Setting Out the Gardens

This year I did not include gardening on my Semi-Annual Projects.  It is not all that unusual for me to do something a few years, or intend to, like making my bedroom optimal or following TED talks, that I just do them without creating a special initiative for doing them.  Gardening has entered that sphere.  Every suburban homeowner needs to find a place for a few tomato plants and some flowers.  I've had two 4x4 plots in the backyard, located conveniently near the house, though at the expense of optimal sunlight, where I've grown vegetables and herbs.  Last year I moved the herb garden to just outside my front door.  My backyard deck contains three boxes just right for some flowers.  Landscapers trimmed back the rose bushes, so they should be ready to bud and flower with little or no input from me.

Living in Zone 7a, it is too soon for outdoor plantings but not too soon to ready the soil.  My mistakes over the years have been many, but usually different mistakes each year.  Thus far, I have begun tomatoes as indoor sprouts, planting ten of them from a recently obtained packet.  I planted five each of pepper and eggplant from seeds obtained in previous years.  Not sprouted yet.  Give it another week, then buy new seeds.  One mistake has been not adequately delineating the square foot markers that make my 4x4 beds into sixteen separate one square foot units.  I marked one bed with string.  I also found an unused area next to the deck.  It might be just right for rosemary, or maybe even better, I've not been able to grow carrots or other deep roots in the beds due to a layer of weed block.  The unused area seems deep enough to try some carrots and beets there, keeping the rosemary in front with the other herbs, though rosemary has thrived in my backyard in prior years, and far better than it did in the front pot last year.  Maybe I could do both in that space, or use it for the root vegetables and plant the rosemary right next to it.  But conceptually, I still like having all my herbs in the front and vegetables in the back.

What to plant?  I went to the seed display at Lowes.  Must have tomatoes.  Four plants overwhelms the backyard beds, so maybe only one in each of the 4x4s this year.  And I am determined to have my own peppers and eggplants.  Lettuce has not done well in my hands.  Vines have, cucumber and zucchini, but there are limited places to plant them as they spread out.  Pumpkin has been a lost cause,

My herbs do OK, though never as well as what the ladies on those TV cooking shows take from their window boxes each episode.  The seeds last over several years.  I only need one good sage plant, maybe two basils.  Dill has been inconsistent, but I really like dill.  Separate pot for that this year.  And mint is almost like a weed.  It disappears from its pot each winter, only to return with no effort on my part in the spring.  I rarely use it though.

I'm not a dedicated flower person, other than roses which grace my shabbos table in season.  The small deck boxes get zinnias and marigolds.  Maybe do different ones.  Last year the flowering was limited.  Need to enrich the soil in those areas, I think.

My garden's downfall has always been pests.  Invertebrates infest fruits, furry ones like beans.  I've never used netting, and there have been years of reasonable harvest, so I'll likely just take my chances.

And with a little luck, supplemented by an increment of diligence, my kitchen where I really like to hang out and create, will have some homegrown edibles.