Things Are Moving Along

Just a quick update.  The peas are popping up like daisies... or peas.  Everything else is growing, but slowly. 

I managed to convince my yard work resistant husband to help me with tearing out more blackberries, and we got most of them chopped down.  We won't be able to get rid of the cuttings until the first weekend of May when the yard debris dumpster is brought in though.  So for now we have a pile of blackberries in the way, keeping us from digging up the roots. 

Admittedly it doesn't look much better than it did two months ago... but they grew back quite a bit in that time!  I'm also slowly (very slowly) laying down a thick layer of newspaper along the back of the house and covering that with buckets full of lava rock that I have been removing from the front yard.  Hopefully this will make a weed proof barrier that can act as a path behind the house, and protect the siding from encroaching blackberries.  i picked up a towing ball for my car so my husband can borrow his mom's trailer this weekend and we can make a dump trip or two.  My hope is that we can remove all the junk from the blackberry area and get both sheds cleaned out as well.  They still have tons of stuff the previous tenants left behind.

Eventually the back yard will house winter squashes, which i just can't seem to fit in the garden proper, and maybe some nasturtiums and sunflowers that I also ran out of space for.  The soil back there is in great shape and should work out well with just a bit of sand and compost mixed in. 

Lastly, the patio is completely scrubbed, the patio furniture moved into place, my solar lights were repaired or replaced, and most of the gardening junk has been moved.  It's finally starting to look like a nice place to spend our time in the summer.

Spring Cleaning

February and early March are the time of year to do your yard and garden cleanup.  It's past the worst weather, you get a few nice sunny but cool days to enjoy the outdoors, and best of all the weeds haven't started growing yet.  Once the weather gets warm weeds will start their Spring growth with abundance.  This time of year is when you scour your yard for any trash blown in during winter storms, or left next to the shed last summer when you didn't have time to take it to the dump.  Get these things cleaned up, turn over your compost (especially if you're like me and rarely remember to turn it), pull out weeds in paths and beds while the soil is still damp and soft.  If you have landscape work to do, like laying new paths or putting in new beds, or decorative mulching this is also a great time to do those things.  Getting a head start on these chores means not having to worry about them when it's actually time to plant.  It also means getting ahead of the weeds, so you don't have to weed much before laying paths or mulch.  You can also do a quick trim of trees now, to save yourself the trouble of trying to do it when they're in full leaf or blossom.  For fruit trees this will improve your harvest, for other trees it just helps them to keep a neat appearance, and may remove diseased or broken limbs that could cause issues later.

This is the time of year to get the yard tidy and ready for the growing season.

Start at one end of your yard and work your way around the house getting everything in the best possible shape before the growing season begins.  Remove dead plant matter, maybe wash your windows and power wash the house; clean off the roof and gutters too.  Once all of this is done you will be in great shape to enjoy your yard all spring and summer, and you'll be able to plant, grow, and harvest without wishing you had washed off the siding before planting your new tea roses right in front of it.

This year I will be replacing the pebbles in the path around our house, they have gotten very thin and weeds overwhelm the path rather quickly.  Also the landing below the front porch steps needs new gravel, it has sunk a bit and now becomes a lake when it rains heavily, and grows weeds the rest of the year.  I also plan to bark mulch the open areas around my garden beds, and lay a few stepping stone paths to the shed and fountain there.  Lastly, if my budget allows for it (which it may not since I'm also remodeling my kitchen right now) I plan to rake out the lava rock around the front lawn and replace it with bark mulch, and lay in a pebbled path to the shed on the front side so my husband won't complain about getting his motorcycle through the mud to the shed anymore.

Working With Obstacles

So you are creating your garden, planning beds and plants and maybe some decor, a comfy spot to enjoy it... then you come across an Obstacle.  Anything that gets in the way of the flow of your garden space or your enjoyment of it, or blocks light or walkways, is an Obstacle.  My yard is full of them, your yard probably is too.  some Obstacles can be removed, others can be worked around, but even better is turning the Obstacle into a focal point and highlight of the garden.

An ugly shed turned into a pumpkin patch.

The biggest eyesore in my garden, an obstacle that blocks light to the side yard completely, and cramps my garden space is our ugly old shed.  It leaks and is rusty and needs to be replaced, but until I'm ready to take on that task, and expense, it has become my pumpkin patch.  In an earlier post I mentioned that I had grown pumpkins in a 4'x4' bed, 6" deep.  It's true, not only that, but the same space provided a row of runner beans, a HUGE zucchini plant, a few lettuces and some marigolds and calendula. I used some of the techniques found in the Square Foot Garden system to keep the bed small, while filling it with "Mel's Mix" for the best possible combination of moisture retention, nutrition, and drainage.  Lastly I built a trellis system.  The pumpkin bed had two open sides, one side that backed against the fence, and one that backed against the shed.  On the fence side I used lightweight chicken wire and plastic trellis to run the beans up, covering the fence side entirely in a carpet of beans, leaves, and flowers.  The pumpkins were planted on the shed side and trellised up a nylon 7" square net tied to electrical conduit poles.  The entire pumpkin trellis cost me about $25 to build, and while nylon is very strong it will wear out over time; but the frame will never wear out.  I can reuse that trellis frame for years on end, it is easily removed and set back up if needed, I plan to build many more of them in the near future.  (You can find the specific directions for building this trellis in the SFG book by Mel Bartholomew, which I found to be a wealth of great ideas).  The pumpkin trellis supported 3 pumpkin plants that grew up over it and onto the roof of the shed.  From those plants I got a total of 5 pumpkins, with a total weight of about 75 lbs.  The largest was 33 lbs.  More importantly, I was able to grow pumpkins in an area I didn't think was big enough, kept the shed from being an eyesore, and the pumpkins were up off the ground; far from rodents, slugs and other pests, getting great sunlight, away from kids and pets.  I will never grow a pumpkin on the ground again!  The one caution I will offer in regards to this system is that growing large pumpkins like the Cinderella variety I grew you run the risk of the fruit weight breaking the trellis strings and the fruit falling to the ground.  One of my pumpkins did this, luckily it was nearly ripe and I heard it fall so was able to process it immediately and salvage most of the fruit.  It reached 17 lbs. before the string snapped and if it had been on the shed instead of dangling on the side, or supported with something more than the one nylon strand it never would have fallen.  Everyone who saw my garden last summer exclaimed over one of two things: The pumpkins on the shed, and the massive sunflowers.  No one mentioned that the shed could use a paint job. ;)
When working with an obstacle if it can't be removed, or worked around, try finding a way to incorporate it into your design.  Turn a stump into a plant stand for a huge pot of nasturtiums, hang trellis netting on a fence and make it a wall of green, grow pumpkins on top of a broken down car, or if you have a massive patch of empty where no one goes?  Throw a few different packs of squash seeds out there and see what happens.  I actually plan to do the last one with the side yard near our compost pile this year.