Humble Garden

I just wanted to share with you our first salad. Our first batch of mesclun is ready to be eaten, the radishes are plumping up, and the baby spinach is tender and delicious!

Am about ready to seed in the third succession crop of both radish and mesclun.

Oh my goodness! Ed and crew are FINALLY done with the seven raised beds (with internal radiant heating system). You can see them in the photo above.

Now we turn to the chicken house. I will share that process as it comes along.

I am also now going to start seeding the three brand new beds.

I have brainstormed on the placement of the first aquaculture tank and I will share some of that planning as soon as I have it mocked up in a document.

Bufo a. americanus

Our raised beds must be getting rave reviews in the “Riparian Times” because a whole host of toads have been moving into the neighborhood. Ours look to be of the Eastern American toad (Bufo a. americanus) flavor. We all know that these guys eat insects so we are mighty happy to host them.

We finally got our asparagus bed built.

I am using a modified “Square Foot Gardening” planting plan where, instead of the 4/square foot they do, I am doing one crown per square foot on top of compost and topsoil (with some organic bone meal to modify the phosphate levels).

Here is a shot of the tomato patch from the end.

Here is an update shot on one of the seeded beds.

Here are some plants ready and waiting for the 8×8 bed. Notice that we have some sweet potatoes in there. I am not convinced that these will like it here but we will find out!

See that little black speck to the right of center? That little guy is eating little holes in some of my tomatoes and also in some of the other seedlings.

I looked on the internet and have found that it is called a Flea Beetle. When you go to pick them off the leaf you have to be careful because they will jump away like a flea. They are very easy to kill tho, very unlike a flea.

Since this is an organic garden, I want to deal with this problem with no chemicals.

The internet says to:

• Use covers (not an option because these guys likely came with the dirt)
• Use a trap crop like radishes
• Use a pesticide
• Use onion or garlic or pepper spray

Its this last one that I will be trying today. I am going to get some garlic and make a solution of it and then swab it onto my affected plants. I am going to start it off at a relatively (as it seems to me) concentration.

I am also having another issue.

My transplanted pimento peppers (Bonnie from Walmart) are growing some gnarly looking leaves since their transplantation. Is this a fertilizer issue? A too much water issue? A pH issue? If you know, drop me a note!

Ed is working on the fifth bed today, 6th soon and then a large 8×8 herb garden.

We got some Mary Washington asparagus (with a bonus extra pack), 40 in all. Now we are deciding where we will put these guys. As you may know, eating these wont happen until like 3 years from now. They take up a lot of space vertically so they do not want to be IN the garden…

I am still working on the 4th garden in terms of seed placement, almost there. I am also working on seeding in the companion crops to help deal with bugs and get some synergistic benefits.

This guy is growing like a weed but we are not going to weed him.

Here is the latest panorama. You can see that Ed has finished the 4th bed on the right! I need to plant that one and the ends of the bed furthest to the left.

I have put a small preview of the map template for each bed (below). I measured the pH of various parts of each bed (as well as nutrient content) so I will be adding that to the maps as well. I will share those when I finish them.

Every day I spend time picking weedlets. I use it as a growing zazen practice. Its precious quiet time.

Sometimes I put on my Maya wrap and take Baby Oh out so he can have some freedom from the tyranny of the older middle 3 year old sister.

He loves it. He listens to the birds, he watches me weed, he doesn’t make a sound and has huge eyes, looking at everything.

Here is bit of an update on the most advanced bed.

The mesclun has moved on to it’s secondary leaves and is looking much like mesclun. Its almost time to plant the next batch in the succession.

The radishes have also gotten their secondary leaves. These are the itchy scratchy ones.

Here is the cinnamon basil which has ALREADY gone to flower. I snipped them and have pruned it to make sure its going to get bushy.

Things are sprouting in the first raised bed. In the shot above, you see a sprouting melon.

Here are some tiny broccoli plants. All of these will be thinned down to the best plants (ok, best guess in the best plant). Next planting spree I will be planting only one seed, I dont think I need to plant many and then thin, seems like a waste with such a high germination rate.

Here the radishes are on their first set of leaves. Growing like gangbusters.

Here is a comparison on the mesclun lettuce. The one on the left is 5-27-07. The right is 5-31-07.

Planted our store bought non-organic tomatoes. You can not see the cage around it in this shot.

Leaf from a pimento pepper plant.

Rows of sprouting collard greens.