What are your garden plans for 2023?

Reading other’s goals is inspiring! 2022 was pretty darn good for certain veggies & fruits, especially our 5 apple trees, squash, pumpkins & watermelon! Did lots of canning & freezing.
This is year three at our homestead & here are my 2023 garden goals:
1. Set up worm farms for composting
2. Build a hoop house
3. Do more seed starts
4. Create more areas with wildflowers for pollinators & hummingbirds
5. Plant yams & potatoes
6. Plant more blueberries & raspberries
7. Set up raised beds
8. Manage those darn weeds & insect pests better!!!

Mary Cook wrote:

Reading a permaculture book it occurred to me that instead of stringing cord between the tops of the fruit trees and the fence to keep hawks out, maybe I could plant bushes and other plants between the trees, so the chickens aren't exposed anywhere? If the bushes and plants could also provide forage for the chickens, that would be even better. ...--I'd need to cage smaller plants until established, or the chickens would likely scratch them up.  Ideas welcome.

Since my chooks are free ranging through my urban yard, I have a few tips.  They don't do as much damage from eating the vegetables (those that they access; most are fenced in) as they do by scratching.  So what's worked best is to surround plants with large rocks or branches that they cannot scratch and move.

Also, they want to eat the bugs, so they spend lots of time scratching through woodchips, leaves, and compost piles.  If you can put some of that in their area, it keeps them out of mischief and provides food and "natural behavior" for them.  And they help to move and turn them, creating compost, as it mixes with their droppings, too.  (but watch out for potholes; those are ankle breakers!)

They love to hang out under the bushes and plants.  We don't have birds of prey here, but I think that would help your situation.  I can't offer any suggestions for plants, though.  Mine love mangoes and papayas, but that's the wrong climate zone for you!

As to my 2023 gardening goals, well, I'm already behind (our best gardening season just started), but...
--maintain the two tower garden units I just got
--keep up with succession planting seeds, so I can have transplants ready to go in, wherever there is room
--obtain another plastic laundry sink
--make one or two more worm bins in different areas
--make and trial an indoor worm bin, as a gift for my friend's birthday in March.  (She doesn't "believe" we are likely to experience crazy inflation and possibly food shortages/famine any time soon.  But I am heeding the warnings, especially since, being an island, we cannot just drive to the next state to pick something up.  We import more than 85% of our food here.  And people seem completely clueless!  I started her growing in pots on her lanai years ago, and she's kept that up.  Baby steps...)
--use compost tea and garden scrap teas more regularly
--maintain a garden notebook, so I can know which varieties work best for us
--save more of my own seeds
--air layer duplicates of some of my favorite plants, for redundancy (also because there has already been theft from the street, where many of my plants grow)
--grow and process more medicinal herbs
--grow more flowers (with a long-term goal of getting bees!)
--grow more of the spices and herbs for tea that I now purchase
--dry the orange, lemon, lime, and grapefruit peel of any organic fruits I grow/get
--relocate some of the street-level plants to areas in the yard
--obtain more toilet tanks for the back area, a narrow strip that is the only full sun we get in the back this time of year
--refresh my dragon fruit plants and replace the varieties that need hand pollination
--grow watermelons, melons, pumpkins, and chayote squash
--succession plant green, long, winged, and lima beans
--try cover cropping this summer
--try to grow some onions into bulbs
--grow enough greens and grass to sustain a few small rabbits, for fertilizer at least; possibly for meat also (I am anticipating shortages or unaffordable prices for hay, and I do not want to buy commercial feed full of coloring and hydrogenated horrible oils, etc)
--that would also mean building some sort of rabbit housing, too
--use some natural sprays to control powdery mildew and other bacterial/fungal diseases that would normally kill stuff
--figure out how to grow peppers!
--and then make my own fermented hot sauce!
--make and use some of the Korean Natural Farming/JADAM-type amendments
--grow more greens for the chickens and ducks
--kill slugs and snails more regularly, before they become a big problem
--grow all my own ginger and turmeric
--grow Mexican oregano again (killed a plant I had for years; I miss it for cooking, and babies I've tried to grow since have all died)
--grow all my own greens
--harvest more of my coffee
--graph lemon and tangerine onto the jabong cocktail tree
--find a good location for the mulberry and keep that alive this time
--use the shredder I bought to shred cardboard for the worm and compost bins
--rebuild the compost sifter
--possibly start aerobic compost tea brewing
--repot and refresh the kumquat tree
--stop overbuying seeds!!!
--set up the plastic rack I picked up from the trash yesterday as a table for more seed starting
--put up the wire mesh as trellising and plant something like cucumber or peas to climb it
--keep notes on the different micro dwarf tomato varieties I am trying

