May in the Garden

At the beginning of May, it's time to check in with the outside garden. 

According to the schedule, the Spring garden should be in full swing.  Seedlings we planted in late March and April should now be reaching maturity and in the process of being harvested.

For the Red Romain and Buttercrunch lettuce, that is definitely the case.  I did a series of plantings about a week apart, and the earliest plantings are fully mature and ready for harvest.  In fact, I have harvested outside leaves as well as one whole heads of buttercrunch.  The red and white radishes have been plentiful as well.  Growing beside them, the onions have leafed out and are holding their own.  Their height is allowing them to thrive, even though the lettuce is crowding them at the base.

The other bed was planted later, with Bok Choi, Swiss chard and Garlic.  Despite  later start, the Bok Choi have grown tremendously from their seedling stage and have put on plenty of major leaves in a short amount of time.  Both of these beds have been mulched with grass clippings to retain moisture and help with weeds.

At the far end of the bok choi bed, I've already planted three peppers and two basil.  While they are not suffering at all, they aren't actually growing and putting on any new leaves, either.  The truth is that the weather is still too cool for summer crops, or has been until recently.  While we've had pleasant days in the 70s, we've had just as many days in the 50s and nights in the 40s.  All the peppers can do is sulk and hopefully develop their root structure.

The general guideline is that summer crops like peppers and tomatoes really won't do much in the garden until after Memorial Day.  That's the  marker for putting in tomatoes.

Inside, the summer seeds have all germinated, but they are proceeding at different rates:

The roma and cherry tomatoes have exploded with growth and are ready to be transplanted into pots.   The peppers are taking their time, as are the big boy slicing tomatoes, who wish the roma would go away and give them some light.  On the right, the basil are holding their own, but in between are some seedling big boys.

At the other end, the peppers have sprouted along with the ground cherries, both of which are growing with modest enthusiasm.

Planting Summer

Just a quick note that I started the seeds for the summer garden in the propagator today, April 21st.

The seeds were:

• Anaheim Pepper
• Carnival Sweet Pepper
• Cascabella Pepper
• Ground Cherry
• Basil
• Cherry Tomato
• Roma Tomato
• Better Boy Tomato

For my raised beds, I only need three of each pepper and tomato, but I planted 5 of each, in case something happens.  I will plant all 5 basil and ground cherry, if they all germinate.

I continued to harvest another cabbage today for dinner.  I added it to the pineapple teriyaki chicken, where it was delicious.  These very successful red cabbages are making way for the tomatoes I've just started.  I'm looking for them to be ready in 6-8 weeks.

Below are the former residents of the Aerogarden, now growing in pots under the lights:

Strawberries

I've been talking about a perennial strawberry bed for a while and this past Sunday I finally got my start.  I had the middle bed basically dormant under a tarp this past winter, and I had planted nothing in it all last year. This spring it was ready for the strawberries. 

At the same time, a new load of compost was ready in the tumbling composter, So i was pleased that I got to use it on this application.  I also amended the soil with organic fertilizer and bone meal.  I planted 5 plants on 2-foot spacing, removing any flowers or fruits to allow the plants to establish well and hopefully get fruit next spring.  The variety I planted was called Eversweet and it is supposed to be everbearing.

Finally, I mulched it with a mixture of mostly mulched pine straw and a few hardwood leaves.  I ran the mower over it and collected it in the bag to chop it up a little before applying. I went with a good thick layer, to help hold soil moisture and prevent weeds.   When the time comes to root the runners, I will have to clear away a little of the mulch to let the runners actually touch the soil.

The area in the back will be used for the Ground Cherries, which are more of a summer crop, like tomatoes.  I am starting them from seeds in the propagator now and they should be ready to plant out in May.

Friday Update: April 17th

Today was a mix of the front yard and the back:

In the front yard, I weeded the front bed with the Japanese maple.  Then I put down two bags of mulch.  The entire front bed will take about 5 bags but my style is to get a good start on it and then use my progress to estimate how many more to get.  This keeps me from buying too many, but it means that I can't get the job done all at once.

Also in the front yard I put down weed and feed mixed with Milorganite organic fertilizer.  Because milorganite is pelletized and very dry, it makes a very good dispensing medium for other materials that have a tendency to clump.  As an organic fertilizer, it is almost impossible to over-apply.

In the Back yard.  I mulched the upper bed with grass clippings, finally.  I had been waiting to mulch it until most of the squares had come up.  I was hesitant to bury my tiny radish seedlings and make it much harder for them to reach the sunlight.  Now that most things are well established in the upper bed, it is much easier to mulch around them. 

The mulch will hold in the moisture, and in celebration I watered both the upper and lower beds.

I uncovered the middle bed and got it ready for planting.  I'm going to start with three strawberry plants on the uphill side of the bed.  The taller ground cherries will be going behind them so they don't block the sun. 

I'm working on two resolutions this summer.  One is to not leave projects half-done.  Like the mulch in the front bed; rather than waiting one or two weeks to finish mulching, instead, just go ahead and buy the mulch and put it out.  Then it will be finished and I can move on to other things.   It seems that I have a psychological issue with finishing things.  I feel more comfortable with things "mostly-done" and I'm not sure why.

The other resolution is to leave the yard in a clean state. I need to get in the habit of putting things away, putting tools away, putting materials away.  Don't leave trash out in the yard.  Don't leave hand tools or even power tools out overnight.  Don't leave waste wood or old concrete blocks lying around the job site after they have been used.  Instead, put them away by the shed so they won't end up broken or in the way.

Focusing on the Fruit Trees

I've written down a distillation of my approach to fruit trees and keeping them small.  Now I need to apply that principle to the actual fruit trees in my garden.

I'm starting with the two dwarf apple trees, since they seem to have the most potential.  Both get plenty of sun and have a small form factor that will allow them to be cared for properly.  In the last few years, they have been neglected and run wild, a bit.  So I basically need to start with first principles and set them back on the right track.

These two trees flowered in the first two weeks of April.  One has set fruit, and the other is still in flower. 

Step One.   The first thing I needed to do was correct some obvious problems with the overall growth of the tree.  Both of the trees had a wild hare branch that went shooting straight into the air like a water spout.  These obviously had to be removed.

• Remove all water spouts.  
• Remove all suckers growing from the base or from the trunk below 18".
• Remove all dead wood and broken branches.  
• Remove weak branches hanging from the bottom of the limbs.  
• Remove branches that are growing back toward the center or trunk.

Finally set the overall height of the tree.  The maximum height is six feet, though some trees would do better if they were even shorter.  Use your 6' rod to accurately measure the height at which to cut your leader.

Once complete, the tree immediately looked better.


Step Two.  In renovating the tree, identify the primary scaffold branches.  There should be 3 branches at each whorl or tier.  The lowest tier can have 3 or 4 branches as scaffolds.  These should be strong and extend at a 60 to 80 degree angle from the trunk.  All other branches that attach directly to the trunk should be removed.  It can help to mark these scaffold branches in some way to make it easier to go on.  Use flagging tape, hanging labels or even diluted latex paint.  Primary scaffolds are color coded to green.

These apple trees use a central leader profile.  (In this case, the central leader is clipped at 6 feet to limit the height of the tree so it is technically a modified central leader.)  The central leader profile usually has two tiers of scaffold branches.

