our garden.  This year it was so cold much later than normal, it's still not quite as hot as it usually is.  I'm  fine with that!  Because of this the garden was planted much later than I would have liked.  I still have three more beds to plant!  As far as weeds go, we've done a pretty good job at keeping them down, at least in the beds that are already planted.  Mulch helps a lot!

 

 

Last Fall I mulched half of this garden with leaves and chicken manure.  This Spring I left it like it was and planted  right in it.  At first the mulch hadn't composted much and some of the smaller seeds had a hard time sprouting unless I added a little dirt on top and planted the seeds in there.  Now it seems to have composted more and the seeds sprout better.  It has helped keep the weeds to a minimum. 

 

With the other half of the garden I have put down one layer of newspaper and added a thick layer of grass clippings after I planted the bed.  If you were planting seeds I would wait until they have sprouted and are about 4 or 5 inches tall before adding the mulch.  That way you don't suffocate them.  You want to be sure and mow the yard before anything goes to seed, otherwise you will be planting grass/weeds in your garden by adding the grass clippings.



 

 

This is a bed of onions, one of the first things I planted this year.  I only just got around to putting the newspaper and grass mulch on.

As you can see we have to have the garden fenced to keep the chickens out.  The bed in the middle is a row of cucumbers down the middle with some radishes on the sides.  The bed to the right is peas.  To the left you can see a few kohlrabi and beets.

This is a row of beets growing between two rows of bush beans.  Some of the bush beans have climbing tendrils on them!?  I don't think that's supposed to happen!

 This is a picture of the Oregon Sugar Pod II snow peas I mentioned in the last post.

 

 

Some cilantro that is past it's prime.

This is a close up of the cucumbers in the second picture.  They are Poona Kheera cucumbers from Baker Creek.  I grew these last year.  Boy did they produce!!  I ended up with enough to make two kinds of pickles and also some left over to eat fresh.

These are Purple Plum radishes.  They were planted kind of late and are having to grow in the heat, they seem to be doing ok though.

Another shot of the onions.

Do you like to garden?  Do you have any tips for getting the garden in earlier?