Lots of Stuff Planted

I probably got too much sun on my face today, because I didn’t put suncreen on it and I couldn’t stand my wide-brimmed straw hat after about 30  minutes. (Too hot and muggy. Note to self: get/make washable wide brimmed cotton hat, and sell the awesome but stifling and unwashable straw hat. Any takers? It’s way cute.) But I put in three hours work in the garden this afternoon, and we’re getting closer to having all the summer stuff in. The big things left to do: peppers, eggplant, green beans/pole beans, flowers, and corn. Our sweet corn is a 74 day variety, so we do have time for it (though we’ll have to skip the popping corn for this year; it’s 102 days). There are other things that are not as important to me, but I still would like to try to get in, like edamame, celeriac, and parsnips. And, of course, fall plantings will start in July and August.

Lots of stuff is up! All that rain (so, so much) really helped. Look:

• Plum Purple Radish
• Mammoth Red Rock Cabbage
• Nearly all of the curcubits (cucumbers, summer squash, zucchini, winter squashes, pumpkins, melons). The are a few hills that have no plants yet, including Lemon Cucumber (which I remember because I’m so excited about them, so I was bummed that they’re not up). I noticed some curcubits up as early as Thursday and they were all planted Sunday, so I got great germination.

What I put in today:

• Horseradish: We saw this in a little bag at Lowe’s this winter, and couldn’t resist. We love fresh horseradish sauce. But when I opened the bag, all I could find in the handful of soil was two shriveled up stick-like things; they looked like skinny wood mulch. I don’t have much hope for them, but I planted them anyway, 12″ apart. If they miraculously grow, then I know I will need to dig them up every fall to harvest the roots and re-plant just what I need to grow for next year, because horseradish will spread like crazy and is very invasive.
• Mint: Another invasive plant that I can’t resist. My girls gave my mom some cilantro and peppermint (not actually sure what kind of mint, but I think it’s peppermint) seeds as a gift last year, and the gift was passed back to me as a clump of mint last fall. Since we didn’t have our garden dug up yet, I threw the plants in the ground near our house to keep them alive until this year. I finally remembered to transplant them to the garden today – one 10″ clump, next to the horseradish. They weren’t growing or spreading much where I had them near the house, because there wasn’t enough sun. In the sunny garden, I fully expect them to take over, so I’ll need to dig and cull from time to time. I eventually want to plan the mint where I can let it go a little crazy, but I’m not sure where that is yet, so I (perhaps foolishly) put it straight in the garden.
• Lemon Balm: This herb makes the best tea. A friend of mine from Pittsburgh introduced me to it, only she calls it “Melissa” (it’s Latin name is Melissa Officinalis). She has it taking over growing in her back yard, and she made me the most delicious iced tea. I was hooked. So I’m thrilled to be planting this in my garden. Only I just read that it needs light to germinate (my seed packet didn’t say that), and I buried the seed at least 1/4″, so I’ll need to go throw some on top of the soil now. I sowed a couple of rows 4-5′ long; I didn’t measure, just divided up the rest of the row into three equal sections and dedicated one to lemon balm.
• Greek Oregano: Same as lemon balm; didn’t measure how long the rows were (maybe 4-5′), sowed couple of rows.
• German Thyme: Same as lemon balm and oregano.
• Carrots: Sowed three rows 8-10′ long, 10″ apart. First row: Scarlet Nantes Improved Carrot. Second row: Napoli Carrot. Third row: half Danvers (free seed from Baker Creek), half Red Cored Chantenay Carrot. I just made a little furrow with a spare board, tried to scatter the seed evenly within the furrow (shooting for every 1/2 – 1″), and covered lightly. I’ll thin to 1″ spacings after they (hopefully) germinate, and then thin to 2″ after than, hopefully waiting long enough to thin to get baby carrots out of the deal. I will probably sow another succession of carrots down the rest of the row that I sowed to lettuce today.
• Lettuce: Five varieties: Jericho, Buttercrunch Bibb, Antares Oakleaf, Tom Thumb Baby Bibb, and Black Seeded Simpson. After planting the carrots, I divided the rest of the row into five equal sections, perhaps 2′ long each, and simply scattered the lettuce seed over the top of the soil. Then I patted down the soil to help the lettuce seed make contact, sprinkled soil over top in some places, and let it be. I’ll thin the lettuce and eat as baby greens.
• Basil: I finally transplanted my basil seedlings out. They were looking more lime green than healthy basil green, if you know what I mean, but I think they’ll make it. I didn’t have any fertilizer with me today, but I’ll side dress with something, or water with manure tea, soon. I think just being in the ground, rather than a small recycled seedling tray, will help it green up right away. The basil took up 2/3 of a 21′ row (again, all my raised rows are 30″ wide), half being Sweet Basil, half being Genovese Basil. As per the advice in this article, I’ve been pinching all the tops of my basil to help it get nice and bushy. Tonight, we ate the pinchings on our pasta.
• Bright Lights Chard: With the other 1/3 of the basil row, I planted two rows (about 12″ – 15″ apart) of chard. I spaced the holes 6″ apart, and put 2-3 seeds in each hole. (By the way, chard seeds are wicked cool.) I’ll thin to every other plant when the plants are big enough to be baby chard in my salads.
• Parsley: I planted two sections, perhaps 5-6′ long, with 2-3 rows in each section, of Forest Green Parsley and Dark Green Italian Parsley. I probably should have soaked the seed first, per packet instructions, but I had so much planting to do today that I just grabbed packets and planted them. So hopefully germination will be okay, if not stellar.
• Bouquet Dill: Planted next to the parsleys, another 5-6′ section, this time with only 2 rows. I heart dill.
• Broccoli: To finish off the parsley-parsley-dill row, I planted four holes each of Arcadia Broccoli and Thompson Broccoli. (I actually didn’t order Arcadia; it was what Fedco sent me as a substitute for the Umpqua, which was not out of stock when I ordered, but apparently became out of stock before they sent my order.) I put 4 seeds in each hole, and will thin to the strongest seedling. The holes were 16″ apart down the center of the row.

