Garden Planning

For me, March means three things: college basketball, spring break, and planning the summer garden. Last year, our small group of gardeners realized that we could have done a lot of things differently. This year, we need to spend time doing some important work on the garden soil. We need to remove the roots of the invasive plants that grow around the edges and draw water and nutrients from the planting beds. We need to amend the soil with some organic material to provide better drainage and aeration. More on those efforts later.

The second part of early planning is considering what to plant in our space and starting those plants from seed. We spent money on plants from the garden center last year, and if we can start our own plants we will have resources to spend on other things. Last year we planted the following plants:

Cucumbers (1o hills burpless, 2 hills Armenian)
Peppers (20 bell; 6 banana; 12 jalepeno; 4 habanero)
Eggplant (4 Thai; 4 Caspar; 4 Purple)
Bush Beans (seeded rows)
Tomatoes (15 Celebrity; 15 Early Girl; 4 Roma; 3 cherry)
Basil (3 plants; seed underplanting)
Lettuce (seed underplanting)
Melon (12 Hale's Best Jumbo; 12 watermelon - probably Rattlesnake)
Okra (30 Clemson Spineless)

This year, we will plant several different varieties of crops - not only because we would like the variety, but because it would be good to have different varieties ready for harvest at slightly different times. Last year, the plants that did well were: Armenian cucumbers, all peppers, Caspar eggplants, Celebrity and Early Girl tomatoes, basil, watermelon, and Clemson Spineless okra. My hope is that we will plant the same amount of the successful plants (maybe slightly fewer) and rotate in some other crops or varieties that are likely to do well in our growing conditions or extend our harvests.