Tiers should be at least 18" apart. So once you've identified  your 1st tier scaffold branches,  travel 18" to 24" up the trunk and identify a second tier or whorl of lateral branches.  The second tier should have only 3 scaffolds.  Once again, identify the three scaffold branches of the second tier and mark them in some way.

Using a thinning cut at the branch collar, remove any other branches from the trunk except the primary scaffolds you have identified.

The primary scaffold of the lower tier should extend 2 to 3 feet from the trunk, depending on the overall size of the tree.  One of my apple trees is a smaller one and more graceful, and a 2-foot scaffold is appropriate.  The tree pictured above is more vigorous and can support a 3-foot scaffold.  The scaffolds of the upper tier should be shorter than those below, usually 2 feet or less.

The drawing below shows a typical unpruned tree that is about 12 ft tall. (The lines represent 3-ft intervals)  For a commercial tree, 12 feet might be a good height, but for a backyard orchard, we need to trim the height of this tree at 6 feet, near the second line.  All the growth above that point is counter-productive.

Each of the yellow highlighted boxes shows the general location of the lower and upper tiers or whorls of branches.

 Keeping in mind that it is always challenging to represent a 3 dimensional tree in a flat drawing, look more closely at the first tier:

This drawing shows the four scaffold branches highlighted in green.  These are just the attachment points where the scaffolds meet the trunk.

As we look more closely at the lower right scaffold branch in the drawing, several things become clear.  The orange branches are too close to the trunk to be saved, and too long to be fruiting wood. They also hang below the horizontal, making the overall branch weaker. These orange branches will likely have to be pruned away with thinning cuts.

The yellow branch is not part of this scaffold branch; it belongs to a neighboring scaffold. Since it branches too close to the trunk and then immediately comes over and crosses the green scaffold, it likely just needs to be removed as well.

The extent of the green line shows a 24" length, so our scaffold can end anywhere just beyond that point.  That means that the magenta branch heading straight up is just not far enough along the scaffold to qualify as a secondary.  And, it's growing the wrong way and is crowding other branches.  Magenta needs a thinning cut to remove it.  The two blue branches at the transition are good candidates for secondaries. If this is a young tree, I would separate them with wooden spreaders.   Or, you could make a hard cut at the transition and prompt two new branches to grow.


Step Three. At the end of the primary scaffold, the limb should branch into two secondary branches.  If they are not already present, use a heading cut just beyond two suitable buds to stimulate this growth. If they are present, head the primary branch just beyond them.

As before, identify the two secondaries for each primary scaffold and mark them in some way.    Secondary branches are color coded to blue.

These two secondaries should extend from the primary another 24 -36".  Secondaries should be headed at that length.  Use your rods to accurately measure where this break should occur.  I the drawing above, one of the blue secondaries is rather long and probably needs to be headed back by several inches.  This cut may promote fruiting spurs to develop along it, but watch out for water spouts.

Secondary branches should not extend in height above the central leader, especially where it was cut at 6-feet.  You may need to trim the central leader annually; make sure your trim the secondaries as well to remain below this tip.

Step Four.
Growing laterally from the secondary scaffolds are other, shorter branches.  These are the source of your fruiting wood and may contain thickened spurs where your fruit will form.  Since you are completing your pruning in summer, you can easily see where fruit and flowers have formed on these fruiting branches.

Identify the fruiting branches and separate them from non-fruiting growth spouts.  Remove any that crowd other fruiting wood, or cross with them.  These fruiting branches should be 10-12" long but that may differ with the variety of your tree.

Thin the fruiting branches to have at least 6" between them, and head them so that they don't grow very long past their 10-12".  This fruiting wood should be unbranched, and not break up into smaller and weaker twigs.  It may form 1/2" fruiting spurs off of itself to hold the flowers and fruit.

Color this fruiting wood, that is actually bearing fruit, with a red paint wash.  Next year, we will trim off all new growth back to this growth ring, where the paint wash stopped.  Next year, as it bears fruit, we will give it a purple wash, and the following year, we will give it a blue wash. 

When fruiting wood has a blue wash, it means it has been in production for several years and we should then check it to make sure it is still strongly setting fruit.  If it is, we let it go another year, but if it drops off in productivity, we should cut it back and promote new fruiting wood to develop.

Step Five.
At this stage all the branches on the tree should be identified.  Anything that isn't immediately identifiable at this point should be pruned away.  The tree should be more compact, and yet the central area should be more open, allowing light and air to reach the center of the tree.

For this step, clear away all branches that were pruned from the tree.  Do not allow them to lie on the ground under the tree. Rake away any fallen leaves or remnants of fruit from last year.  You want to keep the site clean to prevent fungus and insects from finding a refuge to overwinter and renew their attacks.

With a mower, cut the grass beneath the tree very short.  Apply 4" of mulch under the drip line of the tree, leaving a bare ring around the trunk with no mulch.

The Bok Choi Destiny: Wednesday update

Today we worked with the bok choi and moved it past another milestone.  This is the bok choi and swiss chard that were started from seed back on March 29th.  They sprouted and grew in the aerogarden for two weeks until they were ready to transfer to peat pots under the grow light.

Once in the growing medium, they began the hardening process and after 5 days, the roots had expanded throughout the peat. The leaves had doubled in size and another set had been added.

These plants were eager and were ready to be planted out of their pots and into the garden soil.  With the aerogarden, things definitely grow faster than any other propagation method I've used.  Seeds germinate faster and the intense light and constant moisture makes the plants produce not only true leaves but extensive roots in just a week or so.  This means that they have a huge start when being potted up.

The lower bed had been prepared, and I had designed a dinner kit that consisted of two of these large leafy greens, along with two onions from sets as well as two garlic cloves and a strip of radish or turnip, planted with seed tape.

There are boxes for 12 of these small assemblages, and we filled all but two of them.  These two have all the seeds in place, but are waiting for the straggler chard to make it out of the aerogarden, through the growing -out pots and into the raised bed to complete it.

The final lower bed looks like this:

Of course only the live plants can be seen in this photo.  Note the craft sticks marking the corners of the planting square.

Once again, we've taken another small crop from seed to planting in the garden, completely obviating the need for started plants from Lowes.  Probably saved $16-$20 by starting them ourselves.  Of course, we'll have to see how they do over the next month. 

By May 15th, I will be thinking about beginning the harvest of the greens and radishes, replacing them with peppers.  The onions and garlic might stay in the ground over the summer, but we'll see where they end up.  Bok choi can last as long as 70 days to maturity, but baby bok choy are also delicious and tender after 50 days (less than 2 months). Certainly the radishes will be ready in less than 30 days and we will be ready to thin and replant as needed.

I also began harvesting the outer leaves of the buttercrunch and red romaine in the upper bed.  I picked a few from each plant to keep them from overshading the radishes, and thinned out the radishes as well for some more greens.  In the end, I had enough for a nice salad for two.

The earliest of these was planted-out at the end of March, so these have been growing for about 2-3 weeks.

In the Front Beds  In the front beds the walking onions look like they are ready to dig in and stay the course. There are 5 remaining who look like they will make a good show of it.

