March & April: This year I'm going all out! I'm building raised bed boxes and elevated garden boxes, and growing more veggies than last year. Once I got started on construction of the boxes, I discovered I inherited a small quantity of the Schreiber building genes, enough that I think I did a decent job and had fun doing it.
APRIL
Early April: Meanwhile inside I've got seedlings started in the mini-greenhouse I purchased from Amazon. Nearly everything sprouted in less than a week!
Now comes the hard part! Filling them with a truckload of topsoil that nephew George got for us!
Third week in April: Boxes filled with dirt, I added some organic raised bed soil and potting soil to the first box, then planted 2 rows of onion sets and direct-sowed a row of radishes and a row of carrots. I am keeping them covered at night or during heavy rain.
Meanwhile I also built a couple of elevated garden boxes for my lettuce, spinach, other greens and herbs. I then found some mini-greenhouse toppers online that fit perfectly.
MAY
May 4: Lettuce, spinach and herb seedlings are emerging in the outdoor greenhouses.
The radish seedlings are coming along nicely!
Meanwhile, in the inside greenhouse, the rest of my seedlings are thriving!
May 19: Took trays of seedlings outside to start "hardening off"; the weather has been extraordinarily cool, so the hardening off is coming much later this year.
May 21: Lettuce and Greens in the outdoor mini-greenhouse are thriving; we can start cutting some for salads anytime now!
All seedlings are out of the indoor greenhouse for now. They live on the back porch at night, outdoors during the day. I've taken the greenhouse out to storage, until next year.
The Zucchini seedlings are getting leggy and starting to develop flowers already, so I planted them in their spot and covered them with a row protector, since heavy rains are predicted.
The snap peas are coming up nicely. I've uncovered them and set up a trellis behind them to climb on.
May 24: It looks like we've had our last frost (fingers crossed), so I've taken the mini-greenhouse toppers off the elevated boxes. The greens are doing beautifully, and I've cut some for salad already!
May 26: Everything is planted (all 3 boxes)!
First box contains onions, radishes, carrots, broccoli and eggplant.
Second box is all cucumbers, with an A-Frame trellis set up for them to climb on: Spacemaster on one side, Bush Champion on the other. Picklebush cukes set up with 3 cages in adjoining space.
May 31: The lettuce and other greens are growing rapidly!
And the zucchini is flowering...
Last night, some critter, probably a rabbit, had a feast! Ate the tops off all 6 of my broccoli plants and chomped the tops off 1/3 of my tender peas!
I bought 6 new broccoli plants, moved them to the same bed as the peas (box 3), and put up a 3-foot high fence around that whole box. hopefully that will keep the hungry critters out!
JUNE
June 5: First radishes! Still small, but I love them that way!
June 7-8: Night time temps got down into the low 30s overnight - too close for comfort, so the entire garden got covered (no pics). Everything survived fine, and temps are back up to "normal"! Let the growing season continue...!
Tomatoes
Peas, making a comeback after being bunny-nibbled!
Lettuce & Other greens!
Zucchini
Tomatoes:
June 29-30:
Garden
First Zucchini
June 27: First Cucumber!
Garden view
JULY
July 3: Cantaloupes (planted in same spot as last year, by flagpole): It took the plants a while to get going, but they are growing strong now!
July 6: Picked my first peas today, the vines are loaded! My first experience with peas; have never tried growing them before.
July 12: And the peas keep on coming! Wow! We've been eating lettuce and greens from the garden for weeks now, and still enjoying them in daily salads! I even planted another round of mesclun and looseleaf lettuce several weeks ago, some of which is now starting to mature, ensuring fresh greens will continue on for a while!
Now the cucumbers and zucchini are coming on full force too. I have baby peppers and lots of green tomatoes. Reward time is here!
I've also dried big bunches of parsley, cilantro and lemon balm. The basil is coming along, and will soon be enough to harvest for drying.
Parsley
July 16: Cucumbers are coming on strong! Lots of flowers and baby cukes!
My domain, midsummer!
July 31: Harvest!
AUGUST
August 5: Critters are getting into the rest of the garden! I think because it's been so hot and dry, they are looking for moisture where ever they can find it. So my garden is taking a beating, especially the ripening tomatoes and cukes! Rabbits and/or woodchucks have decimated the flowers and baby cukes from the plants and many larger cukes are half eaten. So I've fenced in the other two boxes with the plastic mesh that has worked so far on the first box.
August 7: Discovered nicely developed eggplants coming on! Also discovered critters have gotten most of the baby cantaloupes (and flowers) as well, so more plastic mesh fence going up around that patch!
One of two remaining small cantaloupe
The next day I went out and found one of the two remaining cantaloupe gone, despite the mesh fence. I can see they dug in underneath it and lifted one of the garden staples out, and carted off the baby melon! So this is war! Below is my temporary fix to protect the last remaining melon until I get a sturdier fence up!
August 14: Seems the critters are getting into the boxes again! I found at least 4 spots where they chewed through the plastic mesh and attacked my tomatoes and cukes again. Time to get out the heavy guns....chicken wire!!
August 15: First tomato harvest! Plus eggplant, zucchini and some cukes came back, now that nothing is eating them down to nubs! Sweet Banana peppers too!
SEPTEMBER
September 5 (Labor Day): The veggies keep on coming, including two gorgeous large eggplants!
September 14: the one remaining cantaloupe is still tiny, but looks like it's ripening.
Also: although I haven't mentioned them, two of five raspberry plants I planted last year came up this spring, and one plant has been doing especially well. Not yet enough for any cooking or freezing, but I've been eating 5-6 berries daily for the past week. I've put up a homemade "trellis" to keep the canes more confined, and have ordered one more raspberry plant to fill in the raised bed I designated for them.
September 18: Noticed this morning that the lone cantaloupe has turned yellow and looks ripe, and wasn't even attached to the vine anymore. It's tiny (I added the pen to the photo to show relative size). Will cut it in a day or two and taste...fingers crossed!
Today I also decided to harvest my potatoes as most of the foliage had died back and I was afraid of them rotting in the bag. But nothing to fear, when I started digging, I found a couple dozen good looking potatoes of various sizes! They were muddy, due to a heavy rain last night, so I washed them, but apparently that wasn't the best thing to do for storing them. I'll have to use them up in the next couple of weeks!
September 21: a nice raspberry harvest. (Note: I continued to get handfuls of raspberries right up through several light frosts, until the first hard frost in early November!)
October
October 18: Eggplants and peppers have continued coming on for the past month. Broccoli too! And the marigolds and nasturtiums have been magnificent!
October 22: last eggplant and pepper harvests! Plus, since we're forecast for a frost tonight, I pulled up a whole bucket full of carrots (sorry no photo!).
NOVEMBER
November 6: last harvest from the garden! We've had a couple of light frosts by now and so I pulled up the remaining carrots and onions, and cut the last of the broccoli. Afterwards I removed all the remaining plants from the garden beds!
November 12: hard frost and the end of the season! I am already looking forward to next year!
I've continued to learn a lot this year, so hopefully next year my garden will be even better!
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