The Modern Victory Garden

We have been enjoying a rather balmy spring so far, but the weather forecast for the next several days is for a sudden shift to much colder weather.   This is a typical early spring condition - with abrupt changes in weather that can catch the inattentive gardener by surprise.   To extend the spring season successfully, you have to watch the forecasts and take action as needed to protect young plants from dramatic dips in temperature.        

All of the plants in the greenhouse are cold hardy and protected adequately by the greenhouse envelope with the exception of the super early tomatoes (Siletz) that I have recently moved out to the greenhouse.   I have been transporting them indoors at night and taking them back out to the greenhouse in the early morning, so they will be fine with the forecasted weather change.   The super early tomatoes are really growing well and seem to be happy with the extra attention and handling they are getting.   They are on the right in the first picture below.   Next to them is the sugar snap peas (Cascadia) and lettuces (Super Gourmet Blend) that I seeded yesterday – covered with a humidity dome.   The tray to the far left has the broccoli, swiss chard, and celery starts.   These tomatoes were started January 22nd and are being given extra care and protection so that they will (hopefully) produce a very early crop of tomatoes for me.   They will ultimately be planted in my 4 large black containers and will reside in the greenhouse until the weather really warms up and then move outside to continue growing.

For comparison, the majority of my tomato plants were started three weeks later on February 13th and they look like this right now.                   

Today I transplanted kale (Siberian Improved), pac choi (Ching Chiang), and cabbages (Savoy Ace and Tronchuda) into the garden.   They took up one 4 foot by 4 foot section in the garden bed.   They don’t look like much right now, but they will not take long to get established.                                 

Because we have some cold weather forecasted, it was important to get a grow tunnel cover erected over this newly planted bed.   I actually covered another 8 feet of bed in addition because I intend to plant the broccoli there in about two weeks and want the soil warmed up ahead of time for that.   

The last thing I needed to do today in preparation for the coming cold, was to cover the onion starts I planted out yesterday.   They are in a bed that does not work well for the grow tunnel covers, so I improvised using some of my tall tomato ladders, a panel of stiff wire grid (part of my compost bin sides), a few spring clamps, and plastic sheeting.                                         

I will leave these in place until the weather warms back up and is forecasted to stay that way for the foreseeable future.   Those of you who follow my blog regularly are used to seeing me use these tomato towers frequently for many purposes beyond their intended role as a support for tomatoes.   I find them quite useful to have around!

I think everything is buttoned up for the cold front that is moving in and hopefully the warm weather will return shortly thereafter.

I was previously going to wait until the plants emerged from the seeding process before sharing with you my inaugural use of the new planting jig.   However, that may take quite a while given it is early spring and the soil is cool (which will slow the germination process down considerably) so rather than wait, I have decided that I will just give you an update later on how things progress with the seedlings and give you the initial report now.               

Last Saturday, I gave up on my attempted salvage operation on the bed of overwintered spinach.   I had failed to get it covered with a grow tunnel prior to our deep freeze in December and then (to add insult to significant injury!) the marauding rabbit ate most of what remained of the feeble plants.   My salvage attempt included covering it with a grow tunnel and giving it a drink of fish emulsion tea.   Last weekend, I came to the conclusion that the few plants that had revived were not worth the effort to keep nursing along.   I pulled all of the plants out and composted them.   The grow tunnel cover had definitely warmed up the soil in that particular section of garden though, and it seemed like a great opportunity to just get a very early jump on the sowing of the spring spinach crop.   On Saturday, I did the bed prep necessary to get this 4-foot by 12-foot section of bed ready for direct seeding.   I pulled the grow tunnel cover off long enough to do the re-mineralization (greensand and rock phosphate) and to broadcast the bed area with organic all purpose fertilizer. I used a hoe to cultivate it all into the top six inches of soil - removing any remaining plants and weeds as I went.   Before putting the grow tunnel cover back on, I raked and watered the bed.   Since it has been covered for over a month now, it was getting dried out.   The next day I came back and checked the soil temperature in the bed and it was almost 50 degrees at about 10 am.   I needed it to be at least 45 degrees before I would consider planting it up with spinach.   

