Future Garden?

I seem to have been strongly influenced by reading Carol Deppe. I wanted summer squash: zucchini and scalloped, if I could find them. Winter squash, I was going to try and grow a kuri type, my favorite. At first, I couldn't find even zucchini starts... then I did. I also bought a pie pumpkin start as the farm didn't have any other winter squashes we'd use. Then I started trying to fill in my blanks...

I have the zucchini and pumpkin starts.
Scalloped squash seed.
Short season butternut starts.
Turban squash starts.
Acorn squash starts

And starts for 1 other winter type squash, almost all of which were compromises. This will over fill the available space. I need to remember that if I want to grow kuri squashes, I have to start them myself, that I can probably find zucchini starts, but maybe not scallopini starts.

What I have left in starts for the garden are 1 six pack of brandywine tomatoes and basil after the squash. Everything else is already planted: onion, leek, brussel sprout, lettuces, cabbage, and cauliflower. I seeded summer carrots. Planted tubers: potatoes (3 types). Also shallots.

I still have cherry tomatoes to seed and other things to seed as well.  The beans and peas are coming up.

If all of this comes in, or even 1/2 of it, we will be drowning in produce, esp. since I also signed up for a 1/2 share at the CSA. I'm tempted to give the acorn squash starts to my neighbor with the 40 acre farm. She would no doubt give me squashes in the fall, but it would free up a chunk of my garden... I'd give her the butternut too, but they're already in the ground.

Oh boy. I really, really need to use my garden notebook this year and track what works/didn't. Having had one year where things actually grew, I seem to have gone *nuts* although I thought I was being careful and circumspect!

I hope it all grows well!

Sounds like an exciting gardening adventure!  I like those crops a lot too.


Out of curiosity, all of those crops are very heavy nitrogen feeders.  Do you have any plans or thoughts about how to replenish the nitrogen in that soil?  Peas/beans?  Another legume?  Heavy compositing?  Something else?


Good luck, and I wish you the very best!!


Eric

Eric Hanson wrote:Out of curiosity, all of those crops are very heavy nitrogen feeders.  Do you have any plans or thoughts about how to replenish the nitrogen in that soil?  Peas/beans?

Probably peas or beans next year. For the past 2 years, I've had the legumes in raised beds, but there aren't any more, nor do I intend to add more raised beds this year, so... time to get the legumes in the in-ground beds. I'm not quite sure how my trellis system will work without side walls. Not sure it won't, but it will be new...

Also, this bed was covered in compost before the squashes were put there and I have a lot more I can use, if needed. We hadn't used the compost we'd built for a decade or more in a sealed composter, until this year... and I have a lot of leaf bins from last year too with partly and totally composted leaves, not to mention the farm behind us, who will give me rotted manure if I take a bucket over there... So, I have a lot of soil food available.

Jennie,

Sounds excellent!!

Just as a thought about compost that you could try.

I learned several years ago that the best place to make a compost pile is in the bed itself.  If I make a compost pile in the bed, then all the compost goodness that washes down from rain or just inevitably drips down thanks to gravity will soak into the earth below—and that land below might as well be your garden bed as opposed to some obscure and otherwise unused part of your property.  Also, any worms under the pile or nearby will gladly come to the surface to get a snack and then drag that vegetable matter down underground.  Over a fairly short period of time the topsoil and the compost pile will sorta merge together to the point that it is hard to discern where one layer stops and the other begins.

At this point, any time I have a winter compost pile, it automatically goes on one of my beds, probably where I had a heavy feeder the previous year.


Food for thought, do as you think wise,

Eric

Hm. A weirdness... one of the 6 basil plants has damped off. Only 1. Planted between 2 others, both healthy? I don't know why. Any ideas would be appreciated!

All but one of the turban squashes have also damped off and maybe the seeds I used too. My "overage" of squash may have resolved itself.

Sounds like a great (and full!) garden plan! Even if half of it thrives, you'll have loads of produce. Passing some squash starts to your neighbor is a smart move—frees up space and still gets you a fall reward. Definitely worth noting what works this year… it's easy to go overboard after one good season!