Spring Garden Thread

[lightbulbsun]

I just started seeds for this year, and I wanted to see what everyone else is up to! I have tomatoes (Amish paste, cherry, green zebra, purple Cherokee, and yellow Brandywine), bell peppers, hot peppers, eggplant, and cucumber started inside. I'm going to be planting some lettuce, spinach, beets, and carrots outside in a few weeks. Once the weather warms up I'll also plant watermelon, edamame, and zucchini.

I'm also working on transforming my yard into a food forest. I ordered a peach tree and some blueberry bushes, and a bunch of native flower seeds. I'm hoping to lay down a mulch base in the next few weeks to clear a space in my lawn so I can plant some more fruit trees in the fall. Right now, most of our yard is either overgrown tree area with a ton of non-native/invasive plants, or grass lawn, so we have a long way to go. 

[simpsongal]

That sounds wonderful - we've had great luck w/blueberry bushes. If you don't want to pull up the grass, I was able to successfully create new beds by laying cardboard under the mulch. It smothered the grass and kept weeks away for years.

Beware the fruit trees and definitely do some research w/your local extension before selecting varieties and for learning how to care for them. We've had nothing but heartache from our peach tree. It's been ~8 years, we had ~1 good season and the rest we're constantly problem solving for pests and fungus. We had apple trees at a time too and also struggled with those. Some fruits are much easier to grow - e.g., I've heard figs are pretty easy.

[lightbulbsun]

Mar 15, 2021 11:39:05 GMT -5 simpsongal said:

That sounds wonderful - we've had great luck w/blueberry bushes. If you don't want to pull up the grass, I was able to successfully create new beds by laying cardboard under the mulch. It smothered the grass and kept weeks away for years.

Beware the fruit trees and definitely do some research w/your local extension before selecting varieties and for learning how to care for them. We've had nothing but heartache from our peach tree. It's been ~8 years, we had ~1 good season and the rest we're constantly problem solving for pests and fungus. We had apple trees at a time too and also struggled with those. Some fruits are much easier to grow - e.g., I've heard figs are pretty easy.

Yes, I'm planning on going the cardboard/mulch route. Luckily we can get free mulch from our township, so that's a great resource.

I've been doing a ton of research on what plants will work best, specifically for my area. I'm hoping that by planting guilds that I can prevent some of the pest issues. I'm also expecting to have to change things around based on what's working and what isn't. I am planning on a fig tree! 

[Deleted]

I did a veggie garden last year with moderate success. Not really knowing what I was doing, I didn't do anything other than till the area and then plant. This year I plan on doing much more to prep my soil. In addition to my one small veggie garden bed, I also did some herbs in pots on my patio and plan on doing the same this year. I started some seeds last night for dill, cilantro, 2 kinds of basil, lettuce, and marigolds. My thyme and mint never completely died back, so I'm hoping they'll start growing again on their own. I've also read that sage and oregano will come back, so I'm holding off starting seeds in the hopes that they do. For my tomatoes this year I'm planning on picking up some heirloom plants at the Farmers Market and will then save the seeds to plant starters next year. I think I'm also going to do jalapenos, cucumber, eggplant, and sweet peppers, but I still need to try to design things out in my current space and see if I can get it all to fit. I'm definitely going to do a trellis for the cucumber, I did a vining plant last year and it completely took over so I don't want to make that mistake again.

[InBetweenDays]

I'm so excited to get our veggie garden going again! We are still harvesting kale from last year. Normally we plant snap pea seeds soon but we haven't been eating those as much so thinking of trying something else. Maybe we should try edamame when it warms up!

Other than that in our raised beds I'm planning to do zucchini, carrots, kale, and green beans from seed. And tomatoes from starts once it warms up. I'm considering doing rhubarb - does anyone know of the concerns with growing that if you have pets?

We also have some pots for herbs and have oregano, thyme, rosemary, mint, lemon verbena, and chives that grow year round. Will add basil when it warms up.

[Wallflower]

I started my tomatoes this weekend - Weisnicht's Ukrainian. It is so freaking good!

I've been building my flower gardens and I really need to see how they are filling in. But I'm getting emails and catalogs and I'm fighting my desire to ORDER MORE PLANTS. PLANTS. GIVE ME PLANTS.

Maybe I'm a little impatient for spring.

[sandandsea]

We will be planting some cantaloupe and watermelon seeds. Doubt we will actually grow any fruit but the boys want to try.

[kate]

Spending money on seeds, plants, and gardening supplies has really helped get me through winter, lol.

