Hi gardeners!

[BelgianMadCow]

:hi: fellow lovers of green!

By way of introduction (I'm mostly in GD where I cross posted this, and reading LBN)



March was cold and rainy - so was much of april :-( Still, I have some things to watch grow, and things I learned (the hard way).

From left to right:

Bed 1
potatoes I just "piled up" heaping soil around the plants so they are deeper inside if you will. Learning point: you really DO need 35 -40 inch between the rows or it becomes hard...

Bed 2
- spinach in various states of development - front ones I started in the greenhouse, at same time as sowing the other ones. Kind of surprising to see the front does better, but the nights have been cold for long... They must be like 5 weeks now, will harvest some leaves of each plant (should be able to do that 3 times). Should have taken new zealand spinach, easier to cultivate and spreads itself out.
- a small bed of radish which is ready (leaves are rather high, should have thinned a bit more) and a fresh seed bed next to it. Aside the radish, chervil, can't see it though.
- behind it with the dark green leaves: Rucola or nut lettuce or rocket salad (literal, unsure of the english name). They are going nicely BUT you do NOT plant them like regular lettuce - should be kept in rows or they shoot up too much. Oh well :-) All kinds of lettuce is what I'll be sowing regularly anyway so as to keep that half bed filled.
- behind that, regular lettuce. Ate the first yesterday, can't find tender salad like that in the stores. Have to use pellets against snails which have really become a problem round here. All the lettuce crops come kind of at once - gonna look into (cold?) salad soup and gonna make some neighbors / family happy.

Bed 3:
- in front, chive. Wow have they grown since last year. It's flowering, looks nice but think it's not as good for the taste. Behind it, oregano, mediterranean herb. It's spreading even faster, already gave half to a neighbor. Under the small drape: parsley, attempt 2. germinates really slowly, helps if you presoak them for a day at room temp. Behind that, covered with anti cat netting, more chervil. Want to have enough for soup, but the germination :-/ Gonna redo it in the greenhouse I think. Behind: 3 rows of leek. Not happy about how they are doing - think I closed the deep planting holes too soon. Last year, I didn't plant them deep at all. Thus, hardly any white part :-)
- aside of the leek: a row of onions, also on side of next bed, challots. Onion type plants are good against leek fly and carrot fly. Tried some insect netting - see the sad hoops - but cats and netting = fun and frolics. Love 'em but they seem to especially like leek, to lie on and poo between. Cats will do more dmg jumping on the tunnel nets than the flies so byebye nets. Next year, cat fence.

bed 4:
- in front, sorrel - a great addition to mashed potatoes. Needs to be more though.
- behind it, tarragon, to flavour vinegar and for real béarnaise sauce of course.
- rest: attempt 2 at carrots (under drapes). Attempt one is in the back of the row, no carrot sprouts to be seen but the weed was happy under the drapes, meh.

Behind it all: 5 berry bushes (red, green and white) that will (I hope) cover the ugly wall and yield more jam input material.

The strange color of the "pathway" grass in front is because I sprayed it - want that gone as it's a perfect start for weeds. Plus, better half wants things to look more tidy back here.

Next up, greenhouse (and 2 chickens besides and behind it). I should chalk the panes to avoid excessive heat. But look at my clean windows first!



Will not go into detail as by now nobody is still reading. Yes, that is a really stupid place for a rhubarb. Love 'em with sugar and raisins in it, gonna try jam as well. No pie experience here at home ;-) Planted tomatoes on the right are finally de-stressing (stem color no longer purple). Say nothing of the lettuce jungle to the left!
The styrofoam containers for sowing I got from local fish merchant, he was happy to get rid of some.

And finally, a look at the other small plot I started - since the neighbor is a young woman living alone, she didn't want to tend to the orchard or the plot of land. Well hellloo new garden :D



Pear and apple trees, and behind it 2 beds of early potatoes, 1 bed of late potatoes, 2 rows of leek (planted better and a bit later as well, the difference shows) with another cat-treated insect netting tunnel. A bed of peas that are an inch up and a bed of salsify to finish. Cucumbers and pumpkin can play in the back, seedlings out in greenhouse.
The REAL neat rows you can discern in the back is the garden of my 80 year old neighbor. Gardening 65 years vs. my umm 2...well suffice to say I spend a lot of time either talking to him over there or stealing with my eyes :-). We also share seedlings, you always have too many.


:hi:
bmc

[NEOhiodemocrat]

1. Impressive!

If it were not raining right now I think that would get me outside working in my garden. Do you use your greenhouse alot? I have gardened for 30 some years and never had one, yours looks nice, maybe I should consider that for a "home improvement project" this summer. Do you have a heating system for it?

[BelgianMadCow]

4. Yup the greenhouse is pretty important for me

that is, so I can reliably grow tomatoes, and paprika. Cucumber I'm gonna do outside but that's a bit of a bet really.
So these are the things I really put IN the greenhouse. I haven't been using it enough to get the early lettuce though.

Aside of that, I can sow and tend to small seedlings even when the weather sucks (rainy). In the back of the greenhouse there's a flat container all along the width of it, at waist level. This is where I spend a lot of time, to get the plants ready. I like to start from seeds even though my local garden center has many plants.

I haven't used a heater so far - am still so far from using the land and the greenhouse as is to their full extent...of course, getting your vegetables early / late is a big plus since they are still expensive in the stores...

My old neighbour doesn't have one either - just a kind of shack with hard plastic walls to get from seedling to plant and to grow the small plants he buys. Aside of that, he has the kind of "low greenhouse" (dunno the word) where you have a low structure with a glass pane on top.



