New Year, New Garden!

Last weekend, Brandon and I spent a portion of each day redoing the garden bed. First I went through and harvested the few remaining crops: three broccoli florets (I was amazed! The only broccoli all year), several bunches of little yellow onions, and one baby carrot.
Then I cut down all the remaining straggler plants, pulled weeds, and turned the soil over. We got some more siding and attached it to the walls of the garden bed to increase the height by a few inches. Then we mixed another batch of "Mel's Mix" (corse vermiculite, compost and peat moss) and filled in the bed. Unfortunately we'd underestimated how much mix we'd need, and so we wound up doing yet another batch today.

We also visited the nursery and picked out some good "cool weather" crops, such as broccoli, kale and chard (keep in mind that the temperature right now is on average in the 60's during the day).

My friend Ona came over to help with planting. She has a plot in a local community garden, and she's constantly harvesting so much food that she has to beg people to take it away. She certainly has a green thumb! We had a good time figuring out the new layout for the plants, and she advised me not to plant the same kinds of plants in the same place year after year (i.e., if you plant tomatoes in the right corner of the garden one season, then plant them in the left corner the next). Different plants absorb different nutrients and need to be rotated for the best growth.

We also sewed a bunch of seeds. Hopefully by planting in January instead of in late March I'll have gotten a good jump on the growing season and will have more to harvest! After everything was planted, we installed drip irrigation. I'm expecting that by using a drip irrigation method, rather than a spray from the sprinkler, my squash will fair much better and not develop powdery mildew.

The baby plants are so cute, and I can't wait and see if adding those extra inches of dirt will do the trick. Here's hoping!