Clean Up Begins

Saturday was a beautiful gardening day, full of birds and sunshine!







Ok, well not really, but it was in the mid 50’s and for a few hours, there was a bit of a break in the clouds that provided some sun. So all in all, it was as good a gardening day as I can expect here in Lucketts in February.

Does this look like a planting bed ready for the new season?? Perhaps not. Because this garden has always gotten away from me each year, my gardening season always has to begin with Clean Up. I know, that is supposed to be the last step of last years garden…putting the garden to bed. But, as you can see, it didn’t quite get done.

So, with my trusty helper, Saturday was the start of pulling, prepping and raking.

And the final result....

If you happened to be passing by Lucketts on Saturday, you probably would have wondered what that fresh, minty smell was. There was an overgrown mint plant, left over from last summer's Mojitos that just needed to go. The mint had managed to fill one of the boxes I will be converting to a SFG, even infiltrating my sage. It will be impossible to keep the mint from coming back without totally emptying the box so it looks like the sage will be finding a new home after all…maybe in a planter.

What to Plant...

What to plant….what to plant….





This is always a dilemma for me. In Mel’s book about Square Foot Gardening, he cautions against trying many new things all at once. He also advises against building a seed list by perusing the many seed catalogs with their beautiful photography and enticing descriptions. This is perhaps the hardest thing to avoid. For some reason, and maybe it’s the presence of those catalogs, January always finds me itching to start growing something (or everything)! But this year, there is a PLAN and I am determined to stick to the plan.

So, Mel suggests looking back at recent grocery lists. I realized we eat a fair amount of vegetables in this house. Lettuce, broccoli, cauliflower, baby carrots (I know… not really babies, but just trimmed adult carrots), greens, and something called “assorted salad fixin’s”. Hmmm, I don’t remember ever seeing a seed packet for something called assorted salad fixin’s. But this is my winter shopping list. During the spring and summer, when fresh, local produce is readily available at my neighborhood farms stands and the CSA I belong to, there are many more veggies I eat. Eggplant, peppers, beets, beans, sugar snap peas, not to mention tomatoes of every size, shape and color. Okay, so this is not going to be the way to reduce my list.








What I finally decided to do was to draw my garden with the grids marked for each square foot. But not all 4 boxes of my garden…no, just ONE box. One box for spring. And I will plant the same selections in all 4 boxes, just a week apart. This will hopefully provide me with a more steady harvest. This also limits me to selecting no more than 16 spring crops. So, now I am down to less than 16 spring crops, less than 16 summer crops, and less than 16 fall crops. Already more manageable!

Then it was just time for a decision. After carrying my garden drawing, my possible seed list, an eraser that allowed me to keep moving things around in the garden and my seed catalogs on several business trips across country (planes are a good place to ponder various seed combinations), I had a final list. The order is in!!!