Garden 2010

So this is the second year of my attempt to grow a garden. As before, the drawbacks are my inherited black thumb, and my total ignorance when it comes to all things garden-related — though I suppose there is less ignorance than last year, as I now have a year of experience under my belt. Also as with last year, I focus my garden on the category of Stuff I Can Eat. Honestly, I do not get as excited by flowers, however pretty, as by the idea that I put a seed in the ground and now it’s two dozen tomatoes. Because Food Is Good.

This is last year’s garden at an early stage. The squash haven’t even come up yet. All that growth in the lower right is the radishes.

A quick recap of last year’s hits and misses:

2009 Garden:

• Created raised beds. (WIN!)
• Radishes, french and regular: the greens were nice, the bulbs never formed, perhaps because I failed to thin them.
• Sungold tomatoes, bought as seedlings: we drowned in these last summer, and they were gleeful drownings. Basically little tomato candies. So good. SB put these on his “must have again” list. (WIN!)
• Summer squash, from seed:  Got two squashess out of them (which were, to be fair, delicious!), then the vine succumbed to powdery mildew
• Zucchini: Death by powdery mildew before they fruited (and everyone told me I’d be drowing in ’em!)
• Black-something (Cherokee?) tomatoes, bought as seedlings: Mixed bag. One died, one grew, and most of the fruits cracked before ripening. We got fewer than half a dozen before fall, but they were all delicious.
• Various other tomatoes, from seed: Never grew, but might have been shaded by the sungolds.
• Parsley: grew nice, but rarely used.
• Thyme: Ditto.
• Oregano: Used some, clearly don’t need to plant as much this year.
• Sage: Died. Shaded by the sungolds.
• Sweet basil (in pots): Never got very big (and my neighbors might as well have a basil farm in their backyard)
• Thai basil (in pots): never used
• Lemon basil (never used): never used
• Mint (in pots): Didn’t grow much, but survived the winter just fine!
• Spearmint (in pots): succumbed to the beloved overattention of Temp Dog #3
• Chocolate mint (in pots): died. TRYING AGAIN, though, because OMG the scent is INCREDIBLE.
• I also planted marigolds from seeds as a garden bed border, because I heard it keeps away some pests. They came up fine and were quite pretty. I never paid the least bit of attention to them.

Lessons learned: Some things sound a lot better in the farmer’s market than in my kitchen. I will henceforth try to plant more things that I know we actually eat. Also, people say plant mint in pots or it’ll take over your garden, but apparently those people don’t have my black thumb. We took down the tree that was shading my garden (because it was falling over), so I hope we have less of a problem with mildew this year. Also, the compost my organic farming neighbor brings in his truck is like twenty-times better than anything I can get anywhere else. I would start my own compost bin, but we don’t have a ton of space in my backyard.

It sounds from this list that I really only had one real “Success” last year with the sungolds, but we did have a good amount of basil (I didn’t buy any fresh basil last year, though we never did make pesto we had plenty for caprese salads all summer), some herbs and stuff, and some slicing tomatoes, and just being able to grow my own food was so cool that I’m all about giving it another whirl.

This is the parsley at an early stage last year. I stopped taking pictures after a while, which is a shame. I’ll do better this year.

Things I’m doing differently this year: I’m considering planting the mint in-ground. I’m just not sure where. There isn’t a lot of room in the raised beds (which is outside our fence, and therefore dog-free), and Rio LOVES mint. I’m also starting some of my seeds in those Seed-starter cardboard things. I didn’t do it last year, and my seeds came up fine, but what the heck, It was like $2 and this whole thing is an experiment anyway. Plus, I’ve begged my neighbor for more compost. And I’m doing more fruit.

Garden plans for 2010:

