We are adding to the family...

The garden family that is. These are 4 of the 6 new boxes that we or should I say Ivan has added for me. He builds them and fills them with the top soil and then I plant the seeds and weed and care for it. =)
The two front one s are deeper. I wanted the one on the right for carrots and they need a deep bed to grow for the length so this is it. I put corn on the right since I want to be sure actually get some to harvest.

Our corn is coming along exceptionally well. Last year at the point it was purple and stunted and very sad looking. We found out it was a phosphorus problem and added ash from the wood stove to help out with this. So far it seems to be doing ok. We will see as the season progresses. The picture below is the corn from 10 days ago so you can see the difference.

 It has gotten very full as you can see. Now to hope it grows tall and actually gets corn. That would be nice!

And my herbs pots are coming along very nicely as well. We made sure everything had lots of fertilizer because I think last year we did not have enough. I have even been able to start using these in my cooking.
We have been very lucky for an exceptional spring this year, warm and mild, with only a bit of rain and not to many tornadoes. I am really hoping for a mild summer so the garden does not bake. We'll see =)
Enjoy your week!

It's SPRING!!!

 It is that time of year again, at least here in the south, and garden prep and planting is well underway. My biggest and strongest helper is hard at work helping me get soil ready, new boxes built and filled and the fence put up to keep out the large dogs.There is no keeping the small dog out, his nick name is Houdini.

 Getting this fence up is vital to the health of my garden. Not only do my dogs like to wander in here but once we add fertilizer they want to eat it and the fruits and vegetables. We had this from last year and even with the garden expansion we were able to make it work. It does not keep out Tucker (aka Houdini), he can slip under easily but he has learned to stay out of the boxes so we let him wander.

 It is not very tall but it is a psychological thing. (for me not Tucker) and the big dogs =) Ivan has mowed in there now and weed wacked and everything looks so nice.

The corn is now transplanted in it's box and then I found out it does not do well with transplanting. Of course, because I did not look this up and it had never occurred to me you could not. Some days...

I am really excited about the garden this year. I did add a lot of wood stove ash to the corn this year so hopefully it won't turn purple and get stumpy. It is getting bigger and seems to be staying green. We shall see...

Stay tuned for more pics and see how awesome this garden will be (we can only hope)

On the Hunt for the Tomatoe Horn Worm (and other garden pests)

As a new organic gardener I have had to learn a lot about things that will cause problems in my garden and one of those is garden pests. Bugs and other creatures that will cause LOTS of problems in your garden. I hate bugs in any shape or form and I really hate the ones who try and eat and destroy my good garden veggies and fruit. (although at this point if they wanted a cucumber or two I would probably not fuss=). I have had to do research on the internet to find home organic remedies for what will get rid of these pests without killing off the bumble bees and other little critters that you need out there.

Living in a very warm area we gets lots of bugs but the one I have way to may of is grasshoppers. I have a LOT of grass hoppers, if you know anyone who likes to eat them, send them over, they could have many a meal from my garden. I looked on line to see how to get rid of them and found a very unique way to rid yourself of the little bugger. Flour, plain old all purpose flour.You put it in a paper bag, poke holes in it and then early morning you sprinkle it over your tomatoes or whatever else it is on. It supposedly gums up the grasshoppers mouth so they cannot eat anymore. My concern became if it will do it to grasshoppers will it do it to the good critters? I have not found an answer to this so I have chosen to not do it and just go to my garden a couple of times a day and whack them off with my hand or take a couple of cucumbers and whack them together with the grasshopper in between. It usually does the job.

 One of the biggest and nastiest things I have found is the horned tomatoes worm. This bug is big, probably the size of my index finger. And nasty! No mater what you do that sucker sticks to the branch no matter what. And if you leave it, it will eat everything in site on your tomato plant and I mean everything. This is the third one I have found in my garden and it had only eaten a little bit, but the first one I found had eaten a whole plant before I found it.

