Thursday, February 4, 2010

Gardening on the Brain

Just a couple weeks ago the weather was warm and spring-feeling. It certainly got me thinking about the garden! I'm beginning to wonder, though, how soon we'll be able to do this:


When we keep getting this!!:

This past Saturday we had another snow-storm dump a nice 14" on us. It is absolutely beautiful and Daniel and I both love winter and snow :) We haven't had snow like this since we've been married, and supposedly it's been quite a bit longer than that since our area has had 2 big snow falls in one winter.

With the incredibly wet November (Yay! We were sooooo dry.), more rain and 18" of snow in December, another 14" of snow this past weekend and calling for more rain/snow this weekend/next week... I'm not sure we'll be getting into the garden as early as I'd hoped. Goes to show why you should never base your plans on what the weather is "usually" like!

I would like to plant peas this year (we missed last year and have missed having peas in the freezer) and because our springs/summers usually get so hot so fast, we have to plant them pretty early so they have a chance to mature and bear before the heat gets them. The last week of February was the till and plant date I was hoping for, no later than the 2nd week of March. Our soil does not drain very well, and even though our garden is at the top of our property, it can stay saturated in some areas for quite a while. We will just have to wait and see :) We have planted peas in mud before, perhaps we'll just do it again this year!

How about you, are you getting your gardening ducks in a row yet? Perhaps this will be your first year or you've done it for as long as you can remember. Feel free to ask questions or share tips in the comments section! I love to hear what my readers are up to :)

8 comments:

Cate said... [Reply to comment]

I am dying to garden, but it's just not feasible with renting...we're considering planting some herbs and maybe a few low-key vegetables (any ideas on what those would be? haha), since our landlord doesn't really care, but as we intend to move in 17 months or so, our options are limited.

Miriam said... [Reply to comment]

Cate, a friend of mine does all of her gardening in pots on her front porch as they don't really have a yard suitable for gardening. Some veggies you could do would be tomatoes, beans (the pole variety would probably work best), peppers, leafy greens (spinach, lettuce). You could probably find some books on container gardening or square foot gardening that would lend great insight into growing veggies in a little bit of dirt :)

Unknown said... [Reply to comment]

I grew up in the country and we always had a garden. I miss it. Now we live in suburbia with only 1/3 acre lot, so not much room. I did container gardening last year with some success - tomatoes (in a topsy turvy grower) and cucumbers. This year, I really want to have zucchini. I hate buying zucchini, even at the farmer's market they are SMALL compared what we grew at home!

I'm looking forward to more gardening and we are also signing up for a CSA this year - bring on the fresh goodness!

Sally said... [Reply to comment]

Hmmm...I am not thinking about gardening, except it has crossed my mind not to have one. I think I will have one though, and hopefully it will go well. We are still covered with snow, so there's no itching to get out there.

Cate said... [Reply to comment]

I might do that...I'd love to grow some tomatoes, especially. They're pricey at the farmer's market, and that way we could put some up for the winter! Seems like I'm always buying canned tomatoes when they're out of season.

Candi said... [Reply to comment]

We planted our first real vegetable garden last year. I planted in June and July! What a crazy idea but it actually turned out pretty good. We got 4 ears of corn, cucumbers and lots of green beans. We planted tomatoes in big green pots I picked up at Walmart for $5, two of them did really good and we got a few little tomatoes. I'm going to try lettuce and spinach this year. We did some seed testing last week that was fun for my daugther. Can you tell I'm ready too?!?! I agree, winter can drag some times, but it's nice to get the cold weather to kill off the mosquitoes. I hope you do some canning tutorials. I really want to learn more about.

Katie said... [Reply to comment]

When I first glanced at this post and saw the first picture I was thinking that you guys were starting your garden already! lol

This year I am definately making my garden smaller! Last year my father-in-law brought his tractor to our house and tilled my garden area and made it waaaayy bigger than I was expecting...since I had all that space tilled I figured that I better fill it ALL! Turned out to be more work than I could handle!

Just going to stick with the basics this year and not do too much experimenting...corn, green beans, peas, squash, carrots, etc. I am hoping to sweet talk my dh into helping me rig up some kind of fence to keep the deer out. This year I would like to actually can some green beans and not feed them all to the deer!

It's so fun to read about other people's garden plans...good luck to everyone!

Judi B said... [Reply to comment]

I so need to organize my thoughts and get some seed. I think I need to start a few plants soon. I told myself that I really wanted some spring crops this year.