So Sunday morning, I did a final smoothing and raking process and used one of my new planting jigs (the four inch spaced one) to plant the spring spinach patch.   It is always important when planting seeds directly in the garden to get the seedbed as smooth and clod free as possible.                                

Before getting underway with the seeding, I brought out the planting jig and my regular 2-foot by 2-foot plywood board that I use for firming in seeds when doing a block planting process.                                            

I used the planting jig to then press out 2-foot by 2-foot sections of 4 inch spaced planting holes down the bed on both sides – 9 spaces per square foot.   Each jig impression provided 36 seeding holes and there were 12 of them to cover the entire surface of the 4-foot by 12-foot section of bed, which calculates out to 432 individual planting holes!                                      

I then just placed a seed (sometimes two) in each hole.   Once the seeds were in the jig holes, I smoothed the surface slightly with my gloved hand to fill in the top of the holes and then used the 2-foot by 2-foot piece of plywood to firm down and ensure good seed contact with the soil.                            

The last step was to water the bed well using warm water and then putting the grow tunnel cover back on.                                                  

It took me just a half hour to plant up this entire bed and the jig worked beautifully.   My only concern is that with smaller seeds (like these spinach seeds) I may be ending up with the seed too deep.   I will have to be particularly light handed with the really small seeds like carrots when making the impressions in the soil.   All in all though, I am very happy with this design. 

So there you have it!   The next candidate planting for the new jigs will be the big pea patch for 2010.   The soil temp is good enough to plant right now, and the forecast is for a really beautiful weekend coming up so I probably get this underway soon too - using the 2 inch spaced planter for that one.   Things are really getting underway now!

Spent a few hours puttering in the garden, shop, and greenhouse today.   The weather is overcast but generally fairly warm (54 degrees as of 1:30 this afternoon) so it is an ideal day to do some garden chores.   Took care of some routine items such as mixing and turning the compost piles and watering the seedlings in the shop (as well as the crops in the greenhouse) with a fish emulsion tea.   The day length will be creeping up in the days and weeks to come and the various greens will benefit from a shot of light nutrition to help them kick up the growth.             

Another task I got to was a salvage operation for the bed of overwintered spinach.   I planted them last fall in a portion of one of the beds in the newer section of garden – next to a green manure crop of crimson clover.   It’s in the mid-section of the lowest main bed in the following picture.               

I have two problems going on with that planting.   First, the germination was spotty and so there are some fairly large bare patches in the planting area.   Second, the wild rabbit that has been raiding the carrots and the cover crop of crimson clover, has also been mowing down the young spinach plants as well.   Despite all that, there is a good scattering of very young spinach plants in the bed and I want to salvage as much of them as I can for an early spring crop.    The first order of business was to take a few minutes and do some weeding to get rid of large weeds that had gotten a foothold established.   Once the largest of the weeds had been disposed of, I then mixed up some fish emulsion tea and gave the entire bed of tiny spinach starts a quick drench.   The final step was to get them under a grow tunnel cover to protect them from any further rabbit damage and to give them a warmer, more protected environment to encourage new growth.   If you look closely at the next picture, you can actually see the small spinach seedlings in the area that has the PVC hoops set up over it.                          

Over the hoops, some plastic sheeting was then put in place.   I reuse the plastic sheeting over and over again, so it is not always very clean looking.   When it is not in current use, I fold them up like blankets and store them in the shop on a shelf.   The plastic is anchored to the PVC hoops using “A” type clamps that I keep on hand for that purpose.   They are inexpensive and last for years and years.   Occasionally using a little 3 in 1 oil on the springs is a good idea, as they get rusty over time and with exposure to the elements.   These clamps are about due for a little oil treatment.               

Now the bed is under cover and should hopefully be able to rejuvenate and grow on more successfully.                              

In the older section of the garden, I have another grow tunnel cover in place – this one protects the main bed of over wintered parsnips and carrots.        

