Garden Diary Part 1
Last time I started a vegetable garden was 3 years ago. Despite planting about 25 different kinds of vegetables, all I got were some carrots, lettuce and swiss chard. Not because I have a black thumb, but because the deer, rabbits, woodchucks, and raccoons with access to our yard decided my garden was their own personal buffet.
After thorough research, I found the only thing likely to keep all of those beasts out of my garden was a fence. A tall fence, because deer can jump.
Here’s what I’ve accomplished so far.
March 15th – Ordered seeds from Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds. If I’m going to go to the trouble of growing my own food, I want crazy stuff I can’t find at the store. Like purple carrots. I grew them last time and they were indeed purple, and very tasty.
Last time I went crazy and bought about $100 worth of seeds. This time I limited myself to a few things that I really really want (like sweet corn and tomatoes).
March 28-30th – I used stakes and twine to mark where my fence will go, and then started clearing the area of the weeds and small trees that had taken over since I last used that part of the yard. Mostly wild blackberry bushes, which are, aside from poison ivy and stinging nettles, the most vile plant I’ve ever come in contact with. I’d already spent two summers clearing the area of thistle. I learned this lesson the hard way: cleared yard doesn’t stay clear. Once you get rid of one weed, another will take it’s place.
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Unfortunately, having a garden does not necessarily mean you will grow things. In my case, my flowers did okay, but my vegetable garden was a big, fat failure. Of the dozen or so veggies I planted (corn, cauliflower, carrots, zuchini, watermelon, etc.), I got 3 pea pods and a handful of lettuce.