On the other side of the stairs, all 12 garlic sets have come up and are showing green fingers above the soil's surface.  Their companions are the sunchokes.  They, too, have been showing the very tips of green foliage.  I had seen 4 of these last Friday, and finally the fifth tuber reached the surface today, so it looks like all of the ones I planted have sprouted.


Looking Ahead
1.  With the bok choi out of the grow lights, it's time to move the rest of the greens into the pots now.  Even the beets and the broccoli, typically slower to develop, are ready to be re-potted. Potting the remaining seedlings will be the next task,

2.  With the propagator clear, it will be time to start a new round of seeds, this time the summer tomatoes, green peppers, green beans, and the rest.

Saturday Report, April 11th

This is an update to the plans I made in the last update.

1.  Repotting the Bok Choi and Swiss Chard.  

     I was able to transfer the seedlings out of the propagator and into 3" pots which are now growing under the grow lights.  For this group, I moved 9 bok choi and 6 swiss chard.

This is the same group taking a little afternoon sun, as I began the hardening off process.

I have three more chard that can be transplanted some time this week.  I though they could benefit from a few more days in the aerogarden released from the competitive pressure of their overgrown neighbors.  What this means, however, is that I am still 6 plants short of the 24 I need to fill the lower bed.  I'll go to the garden center and pick up a 6-cell pack of something appropriate to substitute.  I seeded 12 of each, but a few of the cells just didn't germinate or if they did, the plants were weak.  In the future, I should probably seed 15 cells (three rows) of each plant type, to make sure I grow enough.

2. Prepare the lower raised bed.

Out in the garden, the lower bed has been completely prepared for planting.  I weeded it, topped it with compost and then drew out my squares.  Into each of these squares, I will plant a single meal kit.  As you look at the markers, you will see the garlic on the left, the bok choi and onions in a diagonal pattern and the radish tape in a line between them

I repeat this pattern down the length of one side of the raised bed.  This photo was taken after I had done an initial planting.

Here's the story:  The bok choi and chard I repotted earlier are destined to be planted in this bed.  But, they still have a week, at least, of growing out and hardening before they are ready to be put in the garden.

However, I have plenty of onion sets, garlic bulbs, and radish seed tape ready to be planted right now.  So, I decided to plant all of those in the garden except for the big greens.  This will give the onions and garlic a week or more to break dormancy, and for the radishes to germinate before the chard and choi make an appearance.

Since all of these are planted below ground, I left some stakes in the ground to remind me of where to plant the greens when they arrive.

3.  What's Next?

A.  I still have many onion and garlic sets.   The next step is to prepare the other side of the bed the same way, waiting for their companions.

B.  I know that I will need to buy a single 6-cell pack, so I might as well go ahead and buy that and put it in right away.

C.  The upper bed is fully planted, for the moment, so it is ready to be mulched with grass clippings when I mow.

D.  I also have rows in the propagator standing empty.  It is time to reset those cells and start some of the summer crops in them.  Peppers might be a good place to start.

I want to put the broccoli and beets into the upper bed, into the space occupied by the winter cabbage.  Those two are slower growing than the eager greens, which means an extra week in the propagator and an extra week growing out in the pots.  However, that still means that some of them will be ready to put in the garden in three weeks.  It may be time to harvest the winter cabbage.

4.  Food for Thought
The middle bed is ready for strawberries.  I need to plant them next.  There is literally no need to wait, except that I don't want to feel rushed or pressured to do gardening.  If currently I have plenty of things to do to occupy my gardening time, then the strawberries may wait.

The skeleton of the hoop house needs to come down, and something needs to be done with the beautiful apple trees.

• Mowed underneath,
• Mulched
• Fertilized
• Sprayed?
• Pruned
• heading cuts to limit height
• thinning cuts to reduce the tangle.
• Need to be protected with some kind of netting

Garden update: April 10th

By the end of the first week in April, we are well into the Spring garden.  All danger of frost is past for this area, and that is certainly the case this year.  However, it is still too chilly for high summer plants like tomatoes, peppers, and zucchini.  Put in now, those plants will basically sulk until the middle of May.  On the other hand, spring vegetables like lettuce and bok choi are in their prime.

Today, the high will be 55 F. and breezy.






In the Garden.  Outside, I have harvested the last of the green cabbage and replaced them with the salad meal kit plantings: red and green lettuce, radishes, and onions.  The image below shows two meal kit plantings:

 

 Now, I have the happy task of harvesting the red cabbage, 1 per week.  This should allow small secondary heads to grow, permitting a final round of harvests before they are done.  The radishes need to be thinned while I harvest a few leaves for a salad.

Inside, the seeds I planted in the Aerogarden 10 days ago are coming up strongly. The bok choi and swiss chard are clearly ready to be transpanted out of the propagator.  If I wait any longer, their roots will be too long and entangled, and I will actually lose progress by pruning them back as I remove them.  At the same time, they are already competing strongly for space in the light and are beginning to overcrowd their neighbors.

The key to success with the Aerogarden as a propagator is to know when to move on; to know when to begin the transition.  Things are growing so well in there now, that it seems a shame to break up the party.

These bok choi and swiss chard seedlings could go longer, but those in the middle would grow spindly and weakened from crowding.  The choi are starting to shoulder the chard aside.

I will start moving the bok choi into paper pots for a week, and begin the hardening process.  Next week they will be ready to be planted out.

Released from the competition of the choi, the chard will also be ready for the paper pots soon after.



The other end of the propagator is more of a puzzle.  Here I have the combination of broccoli and beets.  Both have developed nice and strong true leaves.

I don't want to wait too much longer to put the beets directly into the ground.  I won't be paper potting them.  So after I'm finished with the chard, as mentioned above, I will move the beets outside. 

However, the broccoli could benefit from another week's worth of development before being potted on.  All in all, that gives me two pleasant weeks of indoor gardening to look forward to .

Seeding for the Summer Gardening
With the plan in place to move the spring garden plants out of the propagator, that means it will be time to start the seeds for the warm summer garden:  It's time to start the tomatoes, peppers and all the rest.  I have to keep in  mind that I don't need 12 tomato plants or 10 zucchini. I will be more careful in seeding, while still starting a few extra so I can select the best ones to transplant.


 
Front Beds
Outside, the front beds haven't moved much.  I think the Egyptian onions are starting to take hold. It hasn't been easy for them






  The sunchokes have sprouted and I'm seeing the first shoots breaking the surface of the ground.  I was waiting to see how they would grow before planting my garlic. However, the garlic is sprouting now and it may be time to get started.

Checking in with the garden at the beginning of April

Each month, I need to check in with the garden.  I have a list of things that need to be done each month, but this is a check on what I've actually accomplished.

Inside:
Aerogarden.  My Aerogarden produced a crop of lettuce, which I have planted in the Aquaponic garden as well as outside. I also harvested quite a few leaves for salads along the way.  As always, germination was 100% and there was prolific root and leaf growth for the variety of lettuces.

At this stage, I have re-planted the aerogarden with the seeds I need to transfer to the garden outside.  Spring crops include Bok Choi, Swiss Chard, Broccoli greens, and Beets.  These have sprouted but not uniformly:  after one week: 50% of the beets failed to sprout, 7 of the 10 Broccoli sprouted, but all of the bok choi and all but 2 of the Swiss chard.

