Things are moving along SLOOOOOOWLY in the garden department but still, slow progress is better than no progress. Four cubic yards of soil mix will be delivered tomorrow afternoon to the front yard which will need to be carted load by load to the beds in the backyard (fun times ahead haha) and I'm still scrambling to find boxes to line the bottom of the beds. August will be planting time and I'll leave a list here of what can be planted, companion plants that will go with them, as well as what has gone well or not in my yard so far. Let's go!
- Beets-Grew these once and ate the greens, they did pretty well. Now that I know about and can make borscht, these might come more in handy!
- Broccoli-These do well but take up a lot of space for not as much return. I'm on the fence.
- Brussel Sprouts-Really want to eat these but I think they are space hogs. We'll see.
- Cabbage-These didn't do as well. Had some pest problems and the heads were smaller.
- Carrots-Carrots went crazy and I had so many! I don't eat raw carrots though so they only get cut and put in the freezer for soups. Still had too many though so if I grow these, I'll plant less.
- Cauliflower
- Celery
- Collards-My yard loves growing collards. They go nuts and I can count on eating tons of these dark leafy greens every time I plant them. These are a definite yes!
- Green Onions-These do pretty well if my memory serves me. I remember going out in the mornings to get them and add them to my scrambled eggs.
- Turnips
- Chinese Cabbage
- Kale
- Mustard
- Strawberries-These did pretty well if I remember but I didn't have enough of them.(can be planted Sept.15-Oct. 15)
I'd like to make homemade kimchi again this year so I may try Chinese Cabbage this time instead. Also, I love strawberries so I'm saving an entire bed for strawberries which will be planted in September. They do well with green onions so they'll be there as well and this time they'll be sitting on a blanket of straw so no strawberries will find themselves rotting in the dirt. No strawberry left behind!!
Companion plants for everything include:
- Garlic
- Chives
- Chamomile (If I plant this, I'll look into using some to make myself some tea :))
- Summer Savory
- Pigweed (What is this?)
- Thistle
- Catnip
- Hyssop
- Dill (?)
- Mint (More tea!)
- Nasturtium
- Southernwood
- Tansy
- Thyme
Other than that, lots and lots of marigolds! This time around I'm going bigger on flowers. They help a lot with pests and I sometimes skimp a little because I don't want to spend the money so I'll be trying to pack things in a bit more this time around to see how that works. I want full and bushy beds like this!!
Seed order will be made soon as well as the list of what will need to be picked up from the plant nursery. At some point I will also need to figure out how I want to work resting the beds. Growing seasons are year round here but I can't keep hammering out plants season after season in every bed. I can either...
- Pick one main season to grow things each year in all the beds and use the other season to grow a cover crop, something like what is done up north.
- Use half the beds to grow one season and half the beds to grow the other season, with cover crops being grown in between.
- Use three beds at all times but rotate each season so that the fourth bed will always have a crop each season.
With so little space already I hate taking anything out of commission but its got to be done I guess. Anyway, I'm thinking on that.
Off to start my day!
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