What Did You Do In The Garden?

[digitS']

The hoop house is UP.

Two garden beds offering 9ft by 20ft of early Spring growing space. I may need to do some rehab to the little access vestibule. The intent was never to make it permanent but, with 2 steps down, it continues to provide access right through the growing season with the hoop house up or not so – why not? Well, I don't know. Kind of a funny feature to a backyard garden when it isn't access to a 5 foot tall tunnel ... Door is always taken off. Maybe some pole beans should be planted to make use of the frame.

With the same type of soil when I lived out in the sticks, I set up a semi subterranean cold frame. Let's see, open i_¡~\ it looked like that. Well, sorta . I could walk along in the ditch and then drop the plastic film covered frame back over the skinny bed. Semi subterranean. I didn't like it. Similar to the conventional cold frame I set up at another time with glass windows — there wasn't enough space for me to control temperatures. Still, some plants did okay I recall. Once the frame was off, they emerged from their ditch. . I'd rather that the plants were more on-the-level and I can weasel through them through the season.

Steve

 

[digitS']

I "put away" the snow shovels, trusting that we won't have an experience like @SPedigrees .

I mowed the lawn, wondering if @Alasgun will have such an earliest ever experience. Honestly, it may not be the earliest but I think that it almost has to be. Where there is full sun, the lawnmower had something to do. Where there is just any shade at all, I was lost as to where I had been or had not passed through.

This is good country for lawn grass – I once worked on a farm that grew bluegrass for seed. Grass escapes to the vegetable and flower gardens as an invasive weed. It's one reason to try to keep it from growing enough to set seed.

Is that an adequate excuse for claiming the work in this thread? Well, I moved flats of plant starts from house to greenhouse and greenhouse to hoop house and to and fro. May still not count, eh?

Steve

Edit: just checked not only New England but @Zeedman 's neighborhood is receiving Heavy Snow today, according to the Weather Service.

 

[Alasgun]

@digitS' , far from earliest anything; however there was some green grass showing right up against that 5ft tall snow, piled at the end of the plow line. But another inch of snow covered it up last night!

 

[digitS']

Grubbing hoed, rototilled and 4-prong cultivated the second part of the vegetable garden expansion over lawn area. Let's see, yeah, there is just enough room in the full-sun areas to set up 2 canopies with tables and chairs on lawn grass now. Why we would want to do that rather than migrating to shaded and roomier locations, I don't know .

Unfortunately or Fortunately, rain will fall tonight and, perhaps, for several days -- delaying the drying of the grass. Since I don't know about the fertility of the soil, I want every spoonful of it to remain in place. This country has very thin topsoil in many locations. Hundreds of feet of glacial till below a few inches of fertile ground. What will be "the other half of the garden" is absolutely packed with organic matter and compost can be dedicated to the new half for the next couple of years.

Another reason to allow that grass to dry is so that I have room to compost it. Of course, I'd be happy to compost it in-place but I have no idea if I want to dig each bed out to an adequate depth for that just yet.

It should all shake out okay and then, I will dig into this new garden location a little more.

Steve, it's not his first rodeo

 

[Phaedra]

Harvested the compost from last autumn, something around 650~700L - what on surface is now at the bottom of another heap

We re-filled one plastic planter, one raised bed, and then put the rest compost in the huge plastic planters first and can use whenever we need. As it's time to prune here and there, and to change the bedding in the chicken run, our composters will soon be replenished.

 

[CarolPNW]

went with my neighbor to the Countrygirl greenhouse and picked up some pretties for my hanging baskets

 

[Branching Out]

Yesterday I pulled a few weeds, planted out some more lettuce seedlings, and poked in 60 Wando pea seeds. The first batch of peas that I sowed in early March are a couple of inches above the soil now; hopefully these peas will take off right away. I finished the day by prepping several large tubs for sowing carrots. Each big container got some dry organic fertilizer and a deep watering. Today I will sow the carrot seeds, and then top them with a sprinkling of peat moss and a board to keep them dark and moist until they germinate. I have had poor results with spring carrots in the ground, but container carrots seem to do quite nicely.

 

[digitS']

Hauled about 20% of the grass sod out of the lawn area and into the backyard garden. There, I dug out about 15 feet of a 20 foot bed to bury that grass.

The top 10 inches of soil was taken out when returned over the grass, amounted to about 20 inches of loose soil above grade. It is a little excessive since that bed was dug out in late Summer 2023 and spent veggie plants went in there. Nothing too apparent was remaining but the ongoing decomposition should help "take care" of that grass quickly.

Another 5% of the grass went into the little compost pit, along with 2023 zinnias that were used for insulating mulch. Another 5% can go the same route along with more Winter mulch. Now, what am I gonna do with the other 70% of the lawn grass?

Steve

 

[flowerbug]

... Now, what am I gonna do with the other 70% of the lawn grass?

i do one of two things (both vertically challenged). one is to stack it up and let it dry out and once in a while turn it to keep drying it and preventing it from rooting again, keep doing that until it is completely dry. the other is to dig a pretty deep (18 inches for most grasses here will do, but not for quack grass) hole and put it in the bottom and then put a few cardboard or newspaper layers over it, then bury it.

 

[ducks4you]

Mowed. Last week I transplanted asparagus.