So phase 1 is still a general success and I'll continue to hold out hope for the stragglers.  The great thing about the aerogarden is that if you set it up correctly and you will definitely get some useful results.  This is far more certain than previous experiences with jiffy pots or direct seeding.  What this means is that in about 2 weeks, I will have started plants that are ready to plant outside.

Aquaponic Garden.  The aquaponic  garden was producing very well but then began to get a little spindly.  I realized two things.  First, the 30" light I was using simply wasn't large enough and I replaced it with a 48" led light.

The other thing I learned was that the amount of fish that I had in the tank weren't producing enough nitrate to satisfy the plants.  Nitrate testing was always at zero, and still the plants had yellowing leaves indicating a nitrogen deficiency.  I added three more gourami to the tank to up the ammonia production slightly and then I'll see how the nitrate test and the plants in the grow bed react.

Front Beds  The intention was to plant more edible permaculture in the front yard.  To that end, I did three things.  First, I planted the walking onions in the front bed, behind the Japanese Maple.  That bed was enhanced with compost first and then I had about 9 viable onion starts that I put in.  Some of these didn't thrive, but I think that about 6 of them have taken hold.  Theoretically, they should self-multiply and will fill in for the plants I lost.

On the corner bed by the stairs, I cleared out all the mint and instead planted Jerusalem Artichokes.  This is another perennial and a prolific spreader that is hard to contain, hence the need to keep it in that particular raised bed.  The sunchokes are already in the ground and I intend to put a row of garlic in front of them.  We'll see how well suited they are as bedfellows.  The garlic is currently inside, sprouting.

Raised Beds  The cabbage in the raised beds are still growing strong.  The green cabbage never did do especially well, though they produced well enough. They had a tendency not to form heads and were susceptible to a fungus that rotted the leaves.  The red cabbage is huge and beautiful, so that I am hesitant to pick them and wonder what another month will do for them.

Where the cabbage has been harvested, I have replaced it with a Meal Kit garden of two lettuces (one red and one butter), Two onions, and a short row of radishes complete the meal kit.  Already the radishes have sprouted and some of the onions have started to grow, though others still seem dormant.

Structure  I have turned my compost boxes, and they seem to be working.  Some composting is happening.  In addition, I moved one box to the tumbler and have been trying to keep it moving.

However. the lower bed appears to have greater problems with underlying roots that need to be removed.  Also, the middle bed, where we were going to plant strawberries, is still covered with a tarp.  Nothing is stopping us from throwing off that old tarp, refreshing the soil underneath and then starting to plant my Strawberries first, followed by the ground cherries when the earth gets a little warmer.                                            

Overall, for the month of March, this seems very productive

Looking ahead to the current month of April:  in two weeks, and following, I will need to transplant spring seedlings outside, and start summer crops.  In order to do that, I will need to harvest those beautiful red cabbage in all their majestic splendor.  So now that the garden season has begun in earnest, its all about keeping the process working,  keeping the harvest coming, keep planting new meal kits where the old ones have been removed

Easy Aquaponics

This is just a quick glimpse at a very simple aquaponics system that  seems to be thriving.  The system has three components:
1. The standard aquarium underneath, stocked with dwarf gourami and zebra danios.  It has a standard power filter

2. A long, narrow grow bed approximately 6" deep and 40" long. A submersible pump is attached to the underside of the grow bed with a bulkhead fitting via a hose.  The pump is on a timer that floods the grow bed for 15 minutes every hour.  A second bulkhead fitting controls the upper limit of the water in the grow bed by allowing water to overflow and return to the tank below.

3. The grow bed is not completely filled with media.  Instead individual net cups or fabric baskets are filled with hydroton and topped with basalt river rocks.  This prevents the development of anaerobic zones and allows for minimal disturbance when managing the grow bed.

 

The net cups are planted with bok choi, red and green lettuce, basil, and green onions.  An LED grow light is positioned above the grow bed which is full spectrum (white) with additional red and blue LEDs.  The light is on a different timer.

2020 Garden Planner

In the list below, a * means that I haven't ordered it yet.

Throughout the year, we typically plant:

Spring Garden 
Lower Bed
Bok Choi  - seeds in inventory 12 plants
with Yellow onion (sets)  12 plants in inventory

Swiss Chard  seeds in inventory  12 plants
with green onions (seed tape) 6 feet seeds in inventory

Upper Bed
Lettuce  12 plants seeds in inventory
with Radishes (seed tape) 6 feet seeds in inventory
and Red onion (sets) 12 plants in inventory

* Broccoli Greens  6 plants
with  Beets 18 plants seeds in inventory


Summer Garden

Tomatoes - Lower Bed
Roma,  seeds in inventory - 3 plants
Cherry, seeds in inventory - 3 plants
Big Boy, seeds in inventory -3 plants
with Basil seeds in inventory - 3 plants

Peppers - Upper Bed
Bell,  seeds in inventory - 3 plants

with Nasturtium seeds in inventory seed tape

Jalepeno,  seeds in inventory - 1 plant

with Dill,  seeds in inventory - 3 plants
Sweet, seeds in inventory - 3 plants
*with Leeks - 6 plants
*Zucchini  2 plants  (at far end of pepper bed)
with Green Beans (bush type) 6 plants seeds in inventory

Middle Bed:
*Strawberries  - 6-8 plants
with Ground Cherries Ordered 4 plants

Front Bed:
Sunchokes Ordered 4 plants
with Walking Onion  Ordered 6 plants



Winter Garden
Upper Bed
*Cabbage, red and green 12 plants 
with Garlic (sets)  in inventory  12 plants

*Kale  6 plants
*with Parsnips  12 plants

*Rutabaga 6 plants
*with  Red Veined Sorrel  18 plants

Meal Kit gardening

My usual philosophy of gardening is "Fill the garden with plants," which is beautiful and satisfying but for me can quickly lead to the garden getting a little out of control, and things being neglected or not  harvested at the right time. Lately, I've been experimenting with an approach to organizing my gardening based around my principle of "Eat what you grow."

I call it Meal Kit gardening, and basically it means that you divide the garden into moderate units of space and then plant together in that space the things you want to harvest at the same time.  It's easiest to explain with an example. My winter garden has cabbage and garlic and onions.  Typically I would plant all the cabbages in one section and then group all the garlic in another section, and all the onions in a third group.  With a Meal Kit garden, I take a 2 x 2 foot section and plant one cabbage, two onions and two garlic.  During the spring, I make a schedule to harvest one of these meal kits per week, picking the cabbage, onions and garlic, adding some bacon and taking them right into the house for that nights dinner.

This does a few beneficial things for me.  First, because I assemble these Meal Kits from seedlings I started myself, it means I have to think about not only what is fun to grow, but how the things I grow will eventually be eaten.  It forces me to grow what I want to eat.  Second, all the vegetables I need are right in one area so I am sure to pick them all, and include them in the evenings dinner.

In addition, by harvesting the entire meal kit plot at once, I now have a good-sized empty space that I can fill with a new Meal kit. For example, the Cabbage Meal Kit will be replaced with a butter lettuce and a foot of radishes - a ready made garden salad for later in the spring.  The other way, I would pull one of the onions and it would simply leave a gap in the onion bed.  I couldn't fill it in until all the onions were gone. Now, I have a reasonable space that can be put to use right away.

