Big Changes - Before and After x 3

Last post I made some comments about changes coming to the garden. I was needing a day off work to, you know, work.

The last two days have been glorious weather  - cool and breezy which is perfect for some hard labor.

I gave myself some forced deadlines. For example I called the mulch yard and asked for 3 cubic yards of garden mix - (50% soil - 40% mushroom compost - 10% sand) to be delivered to as early as possible Friday morning and dumped at the end of the drive. Knowing the Student would be home by 6:00, pushed me to get this done. Halfway up the drive, you can see some of the material I had already removed from the bed.

The plan was to remove two perennial beds and prep them for conversion to boxed raised beds. I want to preserve as much as possible in terms of plant materials by repurposing them in the front yard, which, as a friend told me "...is pretty sad for someone who thinks they are a gardener."

Ouch, but the truth hurts. 

I've always enjoyed the aspect that the garden is in the back and not visible from the street, my very own "Bijou Caché." It is a surprise to pull up to the very unassuming house, walk down the driveway, and turn to see a vigorous garden. But, as the saying goes, necessity is the mother of invention. If I was going to save those plants they'd have to move. And I might as well tart up the front of the house a bit.

I spent the morning ripping out the East bed, here is the before and after.

Then I moved the soil out of the driveway. It may not look like much, but three cubic yards takes some time.  I did in fact finish before she came home from work. I'll show you what we came up with at the end of the post. I was exhausted by the end of the day - 12 hours of removing plants and shoveling soil will do that to you. I'm afraid I wasn't good company at the German restaurant for Oktoberfest. Oh, the beer and Jager Schnitzel were delicious, but by the time I was finished I was almost falling asleep. A few aspirin before bed and hopefully I would not be too sore the next day to continue.

Surprisingly I felt pretty good! Up at 6:00, took dear daughter #2 for some driving practice, a stop at the local greenhouse (their perennials were all on sale for only $2 each!) and I finally could procrastinate no longer. While clearing out the west bed, I did feel bad as there were some plants I couldn't save. Oh well, if you want to make an omelet.. you gotta break some eggs.

All I need now is to build the boxes and fill them, shred all the material I pulled out of the garden. Won't happen today as it is raining a lovely soft gentle rain, perfect for the new plants in front.

This still needs mulch, and is a little tatty but will be better after wintering over, I'd say it is big improvement. Whew! I need a nap.

Until next time, Keep Digging & Eat Well!

The Gastronomic Gardener
Garden blog http://amidwestgarden.blogspot.com/
Cooking blog http://ihopeyouarehungry.blogspot.com/
Twitter - @gastrogardener
http://www.facebook.com/TheGastronomicGardener
email: thegastronomicgardener at gmail dot com

Square Foot Garden bed build

Seems with the nice weather  social opportunities increase so there isn't as much time to work on things as I'd like. Good things happen to those that say "Yes." Had a wonderful afternoon yesterday with old friends. 

But today I wanted to get the  boxes filled and the grids laid out.

We fill the beds with equal parts (by volume) of compost (I used composted horse manure, and purchased mushroom and cow manure compost. The book suggests 5 different kinds. I could only find 3 so we'll see what happens), peat, and vermiculite.

You mix the compost first. Left to right, cow, mushroom. horse. I did this in a tarp as recommended.

By lifting one side of the tarp I could tumble the compost together to make a nice homogenized mix. I worked my way around the tarp multiple times to get a nice mix.

Add an equal volume of peat, and repeat the tumbling.

Repeat the process with the vermiculite.

Use the tarp to get it to the bed, dump it in and rake smooth.  Repeat for all beds. The smaller beds took 8 cubic feet of mix each, the larger took 14 cubic feet. Calculations are in the book. If you want to know, just ask.

Through the magic of the Internet, POOF! All done filling the beds! In actuality, working by myself, it took about an hour and a half.  I won't need to do it again, so that is nice.

At this point I have nice fluffy raised beds, but the point is to follow the SFG method. So out comes the trusty tape measure.

I measured and marked the frames, used some slat material and nailed them every foot.

The final step is to add the long pieces. The book suggests drilling a hole at the intersections and attaching with a nut & bolt. I decided to weave the long pieces in and out and let the tension hold it in place. Again, we'll see how that works out for me.

Repeat with the rest of the beds.

You can see why it is called square foot. About a month out from putting in most of the garden.

Still to do, add upright supports to the right of the long beds, I'll grow tomatoes, cucumbers and squash there,  I'm also going to mulch the entire back area that was the lawn, one less thing to cut.

Of course the perennial beds are in dire need of attention, which they will receive in turn.

Until next time, Keep Digging & Eat Well!

The Gastronomic Gardener
Garden blog http://amidwestgarden.blogspot.com/
Cooking blog http://ihopeyouarehungry.blogspot.com/
Twitter - www.twitter.com/DavidPOffutt
http://www.facebook.com/TheGastronomicGardener

2010 Vegetable Garden Recap Video

Here's a little video I put together recapping the 2010 Vegetable Garden. Enjoy!