Wow, some lofty goals...but they say you should aim higher than you think you might accomplish, right?!  Thank you for forcing me to set some goals.  Things fall too easily by the wayside otherwise.

Happy New Year to my permie "family."  We are helping to save the world...and let's hope more people join the movement, eh?!

(I'm guessing with the coming nitrogen fertilizer shortage, some people WILL figure out that aged urine becomes ammonia, so we actually make all the fertilizer we need...without the industrial mega-corporations...)

To move to self sufficient.   Plant in garden beds, along with fruiting trees?

I'm already halfway into my season, so I'll share what I've done so far.

-plant old seeds already (i don't think i need to describe my seed stash problem to permies). I did get a few things that have never come up (like bottle gourds and cantaloupe), too early to say whether they'll actually produce or not, but here's hoping

-keep on trying. 5 batches of okra in the ground and i'll put another one in tomorrow. they've been in since september and grown maybe 5 cm max, forget about actually making leaves or flowers. Eventually they'll grow, I just need to keep trying. My first batch of sweet corn made ears at less than a foot tall, I ripped it all out and batch 2 is looking a bit more promising

-roll with punches. We've had insane weather and health challenges. The plants keep growing, whether I'm out there or not. I wish I had more garden time but I'm taking what I can get and not feeling too bad about it.

-zen thinking: I have a new puppy who is determined to destroy every blessed thing I own. Just this week he got over a 5-foot fence to eat my cucumbers and a six-footer to destroy my succulents. I'm trying to remember that there will be other cucumbers, succulents are a dime a dozen, and that one day this puppy will be an old dog laying in the sun, and that all this is temporary.

1) put my new greenhouse to use
2) set a new produce challenge for myself to go longer than this year(early Nov) without any store bought veg/fruit
3) start enough extra plants to hold a "plant sale" in the spring!

OH!  and 4)  work on my 100,000 calorie PEP challenge!

I am in the process of rebuilding the high tunnel.  My wife informs me I will finish the greenhouse on the SE side of the house.  I am expanding the garden by about 300 sq feet.   I am hope to plant about 1/2 acre in sunflowers.   The operative word here is “plan”.   I will post in the fall as to what has been accomplished.

Well I had a pretty good success with one of my goals for 2022 - the simple farming system. At least, I did a lot of digging and have an area pretty much prepared for actually growing some food this year!
The other two goals I didn't do so well at - the polytunnel still needs it's cover - I missed it last year, and the local gardening club just didn't get off the ground, although I did give it a good shot (here)

I have far too many projects for 2023 as usual, but to simplify:
Simple Farming:

Solar Aspect beds

project thread
This year I'm going to grow food, collect first seeds for my landraces and hopefully grow black oats for the first time.

Chinampa and water terraces:
project thread
I'm going to finish planting this up, hopefully fairly early in the year.

Crater Garden:
project thread
I'm going to dig a big hole!

Other plans:
I want to plant some hedge plants around my tree field to create a barrier to eliminate the need for my deer fence in time.
I need to plan my front garden to work with our proposed house extension. This will involve a new composting system that is more dog/bird resistant, a new drying line for the washing, and access paths that don't turn into mud baths for half the year!
Recovering the polytunnel is still on the list, I want to plant more soft fruit out in the tree filed to get more varieties, maybe start a perennial  root polyculture area, and I'd quite like to get round to some things I've never quite done; like using the lush nettles in my garden for making some fibre yarn.

