Planting Time!

I am excited and exhausted to say that Jeff and I got our garden planted this past Memorial Day weekend! I woke him up out of a sound sleep Saturday morning around eight by shaking him and announcing that today was finally planting day!!! He was just thrilled, but after two cups of coffee and a reminder of how amazing the produce will be, he got going. We set up all the seedlings from our inside garden on our patio table. This year we started most of our plants by seeds which we kept in a small table top greenhouse in front of a south facing window in our living room. We also had six trays of seedlings which I took in and out everything day before and after work. (Thanks goodness we were finally planting since I was sick of having to do that, and I am sure my neighbors were done with seeing me in my PJs flailing around with seed trays every morning!) We believe in using a slow release fertilizer once for the season so we spread that over the entire garden surface and began digging in all the plants.

Turning the entire garden surface (thank goodness we registered for a pitch fork for our wedding), individually digging all the holes for the plants, and watering for our new 20 by 30 ft garden ended up taking the two of us most of the weekend. However, now that everything is in, the rest of the garden maintenance is not as time consuming until harvest!

I had fears that the lasagna garden (see post explaining lasagna gardening here) wouldn't work somehow, once we started to plant... did I get enough dirt? would the cardboard rip up as we planted? etc. However, it worked out just fine. Towards the outer edges the layer of dirt was a bit thin, but we planted marigolds there (to keep away pesky animals) so we weren't too concerned with making sure those were perfectly transplanted.

This year in our zone 5b garden we have planted:
Two varieties of heirloom corn
Four varieties (two heirlooms) of tomatoes
Tomatillos
Eggplant
Spinach
Cucumbers
Red Onions
Three varieties of peppers
Purple bell peppers
Red bell peppers
Asparagus
Black beans
Green beans
Lemon Balm
Dill
Rosemary
Mint
Stevia
Tarragon
Quinioa
Purple hull-less barley (for chicken feed)
Purple Adirondack potatoes

Command Central- Garden Plan on graph paper and seedlings galore!

Our new "lasagna" garden

The black raspberries!

The garlic we planted last fall

The grape vines

Aquaponic Mishap 2

While I did make a fatal flaw in the aquaponic system I didn't mess it up in the way I thought I did! So today I was at our local home brew/hydroponic store (Yeah, isn't that cool?) I was asking about their pumps after my last aquaponic post where we thought I had left out a pump (see post here.) I ended up chatting with the girl who low and behold turned out to be a aquaponic major at a local college. (Yes they do have such a thing...I was just as surprised to learn that.) She was great! Turns out that I am okay with out pumping the water out of the tank onto the plants since the air pump makes the water (with the poop when is dissolves) mist onto the bottom of the plants. So instead of buying a new water pump all I had to get was a a tube for my air pump to make sure the mist spreads around all the plants.  My big mistake was is putting perlite as my growing medium. Fish will eat the perlite and can't pass it which eventually kills them. I am going to have to grow my plants in just the pea gravel. Lets hope I can transfer my seedlings to the just pea gravel pots because I would hate to lose that growth.

The fish in the bag they came in. I had them waiting overnight so the temperatures would adjust to avoid shocking them.

Aren't they cute?

Freedom! I let them into the big tank this morning, and I am glad to say not one of the died overnight!

Garlic Planting

One of the many garlic seeds I planted today. You can see a little of the cider making pulp that we are using as fertilizer also.

Chicken bedding instead of straw to keep the garlic warm over the winter. (Yes that is my Halloween pumpkin in the background that we threw in the garden to compost over the winter.)

Sadly it is that time of year to plant cold crops so today we put in our garlic for next Spring. My dad got us the garlic from a local farmer's market. He wrote on each bulb what kind of garlic it is but the marker blurred so I have no idea what I am planting! Hope we like it! Lacking straw to put over the garlic like you are supposed to do I put old chicken pen bedding over. I figure it will keep  it warm like the straw would and the chicken poop will be fertilizer- bonus! Lets hope this garlic works out.

Food Security and Safety

Shucking beans and our all from our garden meal

11/8/10- Last winter Jeff started making homemade bread and it became quite the hobby for him. My mom got him a breadmaker and things really took off. I do see his point in understanding where your food comes from and to know what is in it. Today for dinner I enjoyed some homemade egg bread (thanks chickens) and homemade cider. It felt so warm and yummy it almost didn’t make me sad winter is coming. Today my LED grow light came. The light is all red and blue for optimal plant growth but it makes my living room look like a bad nightclub! I will have to figure out how to hang it also. If I am not careful the cops might knock on my door to see what kind of plants are growing in my house!

Garden Set Up

5/29/10 Have to take a break from the chickens today and put in this year’s garden. Sadly this means we are covering up the biggest chicken dust bath in history! Jeff and I will have to find their favorite treat of worms from somewhere else in the yard now.