I opened it up this afternoon long enough to dig up some carrots and parsnips for tonight’s dinner menu.                              

I trimmed the tops and root tips off while still in the garden so I could just toss them directly into the compost pile.   A rinse under the spigot and they were ready to go inside - where they will be peeled and/or scrubbed and then roasted with nothing more than just a drizzle of olive oil and a sprinkle of salt.   

The January King cabbages looked pretty ragged right after our period of deep freezes in December but now they have really bounced back.   The cabbage heads are starting to get some good size on them.                       

Did not get to my shop project this weekend at all.   Decided instead to wait until next weekend to get going with it - since it is a three-day weekend for me and I will have a little more time to devote to it.   Next weekend I will also be getting the first of the 2010 seed starting efforts underway.           

Did a general walk through of the entire garden making a mental note about items that will need some attention in the next several months.

• I have several beds that will need to have compost added to them this spring but unfortunately, I am not going to have enough finished compost to cover all of it.   We expanded the garden fairly significantly last year and I need to increase my compost production to provide for the extra amount of growing beds.
• Around the end of January, I need to turn over the green manure crops of crimson clover to let them have sufficient time to decompose before the beds are needed for planting.
• I have decided to construct some grow beds in the greenhouse – using up leftover timbers from last year’s garden expansion project.   I just barely have enough materials on hand  to do this, and only if I continue using the 3 half whiskey barrels I already have in the greenhouse.  However, going this route will help me avoid the expense of buying 4 more half whiskey barrel planters.

By steadily working on these items over the coming weeks and months, the garden will be ready for the big rush of spring planting without undue wear and tear on me.    I much prefer to pace myself through the various garden chores that need doing each season.     Do you have some "pre season" chores lined up to do this year?

There are many of us who have limited space availability for food production gardening and yet still manage to produce a tremendous amount of our own food supply.   This post is part of a blog series devoted to exploring the many techniques available to optimize food production gardening. There are quite a few topics that relate to this pursuit - including (among others):

• Crop Selection
• Intensive Planting Practices
• Season Extension
• Soil Management & Fertility

Focusing on Crop Selection kicked off the blog series, which was then followed by a four-part exploration of Intensive Planting Practices - including the topics of Raised Beds, Closely Spaced Planting, Intercropping & Succession Planting, and Vertical Growing.   This week let’s talk about Season Extension.

Season extending is essentially the practice of using various tools and techniques to allow for a much earlier start and a much later ending to the growing season.   There are three primary reasons to go to the trouble and effort of extending the garden season:

1. It allows you to grow crops that require more growing days than your area would naturally provide;
2. It provides enough additional growing days that you can plant crops in succession that otherwise would not have sufficient time for the second crop to mature; and
3. It lets you harvest fresh greens and vegetables for much longer than the traditional growing season would allow – throughout the entire year for really cold hardy crops.

My own experience with season extending is that it is most efficient and effective if I work with nature rather than against her.   In addition, I think that you have to be able to accept that there will be losses periodically.   A wise gentleman once told me that if you are not occasionally losing some crops in the early spring and late fall – you are probably not living close enough to the edge on your season extending practices to be getting full value from it.      

Season extension generally uses various forms of protective covers or structures to increase soil and air temperature, protect plants from wind and frost, and reduce moisture loss.   Of these benefits, I believe the greatest value comes from the warming of the soil.   The Rodale Research Center has conducted experiments that show temperatures at the plant’s root zone is more important to growth than air temperature surrounding the leaves.   The ability to provide a warmer environment and soil comes from passive solar heating that is then (in some part) captured by a heat sink (dark soil surface or dark plastic mulch) that absorbs the solar heat more than a light or reflective surface would.   Some folks move beyond passive solar options and actually use a hot bed or greenhouse that has an energy consuming heat source.   While this certainly will yield good results, it is also fuel intensive and can be quite expensive.   For the purposes of getting optimal production and value out of our home vegetable and fruit gardens, I think it is impractical to consider regularly using anything but passive solar options.                                     