It also naturally creates a schedule for harvest.  If I have 12 cabbages in 12 meal kits, that means that I will need to harvest one meal kit plot each week for the three months that they will be mature.  Yes, the first ones might not be quite mature, but certainly fresh and edible and can be added to other ingredients to round out the meal.

Finally, if I want to experiment with something new, I need to think about how it fits into the existing planting schedule, about how I am going to cook that new mustard green or rutabaga and what would go with it; what supporting cast of characters that helps turn a single iconic vegetable into an entire meal.

Spring Meal Kits:
1.  Two Bok Choi and two Yellow Onions.   Per 2x2 block.  Six blocks 

2.  Two Swiss Chard and one foot of Green Onion seed tape.  Per block.  Six blocks

3.  Two Lettuce, two Red Onion, and one foot of Radish seed tape.  Per block.  Six blocks

4.  One Broccoli green, and 1 foot of carrot seed tape.  Per block.  Six blocks


Summer Meal Kits
1. One Tomato plant and one Basil plant Per 3x2' block. 8 blocks

2. Two Pepper plants and one Nasturtium   Per 2x2 block.  Six blocks

3. One Zucchini and three Green Beans, bush type  Per 4x3' block.  2 blocks


Fall Meal Kits
1. One Cabbage and two Garlic   Per 2x2 block.  Twelve blocks. 

2. One Kale and two Parsnips   Per 2x2 block.  Six blocks

3. One Rutabaga and one Red-veined Sorrel  Per 2x2 block.  Six blocks


Now, there are objections to this method of gardening. 

The primary one  is that the vegetables in these meal kits all mature at different times.  The radishes will be sprung up and out of the ground by the time that the lettuce is ready, and at that time, the onions are just only getting started.

The answer to the first objection is to simply say that it's true.  The onions might be more of a green onion, and by picking it you are forgoing a much larger onion if it was harvested later in the Fall.  This efficiency is the sacrifice for a more dynamic garden, one that has more interest at all times of the year.  There is a story that illustrates one of my recurring garden failures. 

I sometimes get the urge to plant a long season crop, like cantaloupe.  I carefully tend it all through the hot summer, and just about the time that the melons are about to ripen, some fungus or insect infestation or flock of crows come in and damages the harvest.  The result is that I am very wary of plants that stand for a long time without being harvested.  I love vegetables that are "cut and come again" or that can be picked in an immature state like peppers and green beans and onions.  I don't have to wait for a perfect moment of ripeness, that may never come. 

My answer is to plant many vegetables and pick them over a long season.  Some may be immature but still delicious; others may stand too long and be slightly soft.  And many will be picked at the peak of perfection. 

The other solution to this objection, is to take some time to match companion plants that have similar maturation cycles as well as seasonal preferences.

January 2020 Gardening

January is a month of planning, of looking ahead throughout the gardening year.  Not much is happening in the garden right now, as the winter crops have basically become dormant even under the row covers.  They are gathering strength and quietly biding their time.  And so should we.

Start by checking the Gardening Tasks page for January 
You can copy whole sections of that page here and check them off as they are completed

Feeding the Beds

• Make sure the beds are well mulched, if there is any leaf mulch to be removed from the lawns.  
• Check the soil to see if any watering is necessary; only a minimum to prevent fungus.
• Prune back any brush and clear the vines from the base of the fence line.
• Prune the fruit trees
• Turn the compost boxes

Harvesting

I will not start harvesting my cabbage until next month, but it is encouraging that it is still growing under a double layer of row tunnel plastic.


January Cabbage on January 29th:

Planning

This is the month where you set out your plans for the coming year.  You look over what worked, what grew well, what you ate all of, and what you didn't care for.  Now you have to decide what you will plant this year.

We need to note where we planted last year, from your garden layout, for example, and then see how crop rotation can help with the coming season. We have three beds, so its a simple matter of rotating all the crops to the next bed over.

Next, we make a note of where we want everything to go, using the garden layout to document our decisions.  This is the tool we will use and refer to throughout the year so we don't have to continually re-invent this particular wheel every time we need to harvest something and re-plant.  It also reminds us that the wheel is continually in motion, and we have not just one crop but a series of seasons where crops must be eaten to make room for new ones.  So we will need at least three garden layouts, to cover the three growing seasons of the year.

Once we decide what to plant, and what space we have to plant it, we can order our seeds.  When ordering, we should place the order for the entire year.  Now, at the beginning of the year, the seed companies and garden centers are fully stocked and will have whatever you order.  Later in the year, they may well be out.  Seeds can be kept sealed in a ziploc in the refrigerator until they are ready to be sown.  (I just started some swiss chard from 2009.)

From the Supplier

This is a major task for January.  As outlined:

1. Decide what to plant
2. Decide where to plant - what section of the garden
3. Decide when to plant - consult the plant page for when to sow indoors
4. Decide how many to plant - this will tell you how many seeds to buy and to start.

As I figure out the answers to these questions, I fill them in on the 2020 Garden Planner

When the Garden Planner is complete, Place the Orders for seed and supplies.
This could be from online seed companies, or from Amazon, or from the seed racks at the garden centers or even Walmart.

Along with the seeds, you also need seed starting supplies like the grow plugs/pellets, liquid nutrients

  I plan to keep seeds for three years so it is very likely that I won't need to buy all these seeds every year. And some of these I may just buy as live plants from the garden center, because I can spend $2.99 on a package of seeds or $3.50 for the one cherry tomato plant I need.  Just replace the seeds that you will use as they are about to expire.

But ordering seeds in anticipation of the coming spring is an honored tradition among gardeners.  It is one that should be upheld.  Opening the package and holding the seed packets is like a second Christmas

Sowing in the Propagator

It may be too early to start most of the seeds, but the exception is Lettuce.  Next month, we will begin the harvest of the winter crops, and as we bring in the cabbage, we will need to have lettuce to set out in its place.  For next month, we will need 6 lettuce plants to be started now.

February 2020 Gardening

Despite the reputation for the previous two months, February is usually the coldest month.  In this area, we receive more snow days in February than January, so this is the harshest weather we're going to receive all year.  If we can make it through this month, we'll truly be in growing weather on the other side.

Indoors, however, it is another story.  We need to begin sowing seed in the propagator that will be ready in 6 - 8 weeks for the spring crop.  Cool weather spring crops run from March to May.  By June, the summer has truly arrived and we will need the garden beds for summer vegetables.

So that means that when March arrives, we need to be ready with seedlings of  Lettuce, Broccoli greens, Bok choi, and the other spring crops.  These need to have at least 4 weeks of growth on them by March.  That means February seeding.

Start by consulting the month by month February Gardening Tasks page to find the checklist of things to do this month.

Harvesting

Cabbage.  This cabbage has been slowly growing since last October, cautiously taking its time.  If we followed the plan, we should have 12 cabbages in some stage of immaturity, as well as 12 garlic planted in a row down the center.

In February, we need to start harvesting them, and we'll do that in two phases.  While full heads may not have formed yet, the outer leaves can be harvested one at a time.

• Phase 1 will be the "cut and come again" style of harvesting where we take a leaf or two from several plants - enough to make up a meal. 

These outer leaves are best used for frying, as in a bacon, cabbage, and garlic stir fry. or sliced thinly and added to Asian bowls like beef and cabbage.

