Hello, steemies! Welcome to my page!
To start with, I'm writing this on the steemit front end because palnet is being really slow right now, otherwise I'd be writing it on palnet.
For those of you who've been following me, you know that I have 2 plots at the local community garden. I've been going up there almost every day lately to work on my plots to get them all planted. I'm mostly done now, but I still need to plant some pumpkins up there. I have potatoes planted in one plot, and flour corn planted in the other plot. Once the corn comes up, I'll plant some Hidatsa hard beans next to some of the corn plants. That way, the beans use the corn stalks as their trellis. It worked well last year, so I'm going to do it again this year.
Here's a look at my garden plots. The potatoes are planted on this end.
The corn is planted in rows on this end of the plots.
I've been watering the rows with a big watering can. I don't want to use a sprinkler right now because I want to leave the area between the rows dry to slow down the weed growth. I use the boards between the rows to walk on so that I don't compact the dirt as much, and also to keep the weeds from growing there. If I had more boards, I'd cover between all the rows, but I work with what I have available.
There's not very many people using the garden plots at the community garden this year, so there's a lot of empty plots. A couple of the plots next to mine have been empty for a couple of years, so they've gotten grown in with grass. Last year I just mowed the grass on those plots to keep the weeds down. This year, when I brought my tiller up to the garden to work up my 2 plots, I also tilled up one of the plots next to mine, and then covered it with the black plastic that I had from covering my second plot last year. The plot was mostly sod from the grass, so it was a lot of work to get it tilled up, but I got it done well enough that it could be used again with a little more work. I figure that if someone wants to rent that plot, it will be much easier for them to get ready for planting.
There is still one more plot next to my two that needs to be worked up. It also hasn't been used for the past 2 years. For now, I'm just going to keep cutting the grass on it. At some point this summer, I'll bring the tiller back up there and till it up, but that will wait until I have more ambition.
I put a new pair of wheels on the front of my mower last week, wheels with actual bearings in them, to make the mower easier to push. It does seem to help, I don't get quite as tired out when I mow around my garden plots now. It also helps with the extra mowing that I do up there to maintain the area around my plots. I seem to have expanded my mowing area, but it does look better that way, and it controls some of the tall weeds that would otherwise grow in that area and spread their seeds.
That's all I have for this post, thanks for stopping by to check it out!
Gardening can be a lot of work and must be attended regularly. You have a good head start :-)
can't believe you have two gardens! one is quite enough work. i wonder if celery would grow there, it will be quite expensive this year
Actually, I hadn't thought about growing celery in the garden, I should check that out. I could start from seeds, but I don't know how long it takes to grow.
Looks great. It's nice to see someone willing to maintain adjacent plots even when it's not their responsibility. Stand up move!
I have some hildatsa bean this year as well. I was considering planting them in my corn too. Perhaps I will just so we can compare results!
Good work. Take care!
Thanks!
If you plant the Hidatsa beans with the corn, plant them on the outer edges of the corn patch so they'll get sunlight. They don't do very well if you plant them in the middle of the corn.
OK
Thanks for the tip!