So I found a solution for these nasty huge things and it is very effective, knock them off and beat the crap out of them until they can't come back.My block of wood for just this purpose =)

Of course there are other endless little bugs, you could go on  forever, but I won't. These two are the ones that bug me the most and these are my organic solutions.I do have other garden pests, that I will not get rid of.

The fence I have up stops the big dogs but it will not stop Tucker. He certainly thinks it is not there for his benefit at any rate. So we watch him when we are out there to make sure he does not ruin anything and let the fence works for the big dogs. It does work for them.So this is the way it will be.=)

10 things I have learned about gardening

I am not a professional gardener, by anystretch of anyone's mind. I have grown plants & flowers and helped with a garden when I was very small, but that is about the extent of my experience except for an occasion dabble here and there.This will just be my experiences that I have had and maybe you can take something with you from it.=)

We do raised box gardening and are attempting to keep it all organic, no small chore, but a worth while one for everyone in the end. We live in Arkansas so we will have some different things than other places but I am guessing the general gist will be the same.

Ten (or maybe more) things I have learned about gardening.

1. Raised boxes makes for great gardening when your yard is a waste  land (provided you follow number 2), drain well and are easy to work with.

2. Make sure your soil is good soil. we went to our local home improvement store and got top soil which came I am guessing from a nuclear waste zone. When our plants turned yellow like they had hapititis , we knew something was wrong. Test your soil BEFORE you waste all the time and effort and it will surely create some better plants.

3. Most things can be started early, although I have read up and there are few things that need to be sewn directly into the soil. It makes for healthy plants,  & allows you to get the drop on nature. Here we have an early last frost and we can grown well into fall.

4.Make sure you give everything lots of room to grow. Plants need some personal space too.I in my crazy exuberance made sure and plants lots and lots of tomatoes in the box. In the beginning they looked great. Now I have a small jungle where gnomes run and hide and eat my tomatoes because everything is so close and following up with number 5

5. Make sure you stake those roomy plants. Mine have grown huge and bushy giving said gnome a good place to hide and not allow air and sun to circulate around your plants. I have lots of flowers now and tomatoes forming but it took them a while to get here. I also blame this on the nuclear waste from number 1.

6. You can get a LOT of cucumbers from a few plants.I mean a LOT! Keep what you need for yourself and share the rest with family, friends and neighbors. Don't eat to many at one time, things do NOT bode well when you do. (pardon the dust in the picture we are renovating and it is everywhere)

7.Cucumber and melons will vine everywhere, up tomato plants, corn stalks and fences. Give them their own little place to climb so it dosen't affect the rest of your plants.Those little tendrils they send out will choke the life out of anything once they hang on.Plus you will have a cleaner veggie that the gnome won't be able to get so easily. ( a big stick helps as well)

8.A little helper in your garden never hurts anything and they will learn the love of gardening as well. Children love to help and Ivy spent a lot of her mornings helping me in the garden.It was very beneficial to both Peaches & Ivy =)

9. I have learned what cucumber bugs, eggs from other critters, squash vine borers and other nasty's look like. I am not afraid to thump them or squish them with my bare hands. nasty buggers. They will kill your plants, so get rid of them when ever possible!

 

10. Your dogs will want to be in your garden, they cannot help themselves. 

You may need to put up a small fence. It is probably more psychological for them but it does help. Unfortunately it does not keep our small dog out. He climbs under it, never occurring to him, it was meant to keep him out as well as the big dogs. We just found a small plastic one from Lowes with some small posts and it works just right.

11. It is always important to have a little fun. After all what is life without some enjoyment. Take some time to relax after you have worked hard. It makes going out to your garden much more enjoyable.

 12. And of course the reason we garden is to get the reward at the end. Since this was my first serious try I wasn't sure how it would turn out but so far I have been pleased, I have learned a lot and we have had some nice tasting garden items with only organic pesticides so no poisoning is eminent

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ENjoy your week