A Hard Days Work

Today I put in a lot of work in my garden plots. I started the morning by picking up compost at a city compost center, which is free to residents. I filled my husbands eight foot truck bed 3/4 full with compost. My arms felt like jello by the time we were done and then we had to off load it at the garden. My one plot is divided into four large raised beds and a strawberry patch. I started tilling the raised beds and then added the fresh compost. I will be planting two of the beds with tomatoes and the other two will be planted with winter squash and pumpkins. I thought I lost my strawberry plants from the extremely cold winter we had, but to my surprise they are growing nicely. Last weekend I spent time weeding and cleaning up the strawberry bed. I also moved some of the new plants from last years runners to fill in empty spots. Today I also planted 16 broccoli plants, 6 Chinese cabbages and 4 Deadon cabbages. The garlic, onions and shallots are all growing nicely. I am growing yellow, purple and green snow peas this year and they are also growing nicely. The sugar snap peas I planted did not germinate because I think a rodent dug them up and ate them. I only see two seeds that germinated and the rest of the ground is dug up along the fence where I planted them. It was a very tiring day, but very productive. I always say that getting your garden ready for the season is tiring hard work, but I love to stand back and admire the end product. I am really enjoying the spring flowers, they make me happy.  Happy Gardening!

Compost pile

 

Raised bed that is tilled and composted

 

Strawberry bed

Snow Peas

Deadon Cabbage

Elephant Garlic

Soloist and Bilko Chinese Cabbage



Asian Veggies

This year I am growing a variety of Asian Vegetables. Last year I attempted growing Bok Choy and Chinese (Napa) Cabbage. They were both attacked by slugs, flea beetles or they bolted. This year I plan on using floating row covers and heat resistant varieties. I already started my Chinese Cabbage indoors and I will be transplanting them this weekend into the garden. I also plan on sowing seeds for the other Asian Veggies this weekend. These are the varieties I will be growing this year:

Soloist Chinese Cabbage
Bilko Chinese Cabbage
Michihili Cabbage (Fall crop)
Pechay Bok Choy
Chinese Kale
Choy Sum
Chinese Leek Flowering
Purple Pak Choi (Fall crop)
Malabar Spinach Red Vine

These are my Chinese Cabbage seedlings.

Spring Garden Update

I haven't been very attentive to my blog lately, I have been busy in my garden finally. It is nice to be back working in the garden again. I also have been busy transplanting my tomato seedlings into there own cups. I think I over did it with how many seeds I planted this year. Oh well, I guess I will have some to share with my gardening friends. So far the things planted down at my garden are Snow Peas, Sugar Snap Peas, Spinach and Onion sets. I plan on sowing my carrots, lettuce, kale, pac choi and beets this week. As far as transplanting I will be adding broccoli, cabbage and Chinese cabbage to the garden this week. On Saturday I planted some Pansies in my flower bed outside my fence to add some more color. Yesterday I went down to check on things and half of them were pulled out of the ground and chewed up. I was so angry! Lesson learned, no Pansies next year outside my fence. If anyone has been wondering, I am taking a break from "Tomato Tuesday" for now until this seasons varieties start producing. Here are some pictures of my seedlings.

Broccoli, Cauliflower, Cabbage & Chinese Cabbage

Arcadia Broccoli

Bilko & Soloist Chinese Cabbage

Peppers

Eggplant

Tomatoes

More Tomatoes

Ground Cherries

 

Thanks for stopping by and checking out what is going on in my garden. Happy Gardening!