We'll do that for at least two weeks or as long as the loose leaves last, pruning away the older leaves and leaving just the younger head.

Garlic.  Also assess the garlic at the same time, adding the garlic greens or the whole garlic depending on the state of development.

• Phase 2. By the middle of February, however, it will be time to start harvesting the whole heads, one at a time.  Harvest one whole head each week to use fresh in salads or cooked in stir fry.  Similarly, harvest one bulb of garlic.  With 12 heads, that will give us enough for three months of harvest and will take us to the middle of May.

When the heads are removed, replant the vacant space with lettuce and 3 radishes, which will be picked when all the cabbages have finally been taken.

Kale and Red Sorrel.   We have been harvesting individual leaves all winter as an accent for salad.  Now it is time to begin removing them entirely and replanting with Broccoli Greens.

 

Feeding the Beds

Cabbage:  Once you start the phase 1 harvest of the outer leaves, apply a side dressing of organic fertilizer and water well once.

Hardening and Setting Out

Lettuce :   The lettuce you sowed in January will be ready to be re-potted and move outside this month through a hardening process.  Make this transition very slowly and under row tunnels.

When you remove a cabbage, plant a lettuce and a group of direct-sown radishes in its place.  Use seed tape or high vis coated seeds for radishes and plant 6 in the group.

Sowing in the Propagator

For now, we are only focusing on the Spring garden plants; the cool greens.

This is the list copied from the 2020 Garden Planner.

Spring Garden 
Lower Bed
Bok Choi  - seeds in inventory 12 plants
with Yellow onion (sets)  12 plants in inventory

Swiss Chard  seeds in inventory  12 plants
with green onions (seed tape) 6 feet seeds in inventory

Upper Bed
Lettuce  12 plants seeds in inventory  Started Last month?
with Radishes (seed tape) 6 feet seeds in inventory
and Red onion (sets) 12 plants in inventory

* Broccoli Greens  6 plants
with  Beets 18 plants seeds in inventory

 

Bok Choi, 12 plants
Swiss chard, 6 plants
Lettuce, 12 plants
Broccoli greens, 6 plants
Beets, 12 plants (seed tape)

(Total is 36 plants in the propagator)

From the supplier:
Green (bunching) onion, 15 feet seed tape
Radishes, 15 ft seed tape
Red onions, 18 bulbs
Beets (seed tape)

In February, the propagator is busy preparing the seedlings for the spring garden.  These are all cool weather crops that will break away when the harsh temperatures are past by early March.  But to bring them in by the end of May, we need to be ready to go in March, which means sowing in February.

Tasks

•  Start the new seedlings in the propagator.  You will need the seed starting tray in the aerogrow as well as 36 grow plugs.
•  Prepare the seed tape for root vegetables 
•  Order any remaining seeds that are still on the list
• Turn over the compost boxes, transferring the contents from one to another.
• Purchase finished compost, if necessary, to fortify garden beds.

Landscaping

• This is the month for pruning branches around the yard.  
• Trim anything low hanging, crossed branches
• Thin out the canopy of shade trees so they don't kill the grass beneath
• Trim the brush and trees along the back fence.
• Mow into the woods to clear the needles from the pathways.

Aquaponics pilot project

Ever since I was about 12, I have kept an aquarium.  And from about the same age, I have helped my father work in the garden, until I was about 16 and started a garden of my own.  When they first came out several years ago, I got an Aerogrow hydroponic system and began to understand how effective it can be to grow plants indoors, as well as how modular and encapsulated it was.  That brought me back to my thought of designing a system that incorporated indoor gardening and aquarium keeping into one system that benefited both.  My research revealed that others had already done most of the work and perfected the concept and called it Aquaponics.

However, there were so many different ideas about the best way to accomplish this, and differing ideas about what the end result should be, and many of the voices were stridently opinionated so that the discussion created a lot of confusion where there ought to be clarity.  This is my initial attempt to bring clarity in my own mind.

The aquaponic system I am designing is based on my 75 gallon aquarium.  It consists of:

1. The aquarium and its own filter and light, with fish and plants.  The aquarium filter will process most of the waste solids before they can be pumped up to the grow bed.

• Clean existing gravel
• Continue cycling the  tank
• Start filtration
Replant two more plants

2. Above it rests a narrow grow bed full of growing media.  In my case I'm using hydroton.

• Plug un-needed drain holes
• Wash hydroton and begin soaking

Secure the grow bed on the top of the aquarium 

Position the grow bed in front and the aquarium light behind it.

May need to order another aquarium light. 

3. Nestled within the growing media are net cups with the individual plants rooted in coconut coir/hydroton mix.

• Acquire some herb/lettuce plants
• Secure their roots inside a coconut media, loose-weave grow bag
• Plant within a net cup filled with hydroton

4. A submersible pump moves the water from the fish tank up through a bulkhead fitting and floods the growing media as well as the plants' roots.

• Connect the pump and tubing to the grow bed
• Connect the return tubing to the overflow stand pipe
• Position a filter around the inflow to contain any solid waste
• Test the pump and mark the high water level

5. The pump is on a timer that runs for 15 minutes every hour.  The flow rate is adjustable but it is intended to fill the grow bed to an upper level set by the outfall stand pipe.  Additional water will return to the tank below through the outfall stand pipe.  When the timer cuts the power to the pump, water will flow back to the tank through the pump, draining the water out of the grow bed and allowing oxygen to the roots.

• Test the pump on the timer and adjust the flow rate as necessary
• Set up the timer program

6. A second led plant light is placed above the grow bed to give light to the growing plants.  The intention is to harvest the plants to keep them below the lights, although the height of the lights are adjustable.

• Determine a way to support the plant light
• Set up timer for plant light.
• Determine if plant light and aquarium light should be on the same timer.

 7.  Cautiously stock the aeroponic system

• Begin adding more plants and more fish and see if the system remains stable. 

Raised Beds

The why and how of making raised beds:

Why? 

• Allows you to grow anywhere. 

 Soil can  range from packed clay, to a layer of sand, to the concrete patio that takes up the whole of your backyard.  If you're dealing with the typical back yard in a suburban development, you're looking at deeply suboptimal ground that will take years, even decades, of hard work and amendment to make productive.  Typically, you would be dealing with the ground that the developer bulldozed flat to create a building site.  So you turn it with a shovel, or with a rototiller and then amend it with cubic yards of peat and compost for their organics, sand to reduce compaction, and possibly lime to address the pH issues.  In the meantime, you hope that a hydraulic leak or rinsing from the concrete truck hasn't permanently poisoned your soil.

After a decade or so of constantly feeding and reconstructing the soil, you have finally overcome the limitations of your backyard and developed a fertile garden.  And it is only then that realize that you would have been better off if you hadn't had to deal with the limitations of the packed clay ground your contractor left you, and had simply used the amendments as the growing medium to start with.  Any element of that packed clay simply limited your productivity, so why use any of it at all?  The truth is that you can start immediately with a rich, productive garden, and eliminate the uncertainty.