The real trick to using unheated season extension is to capture and hold as much solar heat as possible and to grow crops that are by nature already very tolerant of cold conditions.   Cold hardy crops like spinach, kale, corn salad (mache), root crops (beets, parsnips, carrots), brussel sprouts, green onions, leeks, certain cold hardy cabbages, and a variety of less common greens are all really good candidates to be grown late in the season or overwintered with protection.   Similarly in very early spring, you can use protective covers to thaw and warm up garden soil long before the last average frost for your area - so that you can get an extremely early start for hardy vegetables such as peas, onions, Chinese cabbage, lettuce, spinach and kale.   These vegetables will germinate and grow in relatively cool soil temperatures (at least 40 degrees or greater) and often have planting instructions to “sow as soon as you can work the soil”.   I mentioned in another recent blog post that I think there are two simple tools most gardeners should have in their garden shed – one is a PH meter, and the other was a good soil thermometer.  

During the early spring if you are going to push the start of the growing season you really need to be able to monitor the soil temperature to know when it is ready for planting up.   As noted before, the soil temperature is much more important to pay attention to than the ambient air temperature.   Soil temperature should be measured 1 to 3 inches below the surface of the soil and the best time to take the measurement is between noon and 3 pm.   Remember to shake the thermometer back down before you use it again.   If you place a season extending cover over a growing area it will take a while for the soil to warm (days), and it is important to measure the progress with your thermometer periodically so you know when you it is ready for planting up.    

There are many season extending protective covers that can be used ranging from a cloche, cold frame, grow tunnels (also known as portable hoop houses), full size hoop houses, or greenhouses.   Each of these examples of season extending protections provides the benefits previously described - with varying degrees of success.   In general (assuming an equivalent sunlight exposure), the larger the volume of air in the protected area and the more dark surface area available and/or insulating materials used – the greater the warmth will be for the growing area protected.         

I generally use three types of season protecting covers. The first is a simple plastic sheeting cover raised just enough off of the surface of the soil to provide solar heating of the soil for the purposes of warming up a seedbed for a very early planting.   The cover can be left in place after the germination has occurred until the plants get tall enough to push up close to it. Usually by that point the weather has continued to improve enough that they are safe anyway and ready to grow on without the protection of the cover.               

You may recognize my tomato ladders in the preceding picture being used as the support structure for the plastic cover - just laid on their side over the bed edging boards.                       

The second type of protective covers I regularly use are grow tunnels.   I use 10 foot sticks of electrician’s PVC conduit (connector end cut off) inserted into brackets placed on the edge my beds or directly pushed into the soil (inside of the bed edging) to create support hoops.   Over the support hoops I place clear plastic (4 or 6 mil) that you can purchase at any hardware store (usually in the painting supplies area).   I use inexpensive “A” or spring clamps to hold the plastic securely to the hoops.   They last an incredibly long time and make quick removal and access to the growing beds possible.   These same hoop tunnels can also be used during the summer growing season to hold protective bird netting over the grow beds.  This is useful to keep birds and other creatures out of the garden (like bunnies, cats, and dogs).   I use netting regularly to protect my beds from my dog who seems to walk through every newly seeded bed that exists unless protected in this manner!     

I generally use grow tunnels to either protect an overwintered crop (such as a large bed of spinach), protect newly planted seedlings during the early months of the growing season when weather is unstable and the plants are very young and tender, and to warm up large areas of growing bed for early crop starting.                

The third protective cover I regularly use is my unheated green house. During the late fall and winter months, I use it to grow cold hardy crops in large containers.   I generally grow mostly greens in the greenhouse because the larger air volume and greater surface area captures solar energy better and increases the odds of semi-hardy crops like swiss chard, Chinese cabbages, and lettuces of surviving.           

In the spring, I use the unheated greenhouse to grow on the semi-hardy crops that I started under the grow lights very early in the year.   This allows me to move them out of the seed starting area - making room for the next big round of seed starting (usually the summer crops of tomatoes and peppers etc) but protects them from the erratic and unpredictable very early spring weather conditions.             

