2020 Garden

This is more of a where we started post than anything. I can look back in a few years and see how much we've accomplished, hopefully! 

We moved from a zone 9 to a zone 6. That is a huge difference and I honestly feel like a completely new gardener. We also have very sandy soil. The soil is a dream to work and pull weeds but lacks nutrients our plants need. It also doesn't hold water and seeds float away.  It's not really soil - it's just dirt (well ... sand).

Our current garden consists of 7 raised beds along the fence in our backyard in town.  Our neighbors told us that they were filled with the dirt from our yard ... maybe that is why we have so many holes (kidding - kind of).  

We moved in the middle of summer and missed the window to plant a full garden. We did plant 2 zucchini plants mid July which gave us several zucchini before they met Jack Frost, several peas and green beans which didn't grow very tall but gave us a few peas and beans. Kale is still growing strong, and we have a broccoli and a brussel sprout plant that are slowly growing - not sure we'll get a harvest from either of those. Everything was planted from seed directly in the beds. 

I found bagged manure and compost on clearance at Walmart and got as much as I could fit in the basket (they were 25 cents)!  Then I convinced my hubby to go back and get another 10 bags.  We've added a bag of manure and 2 bags of compost to each bed. That was 2-3 inches on the top before we mixed it in.

We have mostly put the garden beds to bed for the winter by covering each bed with leaves we chopped up with the lawn mower. At our last house we did this with the garden boxes and it cut down so much on the weeds. Hopefully it will be the same here while also adding organic matter our soil desperately needs. 

There are 20 cloves of garlic planted in one bed, it is supposed to grow really well over the winter here.

That's it for our 2020 garden - not much but it's a start! 

Pruning Fruit Trees

January is a great time of year to prune your fruit trees. Don't be afraid to prune! Your trees will thank you! My favorite resource for fruit tree advice is Dave Wilson Nursery's You Tube Channel. They have fantastic videos on pruning, grafting, and much more. Go visit them at:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FWu4u--cZ84

My husband doing some winter pruning

A California Winter Garden

If you live in a climate that allows it and have never had a winter garden - you are missing out!
A winter garden in California is so simple and such an easy way to get some fresh produce in the winter. We have a cool enough winter without much frost.

3 young broccoli plants - volunteers from last year

We have grown broccoli, cauliflower, Brussels sprouts and lettuce. Lettuce and broccoli have been the most successful for us. Both are super easy. You can usually find broccoli starts at the local hardware store (or you could start them by seed but we have better luck with starts) and lettuce seed is equally easy to find. We like to purchase the salad bowl seed packs that include a mix of varieties.

All we do is plant them, maybe fertilize them, cover them if a deep frost is coming (we have only done this twice ever) and harvest. :) Unless it gets super dry like the last year or so, we don't even water them. Sometimes I forget we even have them.

Healthy broccoli plants

For best results get your starts in the ground October 1st. Lettuce can be sown later and sown again mid winter for many, many harvests. Don't plant too much lettuce as you can't preserve it well. And don't be afraid to thin your lettuce early and thin heavily. We forgot to plant lettuce this year so no photos.

How about you - do you have a winter garden?

Milk Jug Greenhouses

This spring with my introductory plant science class, we tested out milk jug greenhouses. We are still getting the data analysis completed, but I'm very pleased with the results. While I can't confirm that the results were statistically significant, I can tell you that the germination rates with our milk jug greenhouses were about equal to the germination rates in the commercial greenhouse. These cheap little greenhouses work! 

The idea with the milk jug greenhouses is that they are a very cheap and easy way to get your seeds started earlier than you might be able to start them in the ground. I've seen some people make the milk jugs into a sort of plant cover to protect the plant. But by using the whole milk jug, if you have a cold snap, you can bring the whole thing inside. It is cheap, easy and effective in starting your own seeds and hopefully getting an extended growing season with your garden.

Here is how to do it. 