This is especially true if you are unfortunate enough to have a concrete back yard or one that was packed gravel or a parking area where no soil at all exists.  You will be building your garden above ground and that can rest directly on a paved platform

How:
Let's start by taking a minute to asses the situation.  You need to find the location in your yard that gets the most sun throughout the day.  Avoid being too close to fences and trees that shade your garden late in the day                                                                                                                    .  You need to level the site.  If you are vulnerable to burrowing mammals, you may need to line the bottom of your raised bed with hardware cloth.

We are going to work with a raised bed that is 4 feet by 8 feet.  For our first year, we will make it out of 2x8s and it will only be one level high. You can use 2x6s for a more economical approach, or 2x10s for greater volume.  In subsequent years, we can add additional layers of 2x8s to increase the depth of the raised bed.  We will also dig down into the existing soil by 4-6" inches, giving us 10" of growing medium.  We can accomplish this simply by digging down one shovel depth and turning the sod over so the grass is on the bottom.

Next some quick math:  A raised bed of 4' x 8' by 6 inches has a volume of 16 cubic feet.  A typical bag of garden soil is measured in cubic feet, or 20 - 25 quarts.  And, there are about 25 dry quarts in a cubic foot so each bag of soil is approximately 1 cubic foot.  We need 16.  As an example the garden center has "garden soil" at $6.77 for 2 cubic feet.  We'd need 8 bags to fill the bed, for a cost of about $55.00, which is manageable if a little high. 

One recipe for filling a raised bed is:

• 4 bags (2 cubic feet each) topsoil
• 1 bale (3 cubic feet) compressed peat moss
• 2 bags (2–3 cubic feet each) compost or composted cow manure
• 2" layer of shredded leaves or grass clippings as a mulch layer on top. 

However, you may have other sources of soil around your yard including leaf mulch and compost.  A way to cut down the total volume is to begin by filling the raised bed with leaf litter, grass clippings and even small branches about 1/3 of the way and then layering your purchased garden soil on top.  After a year of being on the bottom of a working garden bed, the organic base layer will break down into compost.

A Step-by-step Resurgent Garden

This is a gardening letter to myself:  My gardening enthusiasm waxes and wanes with the years.  Some years, I go all out and the garden produces in abundance, and other years life intervenes and I don't have time to put into a really successful garden.  Some years, I never get started and the garden sits fallow.  But inevitably, that urge to grow, to nurture and plant overtakes me again and I wonder where to begin.

So this guide is an overview of the successful steps I've taken in the past to make my garden work.  If I tell myself this all in one place, I don't have to re-invent the wheel, and re-learn the knowledge all over again.  Below, I've gathered 8 steps that I need to consider.  The purpose is to create links to a more in-depth exploration of each topic, so this is really an index, of sorts, for further research.  I need to have a way to supply each of these pieces

I've divided the list into two categories:  Planning and Structure.

Planning includes the informational pieces:

• What to plant - Plant Selection, Perennials vs Annuals
• When to plant - Frost dates, crop rotation and succession planting

Structure are all the physical pieces of the garden.

• Raised beds
• Compost and soil enhancements
• Seed starting, Transplants
• Row covers and low tunnels

So, my future self,  its January, and you're determined that you will have a garden this year. What do we need to do to get started?

1.  Frost Dates

It helps to plan your garden around a schedule.  Doing things at the right time means less work and better results.  But the schedule is not the same for every part of the country.  Instead it is set by the frost dates in your area.  There are two frost dates in every year:

• The Last Frost is the date in the Spring when freezing temperatures are no longer expected; technically, below a 30% probability.
• The First Frost is the date in the Fall when the probability of freezing temperatures climbs over 30%.

These dates are readily available on the web.  Bonnie Plants has one, as well as the Farmer's Almanac
 
For my area, the last frost in the Spring is March 28th while the first frost in the Fall is expected on November 18th.

So how do we use these dates?    Let's take Radishes, as our example.  A typical seed packet will say, "For a spring planting, sow seeds 4–6 weeks before the average date of last frost."  If my last frost is March 28th, then I could be sowing radish seeds in late February or the first week of March.

"Sow seeds 4–6 weeks before the first fall frost."   Since my first frost date is November 18th, I could sow radishes as late as mid-October and still get a reasonable harvest.

So we set the clock by the frost dates.  Note that they don't start the clock; many thing should happen before then so that the process is already in motion when the garden kicks into high gear.

2. Plant Selection

Often when people think of gardening, they envision a summer activity with tomatoes and cucumbers, but the garden can be productive in most months of the year with the proper planning.

However a productive garden is one that is not only green but produces the things that you want to bring to your dining table.  It only makes sense to plant what you will eat.  I say that by sowing, I am making a promise to the plants that they will be harvested and enjoyed as part of our regular meals.  So plant selection needs to be given some thought.

To some gardeners, the garden is a field of experimentation, with various cultivars and new variants to try each year.  I used to wander up and down the aisles of my Home Depot garden center, looking at the racks of Bonnie Plant seedlings, envisioning what I want to bring home, and seeing what new exotic offering caught my eye. 

Lately, my approach to my garden is that I want it to be productive. I want to plant something that will produce reliably and in abundance with consistency and efficiency.  While I appreciate the beauty of the living system, I also want to devote my time to something that can feed my family as well.

I need to find out which lettuce produces the best for my climate and day length and temperature, and then plant that variety year after year for a consistent yield. For now, I need to be aware of what variety I'm planting, how it performs, and how much I like the taste and texture of what it produces.

In addition, I like to create a page for each specific plant that I grow.  Remember that I only have a limited number of plant types that I work with so it makes sense to know as much as possible about each one.  This includes my own experiences from year to year.  I also include how I'm going to prepare that vegetable for eating, so I have an idea before I plant it.  Eat what you plant and plant what you will eat.

3. Succession Planting and Crop Rotation

At this point, many new gardeners' eyes begin to glaze over, but this is a simple concept that makes the best use of space, limits disease, and balances nutrients.  Basically, what we are doing is dividing our garden into three categories based on the type of production of our plants.  The tree categories are:

• Roots
• Leaves
• Fruits

Each type of vegetable pulls the same kinds of nutrients from the soil and creates an environment for the same kinds of diseases.  Plants that mostly are grown for their leaves (like lettuce, cabbage) tend to deplete the soil of nitrogen, root crops need phosphorus and potassium, while fruiting plants (such as tomatoes, and peppers) need a balance of the three.

The simple solution is to divide your garden into three sections where each type will be planted.  Then "rotate" the crops by planting the root crops where the fruit crops used to be last year.  The fruit crops will be planted in last year's leaf crop areas; and the leaf crops will no be planted in the root crops area.

At the same time, planting tomatoes in the same location year after year will allow tomato diseases to persist in the soil and more readily attack the plant in subsequent seasons.  By planting carrots there next year instead of more tomatoes, the tomato diseases have nothing to thrive on and so diminish.

I aim to support three plantings in the garden:  The season starts in March or April when the earliest of the cold hardy Spring greens are sown.  This is followed by the basic tomato, pepper, and zucchini planting of Summer.  Finally, I put in a Fall and Winter rotation starting in about September.  These will start well and some of these will lie in the garden over the winter, harvesting cabbage in January and February.  The last of it will be out and eaten in time for the Spring when the cycle begins again.