Using season extension techniques can increase your garden’s production but as much as 25% just by adding 1 to 2 months of growing time at each end of the growing season.   Do you use season extending tools in your garden and if so, what kinds?

Noticed a weather alert for low temps on Saturday morning to dip below freezing.   This is the result of the high pressure system that is building and clearing out the clouds.   This is a good thing because it will bring much warmer day time temps and some much needed sunshine for the next several days, but it will cause the temps to dip down to historical lows for this time of year early on Saturday.   The only crops I have that are in any danger are the bed of cole crops that I just took the plastic sheeting cover off of (earlier this week).   Before leaving for work today, I am going to drape the plastic sheeting back over the bed and leave it on until it warms up on Saturday morning.   Everything else is either a seed bed or an ultra hardy item (onions).  

Been crazy busy with work this week so time for the garden has been early morning/late evening only.   Weather has not been all that great so it's not like I have been missing out on any real opportunities to get much accomplished anyway.    

The pace of late has been pretty wild and unfortunately my body gave me a little reminder yesterday that I need to pay better attention to it.    

I regularly donate blood. Do it about every 3 months and have done it for years never experiencing any problems.  Yesterday I had an appointment at 11:45 am to give blood.  The donation site is located several blocks away from my office.   I planned to walk there from work, spend approximately 45 minutes getting the blood draw done, and then treat myself to a deli sandwich before walking back to work.   With some significant deadlines to meet this week, I have been pulling some long / intense hours - so the walk to the building and the "lie down" for the draw felt pretty good! Was just wrapping up with the blood draw when suddenly I felt extremely clammy and lightheaded.  Uh oh. Waved over the nice attendant and he immediately got me "unplugged", put my knees and feet up and applied cold compresses. After about 10 minutes that seemed to do the trick and I was allowed to rest another 5 minutes and then slowly got up and made my way (carefully) to the food/beverage table.  Managed to get about half way through a glass of grape juice before starting the same drill all over again.  This time I got to lay on the floor because there was no way I was going to make it back to the cots in the center of the room! Had another 15 - 20 minute lie down with blood pressure taking, cold compresses, and an increasingly worried staffer. Finally got to where I could sit back up and have some Gatorade and saltines (yuck) and eventually made it back into the chair and got some water and V8 juice down as well.  Finally, they required that I stand for 4 minutes with a decent blood pressure check at the end of the time period before they would let me go.   Well, I made it 2 minutes before I was back down again! Wow... this was NOT fun and I was getting increasingly worried about my walk back to work. Visions of myself lying in the street danced through my head.   It ended up that I had to sit there for quite a length of time before I could finally stand and stay up for 4 minutes with a decent BP check. While technically cleared to leave, I felt as wobbly as a newborn colt so I just headed over to the deli in the building and got a half sandwich.   I was so full from drinking juice, water, Gatorade, and eating saltines that I could hardly choke it down.  Luckily I was blessed to find a friend and co-worker there having a late lunch so I had some one to talk to and sit with. Eventually I was able to make my way back to work safely and managed to get quite a bit done - but definitely was not 100% for the rest of the day.   As best I can figure, I was dehydrated and/or low on electrolytes because all vitals were good before the draw and actually were once again afterwards.     Lesson learned - drink more fluids on blood draw day, calm the schedule down just a bit, and probably need to eat more mid-morning before trundling off to give blood!

Okay enough about that, let's talk about the status of the garden and my seedlings!   

You may recall that I wrote in my blog (a while ago) that I thought I might have done in my swiss chard seedlings by rushing them to the unheated greenhouse too fast to make room for more seed starting.   Well, I am happy to report that I was mistaken about that!   They have subsequently bounced back and have been happily growing on ever since and are now just about ready to be planted out in the garden.   Yesterday I began the hardening off process for them by putting them outside prior to leaving for work and putting them back into the greenhouse when I get home at night.  I will keep doing this through the end of this week so that they will be sufficiently hardened for planting out in the garden beds this weekend.    