Good luck everyone!

Im just starting on the self sufficiency road so only time will tell what this year will bring.

I bought an old dilapidated croft house with 2 acres in the Scottish Highlands a few months ago and have been tidying up all the rubbish etc to get ready for this year.

Its not been used for about 10 years a neighbour mentioned and from what I can make it was used as a party weekend destination for who ever stayed there.

The previous owner clearly liked their booze there was loads of smashed glass bottles, drink cans, suspicious medication tubs all over the place, tattoing stuff.

They must have decided to have a massive bonfire with all their belongings at some point, there was a big pile of half burnt stuff.... bedding/clothes/batteries everything, loads of junk metal through the soil.

I'm not living there yet, still clearning out some belongings but hope to be up there by end of Feb full time with my five cats

Then the real work begins!

This year I hope to get a lot of trees planted as it just a bare field sadly, and try and attract some birds to the area and also some flowers for the bee's - two easy things to get started.

I'm not sure what condition the soil is in, so will have to investigate and see what I can grow veg wise.

I would be happy with some basic veggies  like potatoes /leeks / broccoli /cabbage for my first year, oh and some cat "grass" for the kitties to run about daft in.

Got a wee bit of Ivy clearling to do also

wow, Paul, you have your work cut out for you....and I hope that stuff growing on the roof is edible!  If not, perfect beginnings for a lasagna-style garden!  (just finished making one myself, yesterday afternoon and this morning...still need to plant it.)

Good luck to you, too!

I've heard that mushrooms of some sort have been used to clean up contaminated soil, and I believe you're in a good climate to grow mushrooms.  You might want to look into that.  Sounds like you'll need to do some decontamination.

Welcome to Permies Paul! Good luck with all that ivy! Here are some ideas that might help.

Thanks Alina and Joylynn, for the tips.

lasagna-style garden is definitely on my to do list - hopefully I will be able to get some bails of hay from a local farmer to start layering.

I just happened to stumble across a good video on youtube earlier about fungi for improving soil by a very cool Japanese organic gardener called Yoshida Toshimichi

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rvHJKqU-mZo&t=1385s

Thanks for the Ivy link, I think the roof might be used by some birds in the area to nest and as a source of food, I will have to give it some thought on how to tackle it with minimum impact on them.

Thanks again👍

Wow. Such great plans! I hope they all go well, if not perfectly.

@Mary @Carla, can you really have a too big greenhouse?

#1 Share knowledge.
1.A) Two years ago I started a calendar list for when to start plants for spring and fall planting. I always lose track of time, and bam! It's next season. I took me a while to figure out how not to plant everything memorial day and harvest just after labor day. A zone 4 mind set. I have been living in zone 8 for a few (ahem...10) years. Finally figured it out. To my surprise, neighbors are interested in the list.
1.B) I enrolled in a Master Food Preserver class with a local collage. If I pass I can teach others. I think I will pass and am looking forward to sharing this knowledge.

#2 Be ruthless (with my garden). I hate to pull flowering veg plants and hold on to the delution that inspite of 99+ degree / 99% humidity days for 6 weeks or more, the plant will continue to produce. It is a waste of time, water and energy. My new mantra, "It will not produce. It will not produce." I will pull them out, and console myself by talking with my new seedlings. Awaiting cooler weather.

#3 Meat chickens. I want to try meat chickens but the DH isn't that excited about it. I am working on my persuasive messaging. Maybe I should take out ads in the newspaper.

#4 Upgrade rabbit hutches. Secretly, I am a 6 foot 2 supermodel. Unfortunately, my 5 foot 3 body doesn't know that and its short arms struggles to reach the very back corner of the rabbit hutches. This must change, and I am unlikely to get taller.  

#5 More fruit trees. At least 1 more. Suburbia limits the open plain. I need to find a loquat, my other one is lonely. It told me it missed it's friend. Mission accepted.

Hi Paul,

Be sure to explore all the potential hiding spots.   When I bought my land, I listened to a well meaning tip and asked local law enforcement to search my property. They came up with a meth lab.