Sprouts! --and Amending the Garden

Our anxious watching was rewarded with sprouts! The miracle of green life never ceases to amaze me.

 The tiny oregano sprouts came up first.

The tomatoes were next. I was worried they were planted too deep but they pushed through! Now if I can only keep them alive until planting time.

We spent Saturday spreading a new load of mink manure compost on the garden. When this wet weather dries out a little we will till it in and be ready to plant some spring crops!

MULCH!

For my 30th birthday I got the wish of my heart.... 36 yards of mulch (this is only half of it). Now isn't that something to cherish?

We spent two days spreading it about four inches thick and wondering why in heaven's name we have such big flower beds.

It makes the yard look more finished, and I love the color contrast with the green grass.

Now I am just trying to convince Mike to till it into the native concrete so I can have healthy, fluffy soil. It would certainly make planting much easier as we start to fill in with plants and shrubs!
 

If anyone is interested, this is where we bought it from: Timpanogos Special Services District.

Peas Please

I have been wishing the garden was ready for weeks so I could plant my peas! It's been such a warm spring I feel like they are going to fizzle just as they get established because of the heat. Ideally I would have planted them 3 weeks ago, but acquiring the manure, spreading the manure, letting the manure dry out, and tilling it in took longer than we planned for.

Our awesome neighbors let us borrow their huge tiller. It didn't take long--in fact I ran to the store one evening thinking it was getting too late, and when I got back Mike had it all done!

Yesterday I found some time to rake it smooth and make a few rows.

Finally, I got me some peas in the ground. Now I'll leave the work to mother nature.

One little interesting note... they were supposed to be planted 2" deep, and as I was spading them in I realized my spade has the inches marked. How handy is that?!

Dung Heap

It's time to amend the garden. If you are like me, it feels a little late because the spring has been so warm. I want to get the peas planted so they have time to establish before being blasted by heat!

Any who are familiar with Lehi know we are surrounded by mink farms.... and that they are smelly sometimes. Well last year we bought some composted mink manure and it was rich and fine and a great amendment for our garden.

This year, I not only bought another load, but I told my neighbor how great it was and she got some too. You can imagine my chagrin when they dumped it and it was smelly, lumpy, stinky mink manure! He says it's the same stuff, just not fully composted, and it should be just fine when we spread it, dry it out, and till it in. I certainly hope so, because for now it smells like we're the mink farm!

I have to admit I have been so distracted by the weeds and lawn this year that I haven't bought my garden seeds yet! I am getting my tomatoes and peppers from a lady in my ward who starts them in her coldframes, but I still need to buy all my seed. I came across a good post here on a friend's blog about buying seeds and sorting through the confusion on what seeds are best. I better get a move on!

Planting the Garden

We planted our garden a week ago and are so excited to watch it grow! As you can see, we started from scratch on our new lot. We cleared about a 35' x15' area of our back/side yard and tilled in a couple inches of composted mink manure. We will continue to amend the soil each year, but that in itself made it so much richer! It also helped that we raked out mounds and mounds of rocks.

At the front we made 7 rows for planting seeds. In order from front to back, they are peas (half sugar, half snap), radishes, carrots, beets, bush beans, lettuce mix, and spinach.

I planted my peas and radishes about 3 weeks ago so we are starting to see those seeds sprout. I am always amazed by the miracle of life!

I bought some adorable vintage spoon garden markers for my mom this year (here on etsy) and I am wishing I had some of my own. Gardens can be decorated too, right? In fact someday we would love to beautify this area greatly by adding split-rail fencing, trellises for climbing flowers and grapes, and stepping stones for easier access.

We also bought and planted all of our starts. We made it a family affair and Maddie loved helping plant the basil, sweet peppers, and jalapenos.

I love baby plants. Let's document here how small they start and then I'll take pictures as they get gargantuan. Above is a tiny cucumber and below are the zucchini and yellow crookneck. They look so small and innocent right now... you just wait.



We transplanted 3 strawberries from our old house for sentimental purposes, and added one new one to make a small row.

We also planted these small onions, 6 tomatoes (Early Girl, Better Boy, Champion, and Jet Star), pumpkins, and cantaloupe. There is room at the back for more, but I think we'll start small this year and see if we can keep up!

It has been raining buckets all week so it's been nice to not have to water the new seeds. I was almost afraid they would wash away... the rows were almost submerged at one point... but I think the rain was good for establishing things. Now we just need some sunshine!

A Day in the Yard

Saturday was a blustery and cold day for yard work, but we gave it a valiant effort. We got a load of compost dumped on the garden to use in back filling trees and working into planting areas. It is rich and dark... and guess where from? Mink manure! If you live in Lehi you are all too familiar with the mink farm smell that permeates the air through the summer... but it actually makes for good compost and doesn't even smell.

We started with the flower bed closest to the front door. It needed to be raised and graded to slope away from the house to drain properly, so we dumped a bunch of compost on and turned it in with a shovel. Hopefully it will improve the rocky, clay dominant, compacted soil just a little bit!

Mike dug a hole for our first and only tree to be planted thus far (Weeping Blue Atlas Cedar). He made me laugh... he has an engineer's brain for sure. He measured the pot and set out to dig an efficient hole exactly that size. When I realized what he was up to I had to explain that gardeners do things differently... the hole needs to be double the height and width of the root ball to allow for growth! He was bummed and wants to buy a pick axe.

I jumped the gun a little and planted some perennials (bleeding hearts and hosta) even though we don't have sprinklers in yet. I'll take a little hand-watering over barrenness.

Coming up soon I am going to tell you about some great shade plants that I hope to find for this North-facing bed!

Composting

All summer I have been collecting my kitchen scraps in a bucket on my back patio. My goal is to make a compost pile someday... when I have some open soil to build on! Everything is overtaken with green things at the moment. (I wouldn't mind tilling up some grass, but I don't think my landlord would appreciate that.)

I've never built a compost pile of my own, but I've learned a lot about it in classes and books. Here's some helpful quotes for beginners from my Sunset Western Garden book:

"Composting is a natural process that converts raw organic materials into a valuable soil conditioner you can use to improve a soil's texture, boost it's nutrient content, and make it more water retentive.

You'll need approximately equal amounts by volume of brown matter and green matter. Brown matter is high in carbon and includes dry leaves, hay, sawdust, straw, wood chips, and woody prunings. (Lauren's note: I have also heard of people using shredded paper or newspaper for this.) Green matter is high in nitrogen; it includes grass clippings, fruit and vegetable scraps, crushed eggshells, and manure. The compost will heat up faster if you collect all the ingredients in advance and assemble the pile all at once."

Basic steps:

1. Chop materials - ideally no larger than 2"

2. Build the pile - Spread a 4-8 inch layer of brown material in an area at least 3 feet square. Add a layer of green material 2-8 inches deep. Add another layer of brown and sprinkle with water. Keep adding layers until is reaches a height of 3 feet.

3. Turn the pile - Add oxygen to the pile by turning weekly to speed the decomposition process. If it is dried out, add water. If it is rotten smelling, add more dry brown material and turn.

4. Keep at it until the pile is dark and crumbly compost. Mix it into your planting beds for the next growing season!

So my goal is to clear out some space in the next month or so and start adding dry leaves (my tree is already dropping!) to the kitchen scraps. I don't know if I'll have enough for the cubic yard they suggest above (3 ft. by 3 ft.) but I'll give it a whirl!

Soil Texture Test

Soils have four basic components: sand (large particles, little ability to hold water and nutrients), silt (middle size, moderate drainage and nutrients), clay (very small particles, high ability to hold water and nutrients) and organic matter (decomposing plants and microorganisms). The ratios of these parts in a particular soil determines it's capacity to grow plants. I have been thinking a lot about this as I've watched my plants grow this spring.

I planted my pumpkin seeds in a corner of my veggie beds and soon realized they needed a lot more space. Luckily I had six baby seedlings, enough to experiment with other locations and still insure that one or two will do well. I tried to transplant two of them to an empty flower bed but much to my dismay they are struggling and dying, while the four left in the garden beds are already flourishing. The lighting, temperature, and spacing are virtually the same, so the killing culprit is the soil! I decided it was time for a soil experiment. We did this in my soil classes at school, and luckily it's easy enough to do at home.