In order to achieve that, I need to begin a more regular record keeping system, rather that relying on notes I've jotted down or breezy, "top of the head" posts.  My suggested system is to create a calendar with all of the activities that are useful for a given month.  What am I supposed to be doing in my garden in April (for example):  what am I sowing indoors into my propagator, what am I hardening off, what am I setting outside, what am I feeding in the raised beds, and what am I harvesting.  At any given moment, I could be doing any or all of these things.  

Early Spring:   Bok Choi, Rutabaga, spinach, parsnip, broccoli raab, radish, Kale, chard
Summer:  Tomatoes (cherry, beefsteak, Roma), Peppers (jalepeno, green bell, sweet red), Zucchini, Eggplant
Fall:   Cabbage (red and green), Red veined sorrel, carrots, parsnip,

 

4. Perennials

Typical garden vegetables are grown as annuals, started from seed each year and then removed when they are done.   However some produce, including many fruits, are better grown from plants that persist for many years, producing harvests year after year. 

 

5. Raised Beds

The quality of soil in your backyard varies widely from location to location.  You may have a deep loam soil in an older neighborhood, or you may have 2" of topsoil over a hard clay.  For this garden we are going to bring in much of our growing medium and fill a raised bed above the surface of the ground.  Raised beds have many advantages, including giving you control over the soil composition, but also in greatly reducing soil compaction, which is one of the enemies of your garden. 

A more aesthetic reason is that raised bed gardens have the benefit of looking more elegant and better managed.  A typical backyard garden has a tendency to look a little unkempt and ragged, a little uninviting.  The raised bed keeps things carefully constrained and manageable.

Anyone can build a raised bed garden anywhere of exactly the size that fits their needs and space, and keep it neat and manageable.

Refer to this page for more discussion about Raised beds

6. Compost

So you start a new raised bed garden, and the first year it is tremendously successful.  Everything grows and the produce is impressive.  So you plant again next year, with nearly the same success, though not quite as much to show for it.  And the third year, your plants seem to lack the spark of the first season and some of them fail to thrive at all.  You get a few heads of lettuce and a few tomatoes, but you begin to question if a garden is really worth the trouble.  In the fourth year, you decide not to bother...  What was happening?

As you grow in your garden, the vegetables that you harvest gradually consume the fertility of your soil.  If you want to maintain that level of productivity year after year, you must return the nutrients to the soil while maintaining the proper composition and soil structure  Ultimately, you will need to make amendments to the raised bed every year to maintain fertility and consistency.

To maintain healthy soil in a raised bed, you need to add 3-4 inches of organic material each year.  Ideally, this will come from your own compost, and will require two of the 18 gal compost tubs of finished compost for each 4' x 8' raised bed, along with grass clipping mulch in Summer and shredded leaf mulch in the Fall.

If you don't end up composting your own, you will need bags of commercial compost from the garden center for each 4'x8' bed.  Either option is completely viable, but you have to use some combination of these sources to replenish your gardens productivity.

Rather than using an oversized compost heap or an expensive compost tumbler, we are going to start with plastic storage tubs as our composter.  I use ordinary 18 gal, rectangular plastic tubs, which measure about 18 x 24 inches on the lid.  You can find these at any Walmart but they are commonly at thrift stores as well.

7. Seed Starting

Many seeds will achieve the greatest success both in germination and later production, if you start them indoors for a few weeks before planting them as a seedling in your garden.  You can achieve this effect very simply by buying your live plants from the garden center, as is common with tomato and pepper plants.

However, you can achieve the same effect yourself with a home seed starter or propagater.  These systems can be as simple as a Jiffy pot set on a heat mat, or they can be very elaborate and control light, moisture, and temperature to optimize your success.

Starting your own seeds allows you to control what to plant, and when, since the Walmart garden center isn't going to stock red-veined Sorrel in January when you want to start it. It prevents the vain hoping that what you were looking for, the cool jalepenos, the Japanese eggplant, still happened to be available when you got there.

The most effective system for seed starting is the Aerogrow system.  However, if the goal is to transplant the seedlings into the garden, they need to go from the soilless hydroponic system to a grow medium that can be planted out in the raised beds.  And they can't stay in the aerogrow for too long because they will develop extensive roots that will be pruned away when they are transplanted. 

The best schedule is to grow them for 2 weeks after germination, and then transfer them to potting soil in the garage where the temperatures will match the outside.  Another two weeks in the grow medium will acclimate them and develop the roots necessary to put them in the garden.

Seed starting is an important component in the overall system.

 

8. Row covers and hoop houses.

 In most places, the temperatures allow for a productive growing season between the last and first frost dates and that limits what you can plant and how long you can grow.  However, covering the garden beds with plastic can keep a killing frost at bay for several weeks, allowing you to start earlier in the Spring and harvest later in the Fall.  It can turn a one-season garden into a three-season garden.  For the little effort it requires, it can produce a tremendous reward. 

 

Start the Clock

Each of these eight elements I've just mentioned fits together into an interconnected garden system that when working properly increases your garden's productivity and your satisfaction.  Your garden is properly envisioned as an ongoing system where each element supports and feeds into the others.

1. Early in the year, you begin preparing the garden beds for the growing season, harvesting the last of the winter crops, cleaning away weeds and amending with compost so that they will be ready when they are needed.
2. You might consider building winter structures like row tunnels to give you an extended growing season or protect from unexpected late frosts.
3. You start with your plant selection, knowing which plants grow best in your area and which you enjoy eating the most. You locate and order fresh seeds for this growing season, or use some that you've saved.
4. The garden planner tells you which beds you will plant your selections into, rotating crops to avoid disease and depleting nutrients
5. Consulting your frost dates, your garden planning tells you when you can set the selected plants out into the garden, 
6. Working backwards from the set out date, you start the seeds indoors in your propagator to have them ready at the right time.
7. When the seedlings are ready, based on frost dates, row covers and their own hardiness, the spring plants are set into the garden and begin to produce.  As the caretaker, you monitor for weeds, disease and insects.
8. As the spring and summer progress, the garden is mulched with grass clippings to return productivity to the garden soil and organic fertilizer is used with heavy feeding plants like tomatoes.  Row covers are removed or replaced with insect netting.
9. As the spring plants, like lettuce and spinach, mature, they are harvested and brought to the dinner table. Remember that most spring crops will bolt when temperatures increase, so plan to harvest them on a regular schedule so the beds are empty for the Summer crops.
10. In the meantime, you are looking for succession plantings and what will replace these plants when they are done. Spring lettuce and radishes will be replaced with tomatoes and zucchini
11. New seeds are started in the propagator in anticipation of being needed later
12. As the crops are harvested, new plants from the propagator are brought out to replace them.
13. Compost boxes prepared last Fall and Winter are turned and evaluated for being added to the beds as a top dressing. 
14. When summer crops are done, but while there is still some warmth in the fall, cool season winter crops are being prepared for the fall season.  Again referencing the first frost date, seeds are started with plenty of time for them to grow indoors, and then also be set out in the beds with several weeks of development before cooler winter temperatures limit growth.
15. Some of the more frost tolerant kale and cabbage will overwinter under row tunnels, giving a taste of the garden all winter.  The plastic row tunnels are prepared and installed in early November, again based on frost dates.
16. Also in October, fall leaves are shredded and gathered to be used as mulch in the fall months.
17. After the beds are mulched, more shredded leaves and trimmings from the garden beds are used to refill the compost boxed