As I mentioned last spring, I am somewhat
handicapped but I love to garden. I am seeking out an easier way. Here are the
results so far:
How the large plants did: Corn, okra, watermelon, broccolli, sunflowers, 3 patches of mustard greens, and peppers.
As I mentioned last spring, I had my son help me roll out woven greenhouse flooring and I punched holes every 3 feet. This was not its intended purpose as I am not using it in a greenhouse, but in my outside garden.
More than one seed was put in each hole. It is working very well: only the pepprs are doing badly and that might be the record breaking heat. It might also be because the peppers are at the edge of the garden: they might be getting watered less.
The okra is doing exceptionally well: there are 4 holes of okra planted, with 1-3 plants in each. We are getting more okra than my family of 4 can eat. The mineature watermelons (Hime Kansen variety, from Kitazawa seeds) have been picked twice, and the plants look healthy enough to set more melons.
Tomatos and potatos.
I have gotten mixed results from the potatos, so I am not sure what to say. I will give an update this fall.
Tomatos are doing very well. Every now and then I take string with me when I care for the chickens, and I tie up a couple of branches. This is AMOST enough:not quite. However, the tomatos are delicious and I am not losing many to rot as very few are toucing the ground. The kids are snacking on the tomatos, and I am also cutting them into the salads. We are pretty much keeping them eaten. HOWEVER, the heat is hurting the pollination of the current crop of flowers: in a few weeks we might be low on tomatos! That is a problem for the future, however.
The small plants that must be weeded did:
How the large plants did: Corn, okra, watermelon, broccolli, sunflowers, 3 patches of mustard greens, and peppers.
As I mentioned last spring, I had my son help me roll out woven greenhouse flooring and I punched holes every 3 feet. This was not its intended purpose as I am not using it in a greenhouse, but in my outside garden.
More than one seed was put in each hole. It is working very well: only the pepprs are doing badly and that might be the record breaking heat. It might also be because the peppers are at the edge of the garden: they might be getting watered less.
The okra is doing exceptionally well: there are 4 holes of okra planted, with 1-3 plants in each. We are getting more okra than my family of 4 can eat. The mineature watermelons (Hime Kansen variety, from Kitazawa seeds) have been picked twice, and the plants look healthy enough to set more melons.
Tomatos and potatos.
I have gotten mixed results from the potatos, so I am not sure what to say. I will give an update this fall.
Tomatos are doing very well. Every now and then I take string with me when I care for the chickens, and I tie up a couple of branches. This is AMOST enough:not quite. However, the tomatos are delicious and I am not losing many to rot as very few are toucing the ground. The kids are snacking on the tomatos, and I am also cutting them into the salads. We are pretty much keeping them eaten. HOWEVER, the heat is hurting the pollination of the current crop of flowers: in a few weeks we might be low on tomatos! That is a problem for the future, however.
The small plants that must be weeded did:
As I had said in an earier post, an assortment of
small plants were put in a raised bed with weed barrier below, perlite above,
and a little fertilizer. Those plants did not come on as quickly as they would
have if I had planted them in the dirt, but they are producing. The wind did
bring weed seeds and it was hard to get them out wthout injuring the roots of
the vegetables. My yield was about 3/4 of what I would have gotten if I had
planted them in the ground, but if I had had to plan them into the ground I might
not have gotten any harvest as I can no longer dig the roots up! I have harvested quite a few
salad greens, and some raw carrots to munch on while I am outside. There are good looking beets in there, but as I do not cook beets very well I am using the greens for salads.
I also have flowers: California poppys are doing wonderfully well and they are still blooming, and I also got anenomes.
Weeds.
3/4 of my garden is weed free. I got a little grass when the wind blew seeds onto the top of the woven greenhouse flooring and the grass got some roots through when it rained, but I pulled the few weeds out when they were small and they have not come back. Unfortunately, where I did not get them when they were small, I now have long grass in about 1/4 of the garden. I am smothering that out, with reasonable success.
That is my vegetable garden so far.
I have planted the garden, watered it, and I have picked: that is all the work I have done. other than pullin a few weeds int he spring that is almost all that I have done, and the garden is doing wonderfully well. The rest of the work was just little things like tying up the tomatos as they grow. I had to weed a little as the grass seed was blown onto the top of the woven greenhouse flooring, but I did not get all of it and so I am smothering out some long grass with scraps of carpet, which does work. On the whole I am pleased with my no work garden. It has not really turned out to be NO work, but since I have not particularly had to weed it sure seems like it!
I also have flowers: California poppys are doing wonderfully well and they are still blooming, and I also got anenomes.
Weeds.
3/4 of my garden is weed free. I got a little grass when the wind blew seeds onto the top of the woven greenhouse flooring and the grass got some roots through when it rained, but I pulled the few weeds out when they were small and they have not come back. Unfortunately, where I did not get them when they were small, I now have long grass in about 1/4 of the garden. I am smothering that out, with reasonable success.
That is my vegetable garden so far.
I have planted the garden, watered it, and I have picked: that is all the work I have done. other than pullin a few weeds int he spring that is almost all that I have done, and the garden is doing wonderfully well. The rest of the work was just little things like tying up the tomatos as they grow. I had to weed a little as the grass seed was blown onto the top of the woven greenhouse flooring, but I did not get all of it and so I am smothering out some long grass with scraps of carpet, which does work. On the whole I am pleased with my no work garden. It has not really turned out to be NO work, but since I have not particularly had to weed it sure seems like it!
Sounds wonderful !!
ReplyDeleteWe're having those same heat-related problems...but my garden is still producing for the most part.
Have you ever had pickled okra? That's one thing I do with it every year...also dehydrate it to use in soups. I plant it every year
Pickled okra? I have heard of it bt I am afraid to taste it! LOL!
ReplyDeleteI dislike the texture of okra as it is slimy to me. That is why I fry it. The one thing that the crunchy outer coating does is that it makes okra taste juicy instead of slimy! I can then enjoy the flavor!