The repotted tomatoes are for the most part doing very well.   Here;s a few pictures of them. 

 I did lose several shortly after the transplanting.  They just did not bounce back from the transplanting process and were too weak to cope with the chilly and damp conditions prevalent for much of the time after the repotting was completed.     Luckily I always plant 1 ½ times more seedlings than I actually need  - for just this very reason.   It is not uncommon to lose seedlings to disease, cold conditions, and unfortunate accidents  - like the time I dropped a full tray of seedlings (upside down no less) while carrying them out to the greenhouse!   The ones that did not expire were never impacted at all - in that they immediately took off and thrived.     Not sure why some were affected so badly while the remaining ones did so well - just one of those mysteries of nature I guess.   I did not repot all of the tomatoes and there are still quite a few that are still in their original cell packs and are under the grow lights.   Here's a picture of them and the second crop of broccoli starts.

 As you can see these are doing quite well too and the broccoli is about ready to be moved out to the greenhouse this weekend to begin the hardening off process.    

The peppers and celery starts are not as far along (both are slower growing) but are also doing very well. 

The last thing I will mention is that I removed the plastic grow tunnel cover from the bed of cole crops (broccoli, kohlrabi, and cabbages) that were recently transplanted and replaced it with bird netting to protect the bed from my dog walking through it.    I did that this morning before heading off to work.   They are doing well and with the milder night time temperatures forecasted for the next few days it is a good time to let them finish hardening off.   Here is a picture I took of them this evening.  It was getting dark, but I think you can see that they are coming along nicely.

That's about it for now.   Hoping to get a lot done in the garden this coming weekend.    

As many of you are aware, on Sunday I spent several hours working on the annual spring potato planting process.   This is a pretty significant undertaking because I plant a large amount (feeds us for a year) and because I trench the beds to grow the most potatoes possible in my raised boxed beds.  The final step requires setting up the PVC hoops over all of the potato beds and covering them with bird netting.   This is necessary because I use bone meal in the trenches as an organic fertilizer and unfortunately my old dog (who shares the back yard with the garden) likes to dig up all the beds looking for the source of that delicious "bone" smell.   She has done it before, so now I just routinely protect the beds as part of the annual planting process.  

(sigh)

Apparently one portion of the netting was not secured tightly enough and our dog must have searched every stretch of the covering to find this one point of potential entry -  but search she did - and find it she did.   She gets points for persistence but they hardly are enough to make up for the demerits she won for herself today.   

The damage consists of her walking down the center of the bed knocking over the piles of trenched dirt, digging up several potatoes in about three trenches and then tearing some of the netting to get out when she "forgot" how she got in, in the first place!   There is no permanent damage done - and it all can be repaired with a little time and attention, but I am certainly not too happy with the family pooch at the moment.   I did my best to secure the section she managed to get through and hopefully she will give it a rest for another year.   I plan to wait until Saturday to tackle the fix up work as nothing is in any immediate jeopardy and I would prefer to do the repairs during the light of  day.       

Ah well, the spring planting season was going entirely too smoothly this year.   I was due for a hiccup in the plan and if this is all that occurs then I guess I am getting off easy.  

The tomato seedlings are now 5 weeks old (planted February 14) and the vast majority of them are now big enough that they need to be repotted to a larger container.   They will not go into the garden until April 11th (at the soonest) or April 18th - and only then with protective covering.   That means there is another three or four weeks of growth to occur prior to planting out and I want to take advantage of that and start developing a larger root system by planting them deeply in larger containers.   Here are the tomato plants prior to repotting them.     

And here are some of them after they were potted up.   They were not watered yet when the photo was taken, so the soil is dry looking. 

The plants that were repotted are now going to be residing in the greenhouse as they are needing more room than I have available under the grow lights and it is time to begin hardening them off for their eventual move to the outdoor garden area.   However, because the night time temperatures are forecasted to dip down to around 35 degrees for the next week, I will be bringing them into the shop (where there are heaters running to keep it from getting colder than 50 degrees) each night and then taking them outside to the greenhouse in the morning.   This adds an extra chore in the morning and evening routine, but ensures too cool temps will not set them back and it gradually introduces them to the greenhouse environment.   I should only have to do this for about a week - unless we have an unusual cold snap at the end of March/start of April.    