• Sungold tomatoes: 3 seedlings (SB is so excited)
• Some form of hybrid slicer tomato the farmer’s market lady recommended: one plant (might get another slicer later, depends if those really are tomatoes coming up in the garden already)
• Sage (from seed)
• Summer squash (from seed): three plants
• Zucchini (from seed): three plants (and I SURE hope they produce as promised this year!)
• Bell peppers (from seed): 4 plants, and can someone who knows tell me if I should use pots for these?
• Anaheim chilis (from seed): Ditto?
• Poblano Peppers (from seed): Ditto? (I ask about these peppers b/c the packets say all this stuff about not planting them near each other, which, given the small size of my garden, would necessitate pots)
• Alpine strawberries (seedling)
• Sequoia strawberries (seedling): One died already, the other one might make it.
• Quinalt strawberries (seedlings): these might have died already. They aren’t looking so good.
• Raspberries: two sticks, and I have NO CLUE where to put them in my yard without ripping out a bush.
• LoganEchollsberries: ditto
• Cucumbers: I have one of those seed strips. Thought it looked fun, but I haven’t planted it yet because I haven’t put anything in the actual garden yet. SB thinks the idea of “burpless” cucumbers is the funniest notion ever.
• Leaf lettuce (seedlings from farmer’s market) : four varieties. Kale, arugula, red fire something, and something else. Seven plants in total.
• Spinach (seedlings from farmer’s market): Seven (SB loves spinach)
• Oregano: one seedling in a decorative pot with
• Rosemary: Ditto
• Cilantro: Ditto (in passing, I think I probably should get more cilantro. We eat a lot of guacamole in this house)
• Sweet basil: Three seedlings worth, from: Farmer’s market, Home depot, and grocery store. We’ll see whose basil wins this year. Haven’t decided if I’m going to pot them or garden them yet.
• Chocolate mint: would you believe the thing DIED ON ME ALREADY? I’m getting a new one as soon as I find some. Chocolate mint, you haven’t beaten me yet!!!!
• The regular mint in the pot came back, so I’m hoping for the best. And there’s SOMETHING growing in the old chocolate mint pot, but I can’t tell if it’s CM or a weed.

I’m not sure what these are (the little things below the zucchini seedling), but I’m glad I took a picture of them last spring, because they are coming up again this year, even after SB tilled the garden. Because they are coming up in rows (even now), I suspect they are tomatoes. But I don’t think they ever got any bigger than this last summer, and I am finding it hard to believe there are still tomato seeds with some juice in them after the blizzards. But I don’t want to tear them out even though I’m about to dump a whole mess of compost on them tomorrow. I guess if they can survive tilling and six feet of snow, they can survive that, too. And…could this caption be any longer?

I’ve added a whole bunch of peppers this year, because our friends did them in pots off their back porch last summer, and they worked great, so I thought I’d give it a whirl. Also, we have a grill now, and I love grilled peppers! I have some money for new plants, too, because I don’t have any of the initial set up gardening costs, like tools and the boundaries of the raised beds and pots. Besides, it’s year two. so it’s time to expand. I’m also doing some berries, because I LOVE THEM, and some strawberries, because my aforementioned organic farming neighbor says you can’t mess them up, even if you try. (Except, I appear to have already messed two of them up, and he said the same thing about the mint last year.) Seriously, I don’t get it. He’s constantly ripping strawberry shooters out of his yard and calling them a menace, and I’ve already killed mine and I’ve only had them for like two days.

I’ve also got this other new neighbor who just moved in, and after being here for approximately two days, had managed to set up a giant compost bin and rip out half her backyard, then till it with some automatic plowy-thing she rented from the hardware store, and into which plowed field she erected a scarecrow and started planting long rows of like, carrots and broccoli and other things that I’m not even ATTEMPTING to grow in my little 6’x4′ plot. She’s from Berkeley, y’all.

She fits in really well on my block, though. I’m totally the odd gardener out, in that I suck and everyone else is totally hardcore. To my left I have organic farmer guy (fig trees, y’all, and a rosemary bush bigger than me), and the couple with half the world’s supply of fresh basil (“we have pesto all winter!” the guy exclaimed, while handing me a giant paper sack filled with beefsteak tomatoes the day I moved in). On my right I’ve got the new gal and her scarecrow, and the woman whose side yard is covered with the most gorgeous flowers, whose front lawn has mower marks like a checker board, and who, year after year, FOR FUN, plants flowers and bushes in the public median despite the fact that they are regularly flattened by the recycling truck. Her flowers are gorgeous, though. It’s a fantastic public service.

And then there’s SB and me. This is what our gardening conversations sound like:

SB: Look, we have tulips!
Me: Oh, cool. How did they get there?
SB: Beats me. I’m surprised I didn’t kill them when I mowed the lawn.

We also discovered this lone rose last year.

Luckily for us, our neighbors are aware of our cluelessness and are always willing to step in and offer advice (or handfuls of fresh basil). Our one neighbor gives us strawberry cuttings and compost and told us about the powdery mildew. The one with the gorgeous lawn explained to us that our lawn wasn’t dead (as it appeared to be in late April last year), it was a certain variety that sounds like “shicksa grass” (but I’m sure that’s not the real name) that comes back late, but saves on mowing. She was right. The basil people — well, they give us basil, and shake our heads at our pitiful potted attempts. And the new girl pulled some stray violets out of my raised beds this evening, and is totally downplaying her scarecrow so I don’t feel so inadequate.

I love my neighbors. I love my garden!

Are you gardening? What are you growing? Do you have any advice for me?