I had never heard of square foot gardening, but it sounds pretty interesting. I’d like to garden, but the parameters for the space I have are pretty limiting - very small front yard, near a busy street, under siege by a goddamn army of squirrels, with occasional incursions by domestic cats & dogs, on soil of dubious quality and unknown toxicity.
I was sort of thinking about just putting out some Earthtainers or equivalent, but a raised bed could maybe be doable. maybe with a chicken wire cage over it for the squirrels.
Does anyone know how much you need to worry about soil quality under a raised bed?
Squirrels are the bane of our gardening life. My partner has gone on some serious pogroms, but they breed like, well, rodents. The best we’ve managed is to plant marigolds with our food, and make liberal use of something that’s pretty much pelletized mace (Havahart Critter Ridder works pretty well).
Part of this week’s lettuce crop, before RatGirl harvested it. No particular reason to post it-- growing winter lettuce here in San Diego is not a major achievement-- I just thought it looked pretty!
To give some sense of what climate change can do, we currently have snowdrops AND tulips above ground, but crocuses and daffodils are nowhere to be found.
Normal order: first snowdrops, then crocuses, then daffodils and hyacinths, then tulips and grape hyacinths, then bluebells, then irises and lilies.
I saw a garden completely covered with snowdrops and crocuses this morning, and our tulips and daffodils are showing leaves but no flowers yet. It never got cold enough to kill our salad plants this winter though.
Just got my little seed tray going under the T…5? T7? lights, and the ones that have sprouted appear a little stringy to me. First time doing indoor gardening without a great whopping huge sodium vapor lamp sucking away my hard earned cash and I’m feeling a little bit like Tim the Toolman Whatever looking at these skinny little tubes. MORE POWER!!! Even though that’ll probably kill the little things, right?
Of course, I haven’t owned a sodium vapor lamp for many years now b/c it just doesn’t feel right growing stuff anywhere except under the sun (other than mushrooms and the like, of course).
EDIT: I think the daffodils are about 8-10 inches high right now…if they’re daffodils…
Do you have any south-facing windows? You should only need grow lights in February if you have one of these, unless you live north of the 45th parallel.
Don’t fret too much about legginess right now. If you have a spare fan that you can turn onto the plants for a few hours each day, this will help correct the issue. Also, get them outside as soon as it’s possible to leave them out all night. By the time they go in the ground, the leggy issue should be mostly worked out. By end of summer, you won’t be able to tell the difference between your seedlings and a greenhouse purchased plant.
I do have some south-facing windows, but they’re in the living room that was just gussied up with paint and couches and all that jazz, so my seed tray was moved elsewhere to make way…and will now be moved right back to where it was.
I went ahead and embraced the timing/plan in my John Jeavons book–I’ve got broccoli (Romanesque and Calabrese), cabbage, three or four lettuces, Brussels sprouts, and a few other things starting early so they’ll hit the ground running in the Spring garden (if everything lives, that is).
How about fertilizer? Anything I should add to the garden other than cured compost?
Goodness, I wouldn’t start any of those things inside. I hope you live in zone 6 or south because if you’re going to start those indoors, they need to be in the ground 6 weeks later, no exception. They’re going to be leggy. If you’re not sure about your soil, I’d recommend getting it tested. Compost is a good, general amendment, but it won’t make up for soil that’s too acidic or too basic.
What I start indoors are peppers near the end of February (I’m in zone 5) and tomatoes near the end of March. I start marigolds at the same time as peppers. I haven’t had great luck starting any other stuff indoors or found much need. Things either end up too leggy to be viable (broccoli) or take off too soon (pumpkins, cucumbers, melons). If you’re pretty close to the end of your average frost window, you should just plant those things outside directly.
Baltimore used to be 6, now it’s considered 7a, either way, those plants will absolutely be in the ground around the beginning of April (I think 4/6 is my schedule for planting the stuff started indoors). And I do have a soil test waiting to be used–I’m planning to do that as part of the double-dig (itself coming up in a weekend or two).
Last year I used, IIRC, something like a 1-1-1 (maybe a 5-5-5 at most) fertilizer weekly, without any noticeable issues with yield or growth rates. I found a 10 lb bag of kelp meal for cheap over the winter at my once-favorite and now-closed gardening store, so I’m planning to use that in much the same fashion.
Left the garlic sprouting, probably invisible at the phone photo. But believe me, they do
The garden looks a bit boring now, but I’m about the greens + a lot of flower and herbs growing together. In a few months it will be a kind of wilderness. But I need the squares because of annual growth, you just need to grow every year something else/an other base green at a different place. (edit) “Rotating the crops” I just read/learned to be the correct expression. Thanks @waetherman.
Today a late walk in the woods, score: a owl, 2 deer, one hedgehog, a few pheasant, a lot of northern birds. No wild boar today, but they are also often seen by us. But now, in spring, you need to be carefully with them.
Not all, this is only the ‘greenery’. Kind of fresh, a few years ago it was ‘meadow’, so, say, grass. We do have a lot of grass. More than you want to know. ( I mean for not farming people, but for the other hectares we ask farmers to put on cows or use it for the hay. Don’t forget we make our money upon north, and are only here in weekends and holiday )
I started at first do some work around the house, flowers, and more flowers, but that is an other part of the property. After that, this:
But ok, some picks from this new greenery
Rambling…, sorry but when seeing that picture something strook me. Memories…
It looks all nice and green and open I see in the pictures. The greenhouse(cold) is relatively new. Long before there was a big greenhouse. The vines on the left where probably in it. I only found the fundament of it, but the vines stand on ‘the inside’ and are of a type which only gives fruit in a very very good summer when grown outdoors.
But I kept them, old and a complete surprise when found. That whole area was a complete (northern) wildernis with shoots and seedlings from the woods on the other side of the ‘road’. Brambles, nettles and that kind of stuff.
After five years now I still make regularly a round with a knive, cutter and digger. The theory: ‘no leaves, no roots, no roots, no leaves’. If its a not working theory, it’s still a very nice mantra when doing that handscratching round.
