The Garden Today

Back to the Present

The plot is actually doing well. Full leafed maple tree shedding leaves into my garden and acorns trying to be mighty oaks and all. Oak seedlings are darn strong little things. I pull gently at first to attempt getting out the acorn, but end up snapping off the seedling almost falling over from the force I was using, no acorn dangling from the end. Next time – a hand trowel will be used to dig those little suckers out.

From that first day of direct seed jubilation, Foster Mom planted her corn seeds, transplanted some squashes, and then skipped town, leaving no child support payments. There may have been an agreement for me to water them, but weed them? See if they were growing? Those are the good parts of any mother’s job; didn’t she want to enjoy them? Foolishly, each time I looked at the rear of the garden to see the weeds had grown another inch, I told myself she would come back. She didn’t and after a month of waiting and hoping, I gave up and weeded. Thinking something may come of her corn seeding, I left anything resembling grass (which I hear is what corn looks like) to grow.


The lettuces fully rejuvenated and leafed out into a nice little patch. The eight or so plants are doing so well I was able to make my first two salads with their leaves last night! Of late I learned most farmers go for two pickings from their lettuce plants, the daring or stingy farmer, depending who is naming names, for three. I liked to get the most out of these, so as long as they are not bitter, I’ll eat from them! Doing some research, this bitter aftermath is a good sign – it means the lettuce variety contains antioxidants. Those that do not tend to turn bitter have more water and less nutritional value (i.e. Iceburg). Jason suggested I begin another planting of seedlings, but without the use of Foster Mom’s grow light, the life expectancy of the seedlings was not high enough to warrant the resources. I also committed my first murder for my lettuce. Rooting out some weeds from the lettuce patch, I somehow noticed a small, white worm thing close to the terminus of a lettuce. Donning work gloves, I pried it off and placed it on a nearby flat surface. I hunted around until I saw a large rock, which I then used to smush the worm to oblivion. May it rest in peace.

The peas I direct seeded are sprawling over their trellis on the eastern side of the garden. I picked my first handful last night as well and added those to the salad - a sweet, crisp treat! My trellis is a piece of metal mesh used for fencing that I strung up on stakes. Next year, to increase the aesthetics of my plot, I’d like to try one like this -

minus the bucket - Not too involved to make and it takes up less room. I bet it looks nice with the peas all over it, too.

Lining the western side are tomatoes. Some are in cages and some are not, a little science experiment to see the benefits of using cages. Cages are probably most helpful when the plants get bigger and heavier with fruit, but they may help the plants grow taller faster as well. I shall see. Interspersed among the tomatoes are lemon basil plants. Foster Mom’s squashes are too small to produce, but keep flowering, so I keep picking the flowers off, increasing the size of the plant. One tried to use my mint plant as a toe hold to get closer to the sun. (Marla, the garden coordinator, gave me the mint from a different plot she was cleaning) I quickly showed that squash who is boss by cutting its coiled tendrils off the mint and redirecting it along the back side of the garden.

The melons (which I know now for a fact are melons and not melcumashes) being a vine like plant, as is the squash plant, need room to sprawl. Along the outer edges is best, so they do not climb all over the other plants. Seedlings outnumbering the available outer edge space, three were donated to any other gardeners who would save them and three were squeezed into my garden border. They are not about 5 inches high with their third set of leaves. Oddly, I’m impressed. I thought, almost hopefully (I know, that sounds weird), they would die in cramped quarters because I was not sure how I would handle the adult vines if they survived. I’m still not sure, but I’ll figure something out if they make it.

Jason said this helpful rhyme the other day – “Knee high by July, doing fine.” If these are words to live by, the Brassica ranks (mostly broccoli with one cauliflower thrown in) are doing great. They are as tall and green as those seen in the picture, almost knee height on me. While I was away camping this week-end, there was an incident that threatened to kill half of crop. The peas are on a semi-flimsy metal mesh piece. I staked one side down, and kept meaning to stake the other side. This week-end must have been gusty because when I came back, I paid for my slothfulness. The pea trellis was hanging over on one side, crushing three of the broccolis! Fortunately the plants are fine, a few snapped off limbs the major injury, and the peas are fine too with their new double stake holding them secure in the breeze like a taut, green flag.

A few hardy kale plants (approx. 6) are also surviving from a tray of spinach and kale I started at home. I started these in a tray, stashed on a tv tray behind the couch in the living room in my apartment. This is the only place that gets sunlight for at least half the day. I transplanted them when they were only three inches tall, still slender and delicate. Their lifestyle at home was all sun, no room to play, so I had to get their roots into spacious ground before they starting falling over from weakness. None of the spinach made it, a shocking statement seeing how EASY spinach is to grow most anywhere - from indoor containers to outside direct seedings.

The carrots I direct seeded are finally growing! I keep pulling them up accidentally while I weed, but if I don’t kill them all, I’ll at least get more than last year! I counted at least six carrot tops last night. The onions are HUGE and have these small, miniature onion balls on the tops of their long, green cylindrical “leaves.” Now that I think about it, they might be FLOWERING! The tiny onions are next year’s seeds/onions! The plants are probably putting all their energy into those precious seeds and leaving nothing for the onions down below. Darn it! I hope it is not too late to snap them off and redirect energies underground. However, I thought most onions gone to seed look like this - which is cool in itself, but mine look like this -

Not quite as unique looking, but interesting. I’ll snap some off and leave others to see what happens.

Experimenting is part of the fun of gardening. Every plant is a chance to try something new. Jason’s sister Angela and I were talking gardening one day and she made the comment, “Now is the boring part. You’ve done all the planting and you just have to wait.” I agreed at the time, but last night as I weeded, I changed my mind. While I am partially waiting, there are so many details to observe and depending how much I’m willing to note of these details depends on how much actual waiting I’ll have to do. For instance, a detail - finding the white worm on my lettuce. If I had not been looking at each lettuce plant to see if there were pests, I would not have found it and an infestation may have occurred. I could merely sit around, water the garden every day, and watch the plants grow, change color, produce or die. But I’m glad I rediscovered watching the garden.