Since it has been raining so much and we haven't been able to plant anything or fear of it washing away we have been planning. We did get the cold frame planted before the rain hit! So we are waiting on that now. Hopefully all the rain is good for it.
I found a nice little tool that calculates exactly how many of each kind of plant you will need to be self sufficient. Its great and kind of daunting if you plug in peas or beans for a family of 5 like ours.
Now I'm guessing that this is for the length of the season, or until you pull the veggies out of the garden, like carrots.
Here is the list of how many plants we need:
100 pole beans
15 broccoli 30 Corns 100 Peas 20 Spinaches
75 carrots 10 Cucumbers 10 Hot Peppers and
15 cauliflowers 15 Kales 15 Strawberries 5 Pumpkins
20 celery 20 Lettuces 20 Tomatoes
20 chives 10 Melons 35 Radishes
So I know I've got the carrots, cauliflower corn, cucumbers (by 5 x's that), tomatoes (just barely), and radishes. Lettuces are really over covered and we may be giving away alot peppers should keep my dad making his dip for this winter and next I think without this we did pretty well! But it was still fun to see and know that we did something right just by chance!
Here is the link.
http://www.vegetablegardenplanner.com/garden_calculators/family_feeder?garden_id=7686
In fact the entire website is awesome and I fully intend to start using it. It offeres a garden journal, where you can upload pics and keep your thoughts on it. A To Do List where you can keep your ducks all lined up! Its got way more stuff that I'm just gonna play with. Registration is free so there is nothing to lose. So here goes!
here is a link to the tour and some of the features it offers.
http://www.vegetablegardenplanner.com/tour
Sunday, April 3, 2011
OK...
So we spent the weekend fine tuning and laying out our garden. Much to my dismay this included cutting down 2 more trees! I hate cutting down trees!!!! Poor Andy had a hard time of it because I gave him and my dad crap about it the whole time! Needless to say the tress are down and one of our fence posts is now 5 inches shorter then the rest of the fence! The tree fell wrong and hit it and drove it down. ARG!
That took most of Saturday. The first part of the day was taken up with attending the first outdoor Farmers Market of the year! We bought 2 pea plants, because our pea starts are not looking so good. The rest of the day was spent cutting down the trees and planning the garden. We are doing a combination of square foot gardening and traditional gardening. Below is a link that explains more fully what Square Foot Gardening is. It is ideal for small spaces and limited space.
Basically what you do is lay out the garden in 1 square foot sections and plant. This is very similar to the way many Native American tribes planted in clumps and with veggies that are benificial to eachother. This is called Companion Planting and what it does is let the plants that benefit eachother naturally through either attracting or repelling bugs or the chemicals that each plant needs the other one is ok with that. Its a really nice old idea that has a name. Most of our grandparents know this without reading a book, or website and I'm sure there are several farmers, of all kinds, in heaven laughing at me as I typed up my garden plan so pretty. But it works for me.
So this was much more time consuming then I thought. Cause guess what? You can't plant corn next to tomatoes, or broccoli next to watermelon, or peppers next to tomatoes, or cauliflower next to anything but lettuce!!! Oh my gosh! Its nuts! Companion planting is nuts but hopefully it will pay off in the end. Here is a look at how it will look. We hope!!!!!!!!!! Below is another link to a tool that was awesome for most of the plants we chose to grow. The entire website is awesome so you should check it out!
Today was all kinds of crazy and didn't get to the garden at all except to water the plants! We still have to lay out our squares because I'm gonna be a little nuts about my space because lets face it I'm that way! But tomorrow provided the rain doesn't come will be planting day.
That took most of Saturday. The first part of the day was taken up with attending the first outdoor Farmers Market of the year! We bought 2 pea plants, because our pea starts are not looking so good. The rest of the day was spent cutting down the trees and planning the garden. We are doing a combination of square foot gardening and traditional gardening. Below is a link that explains more fully what Square Foot Gardening is. It is ideal for small spaces and limited space.
Basically what you do is lay out the garden in 1 square foot sections and plant. This is very similar to the way many Native American tribes planted in clumps and with veggies that are benificial to eachother. This is called Companion Planting and what it does is let the plants that benefit eachother naturally through either attracting or repelling bugs or the chemicals that each plant needs the other one is ok with that. Its a really nice old idea that has a name. Most of our grandparents know this without reading a book, or website and I'm sure there are several farmers, of all kinds, in heaven laughing at me as I typed up my garden plan so pretty. But it works for me.
http://www.mysquarefootgarden.net/companion_planting_locked.xls
It is an excel sheet but if you don't have excel she has a pdf file on her site as well. But this is an awesome site.
It is an excel sheet but if you don't have excel she has a pdf file on her site as well. But this is an awesome site.
Today was all kinds of crazy and didn't get to the garden at all except to water the plants! We still have to lay out our squares because I'm gonna be a little nuts about my space because lets face it I'm that way! But tomorrow provided the rain doesn't come will be planting day.
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