The 2013 Garden, What are You Hoping For

[thistlebloom]

Lesa, I'm really hoping you can pull it all off! Maybe you can scale the garden back a tad so it's a little less work. Is there any possibility of hiring someone for a little weed patrol occasionally? Whatever you do, please don't abandon us! We already see too little of you

 

[Kassaundra]

I hope I can be more organized, and impliment several water saving drought gardening ideas, some of my own some from research.

 

[Gardening with Rabbits]

I am hoping to have our fences put up. The yard needs to be fenced and then I am planning on a fence separating the yard from the garden. I want to transplant the strawberries to a new location. I am hoping to get an earlier start and hoping that turning the swingset into a greenhouse will help. We have hoops for the boxes and I am going to use them this year to get the earliest and latest of lettuce and other greens. I am hoping the rabbit manure will work magic in the garden. I also want to keep better records and be more organized.

 

[catjac1975]

Don't skimp on fencing. We use green coated heavy wire fencing and bury it 12-18 inches deep to keep out pests. The lower part is lined with green coated chicken wire to keep out the small animals. The first fences we did well were put up over 30 years ago and still look brand new. Some of the old posts have been replaced but most are original pressure treated. My husband hates replacing what he has already done!

I am hoping to have our fences put up. The yard needs to be fenced and then I am planning on a fence separating the yard from the garden. I want to transplant the strawberries to a new location. I am hoping to get an earlier start and hoping that turning the swingset into a greenhouse will help. We have hoops for the boxes and I am going to use them this year to get the earliest and latest of lettuce and other greens. I am hoping the rabbit manure will work magic in the garden. I also want to keep better records and be more organized.

 

[thistlebloom]

What is the saying you can't pick your relatives and you can't pick your neighbors . . . then there was something about picking your nose . . :/ ?!


Journey, you need to do some talking TO your neighbor. You cannot have a horse wandering thru your 2013 garden! From the get-go, they need to understand that this situation is unacceptable. Take it back . . . let them know that very soon you will require them to keep it off your property - not a day's tolerance. Even if you don't tell the neighbors your course of action, involving authorities should be next.

Steve

Yeah, and the sooner the better too! We have a certain neighbor who I have no doubt griped about before on here ( and this is probably the same gripe ) who "free ranges" her horses on everyone elses property. She has been asked not to, she's even had the sheriff called out a few times (not by me, though I wouldn't have hesitated to ), and she just sort flips everybody off and says "what are they hurting?" It wasn't until I started taking pictures of them loose and on my land that she started to keep them on her own property.
Her own property being slightly bigger than ours too, incidentally. She's not a renter, so there's not a lot of possibility of swapping her out for a new one, plus she always says she will die and be buried in this home place. :/

If she only knew how many people had their fingers crossed...

 

[journey11]

What is the saying you can't pick your relatives and you can't pick your neighbors . . . then there was something about picking your nose . . :/ ?!

Well, I guess we can kinda pick our neighbors . . . using our feet. You'd need to canvass the 'hood but, even with this marked segregation we've fallen into with the "gated communities" & all that, it's not really possible to do much about who we live next door to even if we move.

I am a fairly anonymous person on the internet. And, because I have gardens in multiple locations, I've got lots of neighbors. See the connection? I'll clue you in on one more thing: a neighbor introduced me to garden forums . . ! We were/are actually on the same forum for years & may still be!

Then around here on the forum, I do a lot of talking about my real life neighbors . . .

Journey, you need to do some talking TO your neighbor. You cannot have a horse wandering thru your 2013 garden! From the get-go, they need to understand that this situation is unacceptable. Take it back . . . let them know that very soon you will require them to keep it off your property - not a day's tolerance. Even if you don't tell the neighbors your course of action, involving authorities should be next.

Steve

We decided we would take our tax return this year and put up woven wire and electric fence around our entire property. "Good fences make good neighbors!" I've talked to them until I am blue in the face. They always promise to keep their animals contained, but don't. I try really hard to keep my cool and get along with folks, but these guys are ridiculous. I have lost too many chickens to dog attacks and besides it will be nice to keep the deer and rabbits out as well. The dogs came after my 5-yr-old too and now she's afraid to go into the backyard by herself. Our property was once part of a larger farm. We have the farm house. Their barn roof supplies my cistern. Pieces here and there, sectioned off by a previous owner for his children. I think I will also build my goat barn on that side, for a little bit of a privacy screen and to put water into the cistern--with no strings attached!