While a good 2/3rds of the tomatoes were ready for repotting, the remainder (mostly "Legends" and a few "Viva Italia") was lagging behind somewhat - likely the result of too much competition/crowding under the grow lights and they were not coming out on top.   You can see some of them to the right in this next photo.

The smaller plants were not repotted but were put back under the lights and on the heat mat.  Because the other tomatoes are now moved to the greenhouse I am down to two full trays of seedlings under the lights, which means I can position them lengthwise under the lights and all the plants will get great coverage.  This should allow the remaining tomatoes to catch up to their siblings rather quickly.

Once the tomatoes were all attended to, I spent the remainder of the day working on the spring potato planting process.   This is a pretty significant annual undertaking because I plant a large amount (feeds us for a year) and because I trench the beds to grow the most potatoes possible in my raised boxed beds.   The total amount of area planted includes the largest of my main garden beds (4'X40') and one of the two medium sized beds (4'X12').   I got started on the potato planting process at about 1:30 pm.   I previously created a web page on how I grow potatoes in raised boxed beds, and I used the exact same procedures this year.    The process was more of a chore than normal because about an hour into the task ... it started raining lightly and pretty much never quit from there on.   I decided to keep working despite the weather because the potatoes are all sprouted and really needed to get into the ground soon.     At about 3:30 pm, I wrapped up with the planting and watering in process and did the final step of setting up the PVC hoops and covering them with bird netting over all of the potato beds.   This is necessary because I use bone meal in each trench as organic fertilizer and unfortunately my old dog (who shares the back yard with the garden) will dig up all the beds looking for the source of that delicious "bone" smell.   She has done it before and I am wise to her "doggy" ways.  

No pictures of the trenched and netted beds because I was soaked through, tired, and ready to go cook some dinner and could not muster the energy (or interest) to take pictures in the rain.   I have to tell you though, that in honor of the annual potato planting, we had a large potato salad with crispy fried chicken for dinner!   Used up the very last of the stored "Caribe" potatoes plus a few "Buttes" to make the potato salad.   I have one full box and one ¼ full box of "Butte" potatoes left in storage and five quarts of pressure canned quartered baby potatoes in the pantry.   These should be sufficient to hold us over to the first of the new potatoes, which usually are available in June. 

I hope you were able to get some time in the garden this weekend.   

Got a late start in the garden today because I had some errands and grocery shopping to take care of this morning.   As soon as we got home and got the groceries unloaded, I headed straight outside to enjoy the surprise gift of a sunshiny day.   It had been forecasted to be gloomy and showery all weekend - so imagine my surprise to see a glorious clear blue sky this morning!   

On my list of things to get done this weekend is the planting of potatoes, the spring spinach patch, and some beets.   I used this afternoon to do all the prep work necessary to make that go easily on Sunday.    Using the broadfork, I aerated all of the existing growing beds that currently do not have anything growing in them.   Once that was completed, I then went back over the beds and pulled volunteer onions, leeks, garlic, and various weeds that had been emerging.    The last step was to use the rake to smooth out the beds so that they are ready to be seeded or planted in.     Here's a garden overview picture showing the beds as prepped late this afternoon.

In addition to prepping the growing beds, I also took some time to weed the overwintered spinach patch.    The bed is looking a little rough because we have been harvesting it hard and very regularly - but it keeps bouncing back with new growth and is keeping us well fed at the moment.   

The broccoli, cabbages, and kohlrabi that I planted out last weekend are enjoying the protection of a grow tunnel cover.    

They are doing very well and are showing new growth already.  

Before I headed in for the day, I started digging a few of the trenches for the potato planting process.   I did just a couple as I was getting tired and needed to get some dinner started, but I am all set to do the rest of the trenching and potato planting tomorrow.  

I can only hope that the weather is as wonderful Sunday as it was today.