pretty Saturday; blustery Sunday

The weather this weekend was quite reversed from what would have been convenient, but part of the point of living in the real world is that things aren't convenient, and we get to make do. Planted another barrel with radishes and lettuce, and thinned out the radish seedlings from 2 weeks ago. I tossed those thinnings into a barrel I haven't planted yet. While it was unceremonious, a few of them might take root and give me something to nibble on before I turn the whole thing under to plant tomatoes there in another 6 weeks or so.

I discovered the wonders of Power Point as a garden record tool. Because I have half-barrels, I set up one slide with the appropriate number of circles in approximately the same arrangement as my garden. I set it up with what was left in the garden at the end of winter (too much dead stuff, not enough green manure). Then I copied the whole slide over to the next slide, and wrote in the changes I made in the first week I worked out there. Each week or two when I get out to the veggie garden I'll be able to copy the slide and record my changes. I even put together a color coding system to track germination, growth, harvesting, and fallow periods. This will be pretty fun.

Spring 2010: Willamette Valley, Oregon State, USA

This year is the year to record. My goal for my humble residential garden is that I will need to buy no vegetables (at the store or farmer's market) for salads this summer while eating salad for lunch or for dinner (me and my husband) at least 3 times a week.
The garden itself has been around for a little while now, but it's time for something more definitive, more shared, and more . . . yeah, just more.

I start with some finished compost left over through the winter and a very green (though inoculated) start on the next one. My big-leaf maple put out more seedlings than I care to count, or the winter was just incredibly mild so they *all* survived. I figured out how to prune my 7-yr old kiwi vines about 1/3 of the way through the project this February, so we'll see what it does to the yield. I'm hoping the yield will be more concentrated, since the vines have yet to produce something that ripens (yes, even in a brown bag with a banana.)

In the 17 half barrels, 5 or so have collards or leeks that thrived through the winter (there's even some fresh parsley out there still) and three are now planted with cold weather seeds: peas along a triangular tomato cage, with lettuce in the outside arches of the barrel; one barrel divided into 3 sections for carrots, radishes, and radicchio, and one barrel (planted more recently) divided in half between broccoli and mustard greens. I'm partial to Red Sails lettuce (when I use lettuce at all; I'm more of a spinach gal) because so far it's done well in my slightly crowded conditions. It has yet to get buggy on me.