 

[897tgigvib]

Hunkie, Amaranth is super easy to grow.
It's in the Chenopodiaceae family along with beets and spinach...so is quinoa and pigweed, oh, and I think celosia is considered in the same family. Botanists might be splitting the family up because of genetic discoveries. The pigment in Amaranth sure smells and tastes like Beet pigment. All parts of the Amaranth plant are edible.

Most of the Amaranths available in seed catalogs grow with their plant architecture vaguely resembling sunflowers.
A tall single stem that grows upward.

Most of the garden Amaranths fit in one of 2 categories: White seeded...actually golden. And Black seeded, actually an intensely dark magenta.
Bountiful gardens' Ellen Bartholomew has developed a white seeded red flowered amaranth.

The white seeded Amaranth grain is the most preferred for flavor. The black seeded grain is used more as an additive like poppy seeds.

One very important thing for the first time Amaranth grower: (anyone who has grown it will understand why the capslock was used )

BE VERY CAREFUL ABOUT LETTING SEEDS FALL TO THE GROUND, ESPECIALLY STARTING WITH THE FIRST TIME YOU GROW IT!!!!!
(hey guys, did i add enough of these !!! things?)

Amaranth reseeds<<<understatement of the year.

Now that my main seedling weeds are Amaranth I get plenty of finger and thumb exercise, and I didn't even have to pay to Gold's Gym anything for membership! How great is that???

On the other hand, Amaranths are beautiful and satisfying to grow, and look real good in with some of the shorter sunflowers.

If planted too closely, Amaranths will make small plants. A foot between plants will get you full sized plants.

Some kind of corralling or staking helps keep them upright, just like sunflowers.

For looks the red flowered varieties are the winners in a close race.'
For flavor the golden flowered are the winners.

Let me know if you grow them, and I'll let you know how to harvest and thresh them.

Oh, Quinoa is similar, but the leaves are more like pigweed leaves, and to produce grain, many kinds are more finicky to grow. Colorado Quinoa is easiest, and it grew very well and produced well for me too!

 

[Naughty]

I have only been gardening for about 3 years now... and learn something new every year. I'm totally addicted to growing my family produce. I also found out that my storm shelter is a great root cellar... so I plan to try for more winter squash next year. I love this site for all the info.... I had tomatoes last year when others were giving up due to lack of .....

 

[skeeter9]

If things go as planned this year, we plan to put in several more raised planters. We have several large chain link panels that we want to put up as a separate garden from the smaller one by our kitchen. We also plan to install drip hoses in our raised beds so I don't have to spend so much time hand watering. I don't mind doing it, but it does take lots of time. Other than that, I would sure like to keep up with the weeding better this year. It really got away from me last year. I'm sure I'll come up with a million other things as planting time draws near. :tools

 

[Jared77]

Thank you! Its been too long coming to be able to add to our family we're REALLY excited!

We hope to get an offer in on the house here shortly and we'll see. Its a short sale so we could be waiting for a while before we can get it approved. So we may not even be in it summer or late summer hard to say. It doesn't need much, just the usual paint, and small things like that but otherwise we're hoping. That's also why I'm focusing only on a container garden this year so I'm mobile and if we get this house I can pack up my tomatoes and move them to the new deck for the rest of 2013 and watch the sun and then figure out the location and and plan for planting the 2014 garden.

Hardest part for me is keeping things in moderation. With so many varieties I want to try its tough to keep the staples and still try only 1 or 2 varieties and I'm positive I'm not alone with that. Plus if they don't do well was it the season or just a bad fit (season too short, soil, etc) so do you grow them again and take up space I would otherwise use for a new variety that I want to try? That's always a tough call.

The other thing I've found I've had to rank what's important by how quickly and much it will benefit us. What's going to give me the biggest return on investment vs cost involved? Is there something I can do for a small amount of $ and not delay the bigger items by too much?

Its especially tough to be disciplined and not go hog wild knowing what next summer holds for me. So I'm trying to sit on my hands and be patient. I know I'll be grateful I did once I get to that point, but until then its tough to not plan anything big. Enough to scratch my gardening itch and have a ready supply of some fresh veggies is the balance I'm trying to strike.