They're cute when they're tiny!

Last week, DB and I got the chance to enjoy some nice weather and a trip to the Boerner Botanical Garden. We missed the tulips last year because of the unusually warm winter and that made me sad. Not this year! And with the help of a Groupon discount, we got to enjoy it at half price. The tulips were in full bloom and some of the irises as well. The one thing I want to go back for is the daylilies and roses. But there's a problem. A giant bumblebee claims the rose garden area as his own and makes it impossible for us to wander around that area. Stupid bee. Reminds me of the honey bees currently hanging around my cauliflower's container. They think they own the place. And I have a fear of bees getting into my hair because I had a bad experience once. A hornet got trapped in my ponytail and stung me when I went to fix it. Needless to say, when there are bees about, I scream like a little girl, flailing my arms as I go running.

The two nice days turned into chances of showers and thunderstorms taking the wind out of our sails for finishing the stain on the fence. To keep ourselves occupied we moved onto a different project: the raised garden bed that we've been talking about for years now. If you recall in a previous post (Hyacinths and breakfast sausage) we pulled up the old, busted driveway to make room for the new garden.

My SFG plan

Pulling together some semblance of a plan we got to work - between thunderstorms. The plan resulted in a raised cedar bed 8' x 4' x 1' along the lines of the one featured on Sunset's website. Using this concept, we wanted to try the square foot gardening (SFG) to get the most bang for our buck. This method, as authored by Mel Bartholomew, provides a practical means to grow an abundance of plants in limited space where the soil might not be the best, to reduce maintenance efforts, and increase yield, among other things. But it needs to keep in mind companion/foe plants considering the amount of space (i.e. carrots do well with lettuce but not celery). Any simple internet search will give you a plethora of results to help determine companion/foe planting for your own garden.

Starting the work on the raised bed

Spread out over a few days we got to work. The frame was easy enough - after we figured that flipping it from one side to the next would be the easiest in order to make sure the boards were level. Taking a concept from the book "I Garden: Urban Style" (2010, p 66), we used a 'lasagna' effect. Newspaper and cardboard on the bottom with garden fabric along the sides then layers of compost, peat moss, and garden soil until we filled up the bed (it took two trips to the hardware store to get all the 'dirt' mainly because we short-changed it the first time around, oops).

Full of dirt and segmented into square feet

After a trip to the local nursery, we picked up some of the transplants, while direct sowed some of the other stuff (i.e. pumpkin, carrot, bean). The nursery offers a great discount for flats of 4-cell veggies. Only needing a half-flat it still gave us extra plants. So we filled up the raised bed and put two each of hot peppers, bell pepper and eggplant in self-watering containers. Because, you know, you can never have enough peppers...but as an added precaution I made little paper bag collars for those plants. If you can recall, I had a problem with cutworms last year. I didn't bother putting the lettuce in the SFG and instead opted to use just a SW-container.

Little, baby veggies! ^_^

To say I'm excited about my vegetable garden is an understatement. I cannot wait until the plants grow and begin to fruit especially since we're trying our hands at 'classics' and new stuff (okra! beans!). Last year's drought worked well enough for my peppers but not for most other things, I'm hoping this year will do a little better. Otherwise, I'll be canning another batch of peppers and salsa, not that I mind but it would be nice to add other things to the pantry/freezer.

Final Thoughts

Most of your veggies and fruit should be outside by now so it should be all about maintenance. Keep the weeds back, stake the peppers and eggplants if needed, and watch out for garden pests - I'm looking at you squirrels. And now is the time to attract honey bees and other pollinators to your garden! Use spring blooming flowers to get their attention so by the time your veggies need them, they're there and ready to roll.

"Remember that children, marriages, and flower gardens reflect the kind of care they get."

- H. Jackson Brown, Jr.