It’s almost the end of March, and you know what the means, right?
Well, maybe not, but what it means for me is that it is time to start thinking about this year’s garden. I have thought about it before this, and have my plan for the year, plus I ordered seeds. But we are heading into planting season now. No, I don’t have tomatoes like the image above yet, but I can dream, right?
The first thing we had to do was get the 8×2 foot raised bed up out of the mud. The ground under the deck got so soggy, the front legs sunk into the mud and it was tilted at a crazy angle. It’s also got soil in it, so it was really heavy. We spent a good while on Sunday with the BaldMan using a 2×4 as a lever to lift it, and I was stacking concrete blocks and wood pieces under the frame to keep it from sinking. Once we got it back to ground level, he raised it again and I slid big patio blocks under the legs. That should distribute the weight enough to keep it from sinking this year. I hope.
After that, I cleaned the dead leaves and junk out of it and put the greenhouse cover over the frame. That should help things warm up a bit more inside. I need to get more soil to replace what was lost over the past year, and then I can plant early greens that can take the chilly weather. I’m starting with spinach.
We also got heat mats to go under the seed start trays in the basement. I have had a hard time starting seeds the past few years and I think it’s because the basement is just too chilly for things like tomatoes and peppers to grow well. I am hoping the heat mats will help there. I am going to keep the big bed for the shallow rooted stuff (greens and such) and put the bigger plants in containers this year. That will not only give me more room to grow quick maturing things, but also give the bigger, deeper rooted plants a better place to grow.
Overall, I am hoping to have better success with some things this year. Some stuff last year didn’t do as well as I hoped, and for some of it, I think in our situation, those plants just aren’t going to work well. For others, I didn’t have the best conditions for them. So, I rethought my basic plan, and am trying to make things better overall. Every year teaches something. The trick, of course, is to learn the lesson and put it into practice in later years.
Now, I just need the weather to cooperate with growing things!
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And So On... 