1. Gather your samples. I wanted to compare the difference between the soils in my garden beds (made up mostly of topsoil and compost) and my flower beds (unamended native soil). I dug about 6 inches deep to get a good representation of the soil at root level and gathered about 1 cup full. Try to avoid rocks and large organic matter.

The sample is best to work with if it has been dried and sifted for large clumps and rocks. My husband laughed at my mud pies drying on a cookie sheet in the kitchen.

2. Dump your cup full of soil into a large mason jar. Add about 1 tablespoon of liquid or powdered dishwashing soap, which acts as a surfactant and keeps the soil particles separate.

Sorry I started my experiment at night so the lighting is bad. You can tell just by looking at it that the garden soil is a lot darker, meaning it has more organic matter.

3. Fill the jar 2/3 full with water, screw the lid on tightly, and shake the mixture thoroughly (I went 2-3 minutes). Set them down and allow the particles to settle. Sand is the heaviest and will settle to the bottom within about a minute. Silt will settle next and could take between one and four hours. Clay will settle last and will take up to a few days to settle out of suspension.

This is how they looked the next morning. On the left, you can see some organic matter floating near the top. The sample on the right shows clearly the 3 layers of sand, silt, and clay.

My samples up close after about a week of settling. Garden above, native below.

Once the particles are all settled, its time to get out your ruler. Measure the whole depth of the soil, and then the individual parts. Now dust off the calculator. Seriously, I haven't had math since high school but even I could handle these simple calculations.

To find the percentage of each type of particle, divide the part by the whole. For example, in my garden soil the sand measured 1 7/16" (1.4375) and my total soil sample was 1 5/8" (1.625) so you divide 1.4375 by 1.625 which is .885. My soil is 88.5% sand.

Once you have figured all your percentages, it's time to look at the Soil Texture Pyramid. Chart each percentage from its relative side and find where they meet in the middle. That tells you the type of soil you have!

Using the same example, my garden soil is 88.5% sand, 7.7% silt, and 3.8% clay. These three percentages meet in the loamy sand section. Loamy soils with high organic matter are well suited for growing vegetables and fruit. Because my soil is very sandy, I should continue adding lots of organic matter every year since it could leach out easily, and it will continue to improve.

My native soil turns out to be a silty loam. It has poor drainage and very little organic matter. To improve it I should add more sand and organic matter, which will help both drainage and fertility. Poor little pumpkins.

If you have read this far, you may be thinking--why go through all this when the answer seems to always be add organic matter?!? Well, that's a good point. You'll never go wrong by adding compost!

There are many other important factors to of soil fertility which include drainage, nutrients (macronutrients and micronutrients), and pH. That should give me plenty of material for another time!

Green Your Gardening

Happy Earth Day!

I couldn't let this day go by without thinking about something I can to personally to make a difference. Here are some ideas:

-Reduce (or remove) chemicals in the landscape. I have to admit that with my gardening background in a large show garden, we relied heavily on herbicides, pesticides, and fertilizers to keep everything super green and lush. I have a lot to learn about organic gardening! In fact, right now we have a dandelion problem developing in our back yard, and my first instinct is to run out and buy some broadleaf killer and zap them! Instead I have been trying to pull them myself and may try dousing them with vinegar. Any other ideas???

-Plant native species. They have adapted to the local climate and soil and require less water and maintenance. Las Vegas was getting pretty good at this; in fact, new homes were only allowed to have grass in the back yards. Front yards were usually rock and native plants. Well-done native landscapes can still be very aesthetically pleasing! Here is a website with information on Utah natives.

-Make your own compost. This is something I have always wanted to be better at. My current problem is figuring out some space... I can't really rip out the landlord's lawn for a compost pile, and my garden space is precious! You can buy compost barrels that spin to mix.

-Catch rain water! We turned our sprinklers on last week to wake up our landscape, but we turned them off this morning because of all the rain in the forecast! Go a step further and set out buckets or barrels to collect rain water! Use it to water plants or even wash your car!