Whew, okay, so that’s what I did today. I broke out our old rainbow sprinkler, which is wonky and only sprays in whatever direction it feels like, and somehow managed to get all the newly sown seeds watered (along with a lot of extra stuff, depending on the sprinkler’s mood). It’s nice to have water in the garden; Jason had to do some serious plumbing to get the water all the way out there. It involved drilling through the foundation wall and 400′ of irrigation tubing, 350 of which still needs to be buried. Still, we have water, and I used a sprinkler rather than my little watering can, and I felt like a queen. Note to self: get a new sprinkler of some sort.

Just for the curious, and for my own records, I’ll talk a little about how the garden is laid out. It is 54′ wide and 60-some feet long. The width is divided into two sections; one side is 21′ long, and the other is 24′ long, and down the center is a 4′ path. (I can’t really say why one side is 21′ while the other is 24′, other than to say that it just worked out that way. We may move the path to the actual center next year, or we may not.) Each side is divided up mostly into rows; at the bottom (south) side of the garden, there are hills for curcubits that are 4-5′ in diameter. But from the top (north) of the garden, each row is 30″ wide and either 21′ or 24′ long, with 12″ in between for walking. The rows keep going until we ran out of time, and then there is blank earth (growing lots of weeds) before you hit the curcubit hills. As Jason has dug new rows for me, I have planted them, and the blank earth section between the rows and the hills has slowly shrunk. Eventually, once we’ve planted everything in rows that we want to, we’ll stop digging rows and just plant the rest of the blank earth section to corn. Next year, we’ll row up the whole thing.

Jason’s been assigned the job of mapping out the garden, as he’s good at that sort of thing. But I’m going to see if I can’t list off what’s been planted from memory. Jason’s map will be very helpful as we plan next year’s garden; you don’t want to plant the same thing in the same place. We hope to make use of a 4-year rotation, if it works out.

Here’s what’s currently planted on the west half of the garden, where the rows are 21′ long. From north to south, one row per bullet:

• Sugar Snap Peas, Blizzard Snow Peas, Fava Beans
• Sugar Ann Snap Peas, Mayfair Shell Peas, Fava Beans
• Potatoes (can’t remember what’s planted where, but I’m sure it’s in a potato post somewhere)
• Potatoes
• Potatoes, one 2′ section of cilantro at the end
• Korean Onions, Evergreen Hardy White Scallions, Bleu de Solaize Leeks, Clear Dawn Onions
• Sweet Potatoes (see sweet potato post for what’s planted where)
• Sweet Potatoes
• Sweet Potatoes
• Horseradish, peppermint, lemon balm, Greek Oregano, German Thyme
• Carrots (four varieties), Lettuce (five varieties)
• Sweet Basil, Genovese Basil, Bright Lights Chard

And here’s what’s currently planted on the east half of the garden, where the rows are 24′ long. From north to south, one row per bullet:

• Tomatoes (eight plants per row)
• Tomatoes
• Tomatoes
• Tomatoes
• Tomatoes
• Verde Puebla Tomatillo (four plants), Korean Perilla, Plum Purple Radish
• Mammoth Red Rock Cabbages
• Early Jersey Wakefield Cabbages
• Parsleys, Dill, Broccolis

And south of all that you have Blank Earth with Weeds, and south of that you have 23 curcubit hills. The garden is enclosed by a 3′ tall woven wire fence, plus another wire a foot above that. We have t-posts at the corners and centers of all sides, and recycled plastic fence posts in between those (they were much cheaper). An international student/friend came to help in the garden, and he built us a simple gate. Jason used two 3-4″ diameter saplings as posts for the gate, and our student/friend used scrap wood, leftover woven wire fencing, and lots of galvanized wire to fashion the gate. It’s all very rustic, but perfect for us. Now I need Jason needs to paint a little garden sign.