Step 1:

Save a milk jug, clean it out. You won't need the cap so that can be recycled immediately. 

Step 2:

Make drainage holes in the bottom. My husband used a knife but in class we were safer and used a drill. Four drainage holes worked great for our class project.

Step 3:

Cut the jug horizontally almost all the way around. Where the handle is, leave a couple inches un cut. The end result should be the top half of the jug being 'hinged' to the bottom half.

Step 4:

Add potting soil and start your seeds. We have started beans, peas, tomatoes, squash and cucumbers all with good success. For each we have just planted four seeds per jug. 

Step 5:

Close the hinge and tape the jug to seal the cut. We have the best luck with duct tape, shipping tape was a bit too flimsy. Make sure the cap is removed and do not seal where the cap had been. The open cap allows for ventilation.

Step 6:

Set out in the sun and enjoy! We did water them as needed, but if you get enough rainfall you may not need to water much at all. If there is risk of frost or you have a cold snap, bring them inside. You could set them in front of a window and take the back out when the conditions improve.

Step 7:

In 2-4 weeks when your starts are looking great, un-tape the jug and transplant! 

I was very pleased with how successful the germination was in the jugs when compared to a commerical greenhouse. It was very inexpensive to try out and you could reuse the milk jugs year after year. We will be repeating this experiment in class with different seeds next spring and I will be using this in my personal garden as well. 

Note: This was not an idea I came up with, but one that I came across online. Whomever originated this idea is brilliant.

I'll update you when the data is complete!

Container Gardening

 We live in the suburbs and have a decent sized backyard.  When we first bought our house I was really excited about having a small garden in a long flower bed - we pulled out all of the roses and amended the soil with both soil and manure. Then we planted, watered, and waited.  Watered, and waited and then it happened ... our plants shrunk (I am not kidding, I didn't think it was possible but it is) and then slowly died.  While we have a few trees in our backyard (a Dr. Suess apple tree and a few freshly planted trees in the side yard) our backyard gets lots of shade. Our house it not shaded but most of our yard is.  I thought the planter got enough sun, but obviously it didn't.  

Here we are 2 years later (or is it 3? Time passes so quickly when you're old) and we FINALLY planted a few plants where the sun does shine!  Our patio.  We bought 2 containers on clearance at Home Depot for $20 each (I still thought it was expensive, but it will pay off).  Michael's coworker gave us some tomato plants, so we used the two planters we bought and a planter we had.  The three plants had grown together and we just ripped them apart and they all lived! 

 Here they are just after we planted them.  

When you plant tomatoes bury 2/3 of the plant - break of the leaves and roots will grow where the leaves were.  This makes the plant stronger. 

 Here they are about 2 weeks later. 

 The other plant which is on the other side of the patio.

And here they are today - almost 4 weeks after being planted.

After we went fishing again last weekend, I put the worm poop (castings) that was left after we used the worms to fish with on the back tomato plant and it shot right up (could be the hot weather too, but I think the worm poop helped).  I will be saving it from now on! 

A few tips for container gardens:

- buy a good container - if it has a hole in the bottom the water will not stay in the planter and you will have to water it more often.  The containers we bought have a water storing 'system' in the bottom - and it works!

- start with good soil - make sure to buy potting soil NOT garden soil.  Potting soil is designed to go in pots (hence the name) and will hold onto water better and won't compact like garden soil will.  We payed a little more for a bag of Miracle Gro potting soil and is has been worth it!

- place your containers in a good spot (most fruit and vegetables need 8 hours or more of sunlight).

- water the plants regularly

The plant in the red planter hasn't grown nearly as much as the other 2 plants.  I haven't pulled it out yet since I want to see how it does, but we didn't put new soil in the planter - we just added some to the top, and I probably didn't have good soil to start with.  There is also a hole in the bottom so the soil dries out faster.  I should give it some fertilizer and see if that helps.  

Do you have a garden this year?  Have any container garden tips for us?