When I got some tunnels, I asked him about it - and he said I've made do without those things for so long, am not gonna start with em now :-)

It came with the house, I saw them new for like 1200 euro - to be honest, I think you can make a VERY large one using plastic sheeting and large hoops for that kind of money.



The size of mine is OK for tomatoes (have 10 plants on one side), but crops that need floor space / have a lower yield I can't really do.

:hi:

[NEOhiodemocrat]

6. Your greenhouse sounds very usable.

I think I will finally let my husband build me one, I kept putting him off thinking it would have to involve a heating system. I see now that even if it extends the growing season a couple of months it will be worthwhile. We have old barn with lots of odds and ends to could probably cobble something together to keep down the costs. And those "low greenhouses" are cold frames. I have some windows we just replaced in the house and was thinking about re purposing some of them for that use. Your garden made me think of the first one we had. We lived in town on a very narrow lot and neighbors kidded us we plowed up the back 40 (feet) and it was wall to wall veggies and fruit. We were the only ones with a garden, but by the time we moved on I think at least 40% of the neighbors had at least a small patch. No one went quite as wild as we did and dug up the whole back yard. Now live on 6 acres and have two big gardens, two types of plum trees, two types apples, apricots, peaches, white cherries, pie cherries, pear trees, plus red, black and yellow raspberry bushes, elderberry, strawberries, and rhubarb. Your rhubarb looks good, is about at the same stage as mine I think. Do you stew it and put raisins in it? I have never had it like that. I do the pie, nice and tart! I have some tunnels in the barn I haven't used for years, maybe I will pull them out and experiment with them. Love your pictures!

[BelgianMadCow]

7. if you're gonna add those to the two gardens, you'll be all set

to completely live off your land I would think! 6 acres phew that really is farm size here, and if you would try to buy that in a housing area you'd have to win the lottery first. Farmland however (you can't build on it) is doable.

The neighbourhood thing in your first garden is what I like about it as well. Girl working in the daycare next door says hmmm we'll try some stuff this year as well, we have the space anyway. Next up, she gets spinach plants I would otherwise have thrown away and rucola lettuce starts as well, and next year I can have some raspberry starts.

Your fruit garden sounds yummy! Must be a feast to watch in bloom as well. Nothing says spring like that imho. Okay, 1st bbq of the season comes close :-)

Rhubarb stew:
Pull the rhubarb stems off the plant (hold close to the root, pull with a twist, no cutting or risk of rot) always leave at least 3 stems on the plant.
Remove the leaf (sucks stem dry otherwise), don't peel the stem.
Cut it into chunks a good inch in size, and wash those.
With the wash water that stays on, put on stove and stew till it's all soft and the cubes are gone - takes about 30 mins.
Add sugar to your taste - I like it pretty acidic cause it's refreshing.
Add raisins (I do until every soup spoon will hold one or a couple) and let stew some more, they swell and become soft then. Love the texture difference!
I like it as dessert but also in cases where you would have apple stew, or with meat balls.
Just today I read about mint-rhubarb jam - am definitely gonna try that, I can imagine that's real special. If my mint takes off hard enough that is...it's written everywhere mint grows so well it's hard to contain - well mine better gets going then ;-) I want to let it go wild anyway, since my wife likes mint tea, and I need it for cocktails *cough*

[NEOhiodemocrat]

9. thanks for the receipt

I had never thought of raisens in rhubarb. Sounds good. I want to make some jam this year also, my kids love it. And yes, it is really beautiful here with all the blooming. Our one old crabapple tree (used for pectin for jam) has more blooms on it than I have ever seen. Everytime I look that direction I am just amazed. And the kids used to call the apricot trees popcorn trees when they were younger because they look like they are covered with popcorn. My lilacs are blooming also as are my lily of the valley ground cover. It smells so good here right now and I love seeing the bees out doing their thing. Our six acres is tucked between a couple of farms and along side a train track, so pretty private. I have plenty of room to grow things that is for sure. My daughter who lives in DC brought her boy fiend home last summer to meet us and he was amazed. He stood in the garden and said "this is thousands of dollars worth of food". Everytime he comes he takes back bags full of whatever is ready plus dried and canned things. I told my daughter he must be selling it on his stoop in DC. There is sure nothing like home grown produce.

[Kolesar]

2. Super

Do you suppose you could resize the images so that they are narrower? As it is, they are wider than my screen and that means that I have to scroll left and right to see the image and to read the text. I have my monitor set up for low resolution. That way I can view the monitor without reading glasses. thanks

[BelgianMadCow]

5. Made em 800 wide max, does that do the trick? n/t

[Kolesar]

8. With Internet Explorer in F11-Full Screen mode, it just fits!...thanks...eom

[Blue Gardener]

3. Beautiful!

I envy anyone with a greenhouse! I wish I had one!:hi:

[FloriTexan]

10. Here's an easy greenhouse idea....

I live in Zone 8/Northeast Texas where it gets cold enough to kill all those delicate lovelies. We have a large covered patio off the back of my house. My husband puts up a few 1 x 2's and frames in between the permanent posts, then me and two of our neighbors stretch heavy duty plastic around the patio. We staple it to all the posts by cutting 1 in squares of that rubbermaid shelf liner (you can't staple directly to the plastic it just rips). The patio cover is a transparent smoky grey which lets in plenty of filtered light and we are good to go for the winter. We get 10 degrees over the outside temperature which is more than sufficient but when the temperature drops below freezing we can also add a couple of small greenhouse heaters which keeps it above freezing. Its costs under $50 to put it up. We've gotten bigger every year. We share plants with the neighbors and share cutting, seeds and plants which saves us money every year because we don't have to replace anything. Geraniums thrive in there and bloom their little butts off all winter as do the bouganvilleas. I'll try to find a picture.