Starting the Vegetable Garden
The wind howled yesterday and I'm not exaggerating. Our little power predictor measured the wind speed at 50 mph at one point in the afternoon. Sitting inside, it felt as if the house must be leaning under the force of the wind!
This morning, we awoke to still, brisk air and blue skies! It was like heaven after yesterday. We rushed to get through our morning routine and get outside to do gardening!
We have eight raised beds for our vegetable garden built by Roy. Most of them are 3 feet tall, four feet wide, and eight feet long, filled with soil. They are easier to keep weeds out of and you don't have to bend over or walk through the rows of plants. We'll probably have nine by the end of the day (he builds more every summer because the garden never seems to hold as many plants as he wants to grow).
We have two beds that are permanently dedicated, one with strawberries and the other with raspberries and blackberries. We started another bed a month ago with lettuce, swiss chard, and spinach . . .
Our leafy-green bed looks a little rough because the chickens like scratching around the edges looking for bugs.
This morning, we planted the other five beds.
The bean bed. Those are soaker hoses going between the rows.
The squash and melon beds - two of them because we like a large variety of squashes. Roy plants these in mounds. Melise thought it was hide-n-seek because she kept trying to take each mound apart to find the seeds again. Roy also planted a row of corn down the middle.
The very attractive tomato and pepper bed. Roy started these plants under lights in our basement. Roy laid down the red plastic in the bed first - it keeps weeds down and helps retain water in the soil. It is biodegradable, so throughout the year it will get ripped apart and be almost non-existent by next summer. He cut slits in the plastic then planted the little seedlings in the slits. We placed cans with the bottoms cut out around each plant. The cans protect the young plants from wind and hail. The lids are angled toward the dominant wind direction, which is the likely direction that hail will come from. Hail will hit the lid and close the can, further protecting the plant.
The last bed was a variety of plants, like eggplant and okra. It looks just like the tomato bed except that the plastic is black.
There are forty more plants in our basement for the ninth bed. I'm wondering who's going to eat all these veggies . . .
Melise was a handful while we planted the garden. She spilled seeds, dug up seeds, pulled up my leafy greens, and tried to dismantle a blackberry bush. Finally, we introduced her to the chives that are blooming. There was little chance that she could do damage to the chives or that they could do her harm either.
Notice the purple petals on her chin? She didn't think they tasted very good . . .
Before I go, I just wanted to update you that the eggs are not yet hatching. I told Roy that I was expecting them to start rocking any moment now. He said that when he looked in once, he thought one was rocking, but then he thought it was just because he had bumped the table . . . can you tell that we are anxiously awaiting our newborns?
This morning, we awoke to still, brisk air and blue skies! It was like heaven after yesterday. We rushed to get through our morning routine and get outside to do gardening!
We have eight raised beds for our vegetable garden built by Roy. Most of them are 3 feet tall, four feet wide, and eight feet long, filled with soil. They are easier to keep weeds out of and you don't have to bend over or walk through the rows of plants. We'll probably have nine by the end of the day (he builds more every summer because the garden never seems to hold as many plants as he wants to grow).
We have two beds that are permanently dedicated, one with strawberries and the other with raspberries and blackberries. We started another bed a month ago with lettuce, swiss chard, and spinach . . .
Our leafy-green bed looks a little rough because the chickens like scratching around the edges looking for bugs.
This morning, we planted the other five beds.
The bean bed. Those are soaker hoses going between the rows.
The squash and melon beds - two of them because we like a large variety of squashes. Roy plants these in mounds. Melise thought it was hide-n-seek because she kept trying to take each mound apart to find the seeds again. Roy also planted a row of corn down the middle.
The very attractive tomato and pepper bed. Roy started these plants under lights in our basement. Roy laid down the red plastic in the bed first - it keeps weeds down and helps retain water in the soil. It is biodegradable, so throughout the year it will get ripped apart and be almost non-existent by next summer. He cut slits in the plastic then planted the little seedlings in the slits. We placed cans with the bottoms cut out around each plant. The cans protect the young plants from wind and hail. The lids are angled toward the dominant wind direction, which is the likely direction that hail will come from. Hail will hit the lid and close the can, further protecting the plant.
The last bed was a variety of plants, like eggplant and okra. It looks just like the tomato bed except that the plastic is black.
There are forty more plants in our basement for the ninth bed. I'm wondering who's going to eat all these veggies . . .
Melise was a handful while we planted the garden. She spilled seeds, dug up seeds, pulled up my leafy greens, and tried to dismantle a blackberry bush. Finally, we introduced her to the chives that are blooming. There was little chance that she could do damage to the chives or that they could do her harm either.
Notice the purple petals on her chin? She didn't think they tasted very good . . .
Before I go, I just wanted to update you that the eggs are not yet hatching. I told Roy that I was expecting them to start rocking any moment now. He said that when he looked in once, he thought one was rocking, but then he thought it was just because he had bumped the table . . . can you tell that we are anxiously awaiting our newborns?
Posted by Susan at May 25, 2010 
Categories: Rural Living
Tags: phillips county raised bed colorado wind power predictor vegetable garden
Categories: Rural Living
Tags: phillips county raised bed colorado wind power predictor vegetable garden
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