Until Next Time, Keep Digging & Eat Well!


The Gastronomic Gardener
Garden blog http://amidwestgarden.blogspot.com/
Cooking blog http://ihopeyouarehungry.blogspot.com/
Twitter - www.twitter.com/DavidPOffutt
http://www.facebook.com/TheGastronomicGardener

Sunday Morning Bounty

I've not been out to the vegetable plot in a bit so  I needed to go see what was happening, harvest anything ripe, thin the radishes and beets that I've put in for a fall crop. I also had the usual bucket of kitchen scraps for the compost heap as well as the milled skins and seeds from the tomato sauce I made yesterday. That was intended for the chickens.

I like the idea of growing the tomatoes, giving seeds and skins to the chickens, who then make eggs, and contribute to compost heap when their coop is cleaned. Closing the loop and not a garbage can in sight!

I haven't shown you the garden recently but this time I remembered the camera. As I got ready to pull out of the drive, I saw some sunflowers, volunteers from the bird seed no doubt, but they were looking cheerfully jaunty, so I snapped a picture.

After arriving on site and dumping the bucket into the compost pile, I treated the chickens aka "the girls" to the skins and seeds of yesterdays tomatoes.  They are quite funny as they will run up to you and beg, and are generally pretty vocal. This quieted them as they feasted.

Here is the whole garden, it is very shaggy and overgrown but is producing  (a little garden humor for you!) quite well.

The eggplants are happy - the Japanese eggplants keep producing and the globe eggplants are getting there too. Despite the leaf damage the fruits are lovely.

The cherry tomatoes keep going - the homeowner claims these as they are his favorite.

The golden Romas were so vigorous they pulled down their support!

The acorn squash are enjoying themselves - we'll have plenty I think. And I  like that they will keep for months!

After all the photography it was time to do some harvesting. I was surprised at the amount of green beans, the plants look a bit ragged but they keep going strong. Also picked tomatoes, peppers, green beans, Indian cucumbers, and a few eggplant. Another good haul. I'm looking forward to making some golden salsa!

After picking I went over to the big box store, picked up some more canning supplies (on sale) - a little lunch and I'm going to tackle the out of control perennial garden!

Until next time, Keep digging & eat well!



The Gastronomic Gardener
My garden blog http://amidwestgarden.blogspot.com/
My cooking blog http://ihopeyouarehungry.blogspot.com/
Twitter - www.twitter.com/DavidPOffutt
http://www.facebook.com/TheGastronomicGardener

Sunday morning quick run to the Veggie Plot

Went to the vegetable plot to drop off some kitchen waste and a couple yard bags for the compost heap. It is amazing how much material we put in there and how it keeps compressing down. It does need a layer of carbon soon - so a bit of straw may be in order.

The rain barrels are all full so the design worked, but with so much rain lately we won't need it anytime soon.

What a lovely day, cool, breezy. My kind of weather!

While at the plot we took time to grab a bucket and do some weeding/thinning. I can saw we will likely have more tomatos than we will be able to handle - Good thing, because canning is also on the agenda this summer for the first time.

Radishes and beets were thinned, onions just put in Thursday are already sending up green shoots. Cucumbers, squash, pumpkins are all vigorous. It's a waiting game now. I'm not a fan of waiting but I will.

A walk around the flower beds is next....

Make your bed!

So we keep on keeping on. Now was time to make the beds. The plan is to make seven 3'x15' beds separated by 2' wide paths.

Here is the planning grid.

The shaded area are the paths, unshaded the beds. I want raised beds so we will shovel the paths and move the material to the bed on the right. This should create raised beds of decent material.
 
My friend was able to identify what likely broke the tines off off the tiller. A steel 2' i-beam mounted vertically in a column of cement. It took me about 15 minutes of shoveling and sledging with an 8 pound maul until I was able to get it out of the way. I guess you'll never know what you will find.
 
Anyway, with the tiller repaired, we went over the plot again. More rocks! It's amazing, I wonder if somewhere there is the former landowner laughing in their grave, maybe we're trying to till a former driveway.  The bed although rather small definately has diffent soil within its boundries, while a large portion is very nice the upper center section is extremely rocky and primarily clay. Having had good luck amending soil before, I turned to adding peat to the plot. We added 12 2.2 cubic foot bales of peat moss - that's 26 cubic feet of fluffy goodness.
 
We tilled that extra material in and then it was time to start shoveling the paths. Ugh! Rows 2 and 3 were brutal. That's right - more rocks. The homeowners wife paid me a compliment -"You are so systematic about setting up garden beds".  - Yes, yes I am.  Hopefully the work will produce (ha a little veggie humor for ya!).  We kept at it, digging paths putting the material on the bed to the right.
 
On the paths we put wet newspapers which we will then cover with straw - the theory being keep weeds  and mud at bay on the paths as well as being compostable at the end of the season
 
Finally we persevered and here are the results, I love it when a plan comes together.
 

Looks pretty good to me! See those blue barrels? - Another project - rain catchment!
 
Until later Dear Reader. Comments? Complaints? Suggestions? Requests?