Here is my third (and final...maybe...) installment of the DIY Vegetable Garden series. I've learned a whole lot in my gardening endeavors this year and have a lot to take into next year from it.
Since it was so rainy this spring, we weren't able to put anything in the ground until almost June!! Hopefully that doesn't have too many adverse affects on the harvest this summer, but now it's just a wait and see game.
HOME GARDEN STEP FOUR: (Finally!) Put your plants in the ground.
For both the raised beds and the in-ground garden, we put soil on top of the weed-blocking tarp, for aesthetic purposes. Neither Brandon nor I want to look at black tarp all summer.
So, in order to place our plants, we first had to cut through the soil/tarp and then dig our holes. This was actually pretty easy, because most of the time the spade was adequate to cut through the tarp.
Well, except the rosemary. We are keeping that one potted so we can bring it inside for the winter and have year-round rosemary!
So what did we decide to plant this year?
- 20 pepper plants, some sweet, most of them hot
- 15 tomato plants, all different varieties
- Mesclun lettuce
- Spinach
- Swiss chard
- Thyme (regular and lemon)
- Basil
- Chives
- Dill
- Lavender
- Broccoli
- Carrots (three whole rows!!)
- 2 potatoes...but we want more!
- Red cabbage
- Brussels sprouts
- Sweet corn (this is a big experiment for us)
- Watermelon
- Butternut squash
- Eggplant
- Cilantro
- Onions
- Sugar snap peas
- Asparagus
Phew! I think we're going to start our own CSA :)
Here are a few things I've learned about gardening:
- Spring greens need to get outside early because they like it cooler (ahem, broccoli!) so if you can't put them in the ground, pot them and put them outside. Broccoli will go straight to seed if it matures when it's too warm.
- If you don't have enough room for all the seeds that you started in your garden, expand your garden!! We didn't have enough room for the vine plants so we added on to our in-ground garden in an area that is still separate from the rest of the plants, so the vines don't take over.
- Asparagus takes 2+ years until you get a harvest out of them. Just be patient.
- Next year, I want to try rolling "seasons". Essentially put in spring plants early, and once they're harvested the summer plants will go in, then once those are harvested, late summer/fall plants will go in. Might be able to catch the tail end of this idea this year. We'll see.
Does anyone else have a garden at home? What did you plant?
In case you missed them, here are the other two installments of my DIY Vegetable Garden posts:
