At my community garden today planting flowers and veggies in the Children's garden at Lanier Community garden. Focus was to plant flowers that will bring in pollinators to the Children's Garden and nearby food plots. I arrived with plants I started from seed for the event. My offering included Borage, Batchelor Buttons, Zinna's and Cilantro. I also planted extra Tuscan Kale, Crisphead lettuce, and a Yellow Pear tomato plant.
My garden plot was ready for some work today. Tasks included hilling soil up and around the potato plants, thining the beets, and some general house-keeping. The best task was my first harvest of Lettuce and Kale! My Tomato bed survived a couple of very cool mornings and the plants are looking good after a dose of Fish/seaweed fertilizer. I always plant too early - just can't hold back!
My third year at the Lanier Community Garden. However, I took over a new plot in the Organic section this winter. I quickly put in beds with various widths in the 20' x 20' plot. I prepped the soil with a Broadfork and shaped beds into witdths of 30", 36" and 4' x 4' beds. Paths are 12' wide. The soil is clay that has been improved with compost and other soil amendments.
Early spring plantings include four potato varieties in the 36" bed (planted 3/16/2018), Four lettuce varieties planted in a 30" wide bed ( 3/26/2018). The samr day I planted the lettuce bed we planted the 4' x 4' beds with two varieties of Kale (Blue Dazzle, Tuscan). Additional plantings since include spinach transplants, Capitan Lettuce, Fordhook Chard and Cilantro. Transplants were all grown in my basement light stand. I planted three beet varieties by direct sowing in early March. My 30" wide bed for Tomatoes is prepped, fertilized, and waiting for planting day. We are still getting high 30's so I'm waiting for the air and soil to warm a bit more. I use the "Florida Weave" technique to support about 9 heirloom tomato plants in the tomato bed. My 3rd 30" wide bed has a 10' long metal conduit trellis with netting installed for 5 feet of Sweet Peas (Flowers) and about three small tomato varieties. I generally grow Juliet, Yellow Pear and Peacevine cherry to supplement my large tomato planting.
The pictures show my hoops and row cover. Works great for these early spring plantings. I purchased a small roll of #9 wire and cut it to size. My row covers have a pocket sewn on both sides of the length of each piece ( I cut my row cover 25' long for my 20' long beds). I slide two pieces of 10' long 1/2" PVC with a 1/2" connector into the pockets on both sides of the row cover. This makes the row covers very easy to use. The PVC is lightweight but it holds the covers down in windy conditions and also allows me the ability to lift one side easily and flip it over into the path on the other side of the bed (see picture of lettuce bed).
