Next Year’s Summer Garden

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Here’s another TO-DO list, of sorts. Keeps me organized and accountable. Ahum…

What I didn’t have this spring and summer and want next summer

  • broccoli (was too late on this one)
  • peas (ditto)
  • green and red peppers (ditto)
  • some hot peppers
  • onions (tried but failed: all rotted in the wet)
  • squash (tried but failed: lots of blossoms, no fruits)
  • herbs herbs herbs: I had some in pots, but want them in the ground this time: their beds are almost ready.
  • strawberries
  • rhubarb (am planting it this week) – DONE
  • garlic (am planting it this week)
  • flowers! Need to establish flowers for the bees I hope to have one day.

What I had this summer and want more of

  • cucumber (for pickling)
  • beans
  • tomato
  • eggplant
  • potatoes, but so far I’ve only dug in the Salem potato bin and the pickings are pathetic – but then the Salem, being a mid-season potato, might not be the right kind for this kind of growing – we’ll see when I explore the two Bintjes bins… So I’m not sure whether we’ll repeat the potato bin experiment.
  • oh well, everything basically, except radishes and beets (we’re not fans)

This all means I need to start digging again, at least 8 more beds, some in the veg garden closer to the house and in the buckwheat field (all these will be in the shade), some in the backyard (sunny), one more up front (sunny).

I need to slash the buckwheat in the herb and berry beds to-be up front and sow compost crop (fava, vetch, wheat and rye). {UPDATE} Did so for the largest terrace bed.

I also have to build at least one more compost bin for the Starbucks coffee grounds, the Fall leaves, and the “orphan” pumpkins that will come our way after Halloween, and the horse manure.

We have to design and build the pvc-pipe hoop house in which we hope to experiment with a winter harvest. It will straddle a block of two or (if we’re ambitious) four 4×8 beds (2 feet apart).

The entire lower front yard also needs to be designed. It’s over the septic leach field, so that’s where the bee flowers will go, with a little pond to the side fed by a wetland system for the rain water overflow from our big roof.

So most of the harvest is in, but the hard work is really just beginning again.

Amie’s school finally starts tomorrow, so I will have time in the mornings to work on my novel (one last push). She lets me do manual labor – clean, cook, can, garden – but the moment I pick up a book or the laptop:

No, Mama, that’s not work!

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