2014 Plans

Just for fun, here's a little comparison of my proposed garden layout last year, and the aerial photo from Google Earth taken May 2013.

 

You can see at the lower right side of the garden, where we added part of another bed.  I picked up some asparagus on clearance at Lowe's.  It was not a well thought out purchase, and not all of it survived.  We'll see if it does anything this spring.  That area in general is undergoing some changes this year.


I am once again, doing a little expansion of the garden.  Last year, I found that 2 of the beds were a bit shadier than I had realized (the 2 beds on the lower left - those evergreens are very tall and throw a major shadow), and the winter squash I planted there did almost nothing, unlike the volunteer squash that came up in that asparagus bed at the other end of the garden.  Since I'm a somewhat lazy garden-builder though, I'm going to try letting the squashes sprawl, planted in compost-rich hills on the sunnier side of the garden, and reserve the bed space for less rampant crops.

I also have taken the 2 round beds just to the left of the path and combined them with the bed to the left to make one large bed.  I gained several square feet of growing space using the same number of blocks (or very close to it).  I'm joining the 3x6 beds just "north" of those into one long bed as well, though I have not completed the task.

This is the proposed garden layout with the changes.  The areas that are not beds, I'm just laying out cardboard and will cover it with the mulch I got from Asplundh last year.  I'll spot-dig and add compost where I'm actually going to plant. 

I moved the rhubarb into a hopefully sunnier spot, just a little "south" of where it was.  I also picked up another rhubarb, a few Mary Washington Asparagus, and Jerusalem Artichokes at a swap last fall.  I also should soon receive my order of asparagus (to fill in the other half of that bed), strawberries, and thornless raspberries, thornless blackberries and yellow raspberries which I'll plant in the space on the left.  I do need to figure out soon what I'm doing with potatoes this year (other than planting them for sure!!) and I still need to figure out a few more details, but it's a work in progress. 

I don't have sprouts quite yet, but I did pre-soak some peas and planted 2 varieties, I have started some salad greens in containers, planted some radishes, and some very sprouted potatoes I had in the pantry.  I'm also painting and reorganizing the laundry room this week, so I'd better get over this cold (or allergy) that's putting a damper on my productivity, since I got the ship notice email that my berries will be arriving soon!