I've started seeds for thyme, sage and multiple types of peppers- jalapeno, lunchbox, red bell, and purple bell. I will also do carrots and greens, direct seed. Maybe shallots, but using sets instead of seeds for that, I hope. I still need to buy another raised bed for it all. I am also putting in a raspberry raised bed to start this year.

I started a bunch of flowers from seed, and I have so, so many fun varieties of petunias and snapdragons coming along. I am also trying nigella, bee balm, annual scabiosa, four o'clocks, and cosmos.

I ordered some perennials and I'm most excited for a couple baptisia plants- twilight prairieblues and pink lemonade.

[lightbulbsun]

Mar 16, 2021 15:51:29 GMT -5 Wallflower said:

I started my tomatoes this weekend - Weisnicht's Ukrainian. It is so freaking good!

I've been building my flower gardens and I really need to see how they are filling in. But I'm getting emails and catalogs and I'm fighting my desire to ORDER MORE PLANTS. PLANTS. GIVE ME PLANTS.

Maybe I'm a little impatient for spring.

Oh, same here! I have an order of some plants coming in a few weeks, and a bunch of wildflower seeds arrived yesterday. I went to Home Depot a couple of weeks ago to pick up the seed starter pods, and it was so hard not to buy a bunch of berry bushes while I was there.

[lightbulbsun]

Mar 16, 2021 18:23:37 GMT -5 sandandsea said:

We will be planting some cantaloupe and watermelon seeds. Doubt we will actually grow any fruit but the boys want to try.

I planted watermelon for the first time last year and got a huge watermelon! Only one, but it was so fun to watch it grow.

[Deleted]

Mar 16, 2021 18:23:37 GMT -5 sandandsea said:

We will be planting some cantaloupe and watermelon seeds. Doubt we will actually grow any fruit but the boys want to try.

I once grew "driveway cantaloupe". In my old house, the asphalt for the driveway went right up to the foundation of my house, but it was kind of separated. I had seen what I thought was a weed growing, but never pulled it. Well, good thing I didn't, because it ended up being cantaloupe and we got several fruits from that plant. Only thing I can figure is that some animals got in to my trash and inadvertently spread the seed. So there you go, cantaloupe is so easy you can grow it by accident LOL

[ssmjlm]

I think I'm going to get one of the raised planters like this: smile.amazon.com/Keter-238699-Elevated-Garden-Anthracite/dp/B07D7SNCF8/ref=bmx_10?pd_rd_w=9TvCi&pf_rd_p=c56dadeb-1250-4595-be05-dacedfb0eeb2&pf_rd_r=DNBG37KTK6700E58SQA3&pd_rd_r=db06c74f-58fe-4d16-a8a7-10ee5699f08f&pd_rd_wg=ROGsf&pd_rd_i=B07D7SNCF8&th=1

We have a lot of deer, just spotted the fox again, plus sometimes rabbits and turtles. I think if I do this, then I can put it closer to our patio and hopefully it won't get completely eaten.

[tacokick]

We have native fruit trees and bushes but haven’t had luck with vegetables besides one volunteer pumpkin plant in 2019.

In the summer we planted saffron crocuses and are planning giant sunflowers for the summer. We had the sunflowers about 10 years ago and they were so fun!

We need some shade loving, water loving plants if anyone has any suggestions. Our yard has a swampy area. We’ve replaced most of the grass with clover which does well but something that really sucks up the water would be nice.

[treedimensional]

My garden of trees, shrubs, and perennials comes back every year. I go to the store for fresh produce. I'm fortunate to have many organic local food options close to my house, and I'm also fortunate that my garden has matured and become shadier as the climate becomes hotter.
I definitely don't have time or desire to grow anything that needs frequent maintenance and replanting. I have focused on creating food and habitat for insects and birds because they can't go to the store, and humans keep destroying their food and homes and making them extinct.

[nicolewi]

@sameoldstory, we had that one year with gourds! It was so cool! Left old gourds out in fall, and some sprouted in spring. It was before we landscaped the front after some work on the house, so I let them grow. It was like Jack & the Beanstalk out there! The plants got HUGE HUGE and we ended up getting tons of different gourds. It was so cool. We gave away a bunch in fall and they were so pretty.

[wildrice]

Mar 20, 2021 8:00:53 GMT -5 melmaria said:

Anyone know what I could possibly hope to successfully plant in a backyard that gets almost no sun? 😕

I’ve always wanted to try a *small* raised box garden, but our backyard is on the east side of our house and our house casts a pretty big shadow in the afternoon.

We have the same problem. I have no idea what to do with our yard in general. It's small and completely unfinished. In my ideal world I'd have multiple veggie gardens and a few other plants, but I'm afraid everything will fail due to the low sun. 

I've heard lettuces do well in low light, and maybe some of the root veggies would do ok? Sorry I'm not more helpful, I'll be curious if anyone else has suggestions!

[lilac05]

Mar 19, 2021 13:54:55 GMT -5 ssmjlm said:

I think I'm going to get one of the raised planters like this: smile.amazon.com/Keter-238699-Elevated-Garden-Anthracite/dp/B07D7SNCF8/ref=bmx_10?pd_rd_w=9TvCi&pf_rd_p=c56dadeb-1250-4595-be05-dacedfb0eeb2&pf_rd_r=DNBG37KTK6700E58SQA3&pd_rd_r=db06c74f-58fe-4d16-a8a7-10ee5699f08f&pd_rd_wg=ROGsf&pd_rd_i=B07D7SNCF8&th=1

We have a lot of deer, just spotted the fox again, plus sometimes rabbits and turtles. I think if I do this, then I can put it closer to our patio and hopefully it won't get completely eaten.

We had two of those last year. We attempted to put some fencing up around them to keep the deer out, but we just called them the Deer Buffets. I messed up the self-watering part anyway, so nothing was very successful, but anything that was growing was eaten. I’m open to any/all deer deterrent tricks! These were about 10’ from my house and in the middle of our rocked fire pit area. (There’s plenty of natural green space and a creek behind our house with lots of food options for them...but they prefer my garden and flowers...including the pot that is literally on my front doorstep.)

[mrsukyankee]

Leafy veg do tend to do okay in shady areas as long as there is a bit of sun that reaches them (it doesn't have to be direct, just not so shaded that it's super dark. I've also had success with some root veg, like garlic and beets.

[sandandsea]

Mar 19, 2021 13:30:05 GMT -5 @sameoldstory said:

Mar 16, 2021 18:23:37 GMT -5 sandandsea said:

We will be planting some cantaloupe and watermelon seeds. Doubt we will actually grow any fruit but the boys want to try.

I once grew "driveway cantaloupe". In my old house, the asphalt for the driveway went right up to the foundation of my house, but it was kind of separated. I had seen what I thought was a weed growing, but never pulled it. Well, good thing I didn't, because it ended up being cantaloupe and we got several fruits from that plant. Only thing I can figure is that some animals got in to my trash and inadvertently spread the seed. So there you go, cantaloupe is so easy you can grow it by accident LOL

This is reassuring. The 4yo picked cantaloupe and wants to the whole front yard into a garden. He’s very into it.

[dutchgirl678]

Last year I started some tomato plants from seeds but I wasn't very successful. The few plants that grew big enough, I put outside too soon and they died when it got too cold. The other plants never really took off. I then bought some plants from a local farm and put them in the ground in May and they did awesome. I kept some seeds from some of them so I might try again this year, but if it doesn't work I will just buy those starter plants again. Last year I also planted a marionberry plant and it looks like one new stalk is growing this year. I have never had much luck with other vegetables, so I will probably stick to 5 or 6 different tomato plants again.

[treedimensional]

If you need shade plants advice, there are many options, but please post your zone or location.
melmaria, wildrice,

[wildrice]

Mar 28, 2021 9:03:21 GMT -5 treedimensional said:

If you need shade plants advice, there are many options, but please post your zone or location.
melmaria, wildrice,

Thanks so much! I am in the Baltimore metro area which i think is zone 7.

[simpsongal]

We've got Cicada brood X coming in May....not sure if that will kill young veggies...

[treedimensional]

Mar 29, 2021 15:26:36 GMT -5 melmaria said:

Mar 28, 2021 9:03:21 GMT -5 treedimensional said:

If you need shade plants advice, there are many options, but please post your zone or location.
melmaria , wildrice ,

I'm zone 4b.

www.gardeningknowhow.com/garden-how-to/gardening-by-zone/zone-4/zone-4-shade-loving-plants.htm

[treedimensional]

Mar 28, 2021 9:29:09 GMT -5 wildrice said:

Mar 28, 2021 9:03:21 GMT -5 treedimensional said:

If you need shade plants advice, there are many options, but please post your zone or location.
melmaria , wildrice ,

Thanks so much! I am in the Baltimore metro area which i think is zone 7.

www.gardeningknowhow.com/garden-how-to/gardening-by-zone/zone-7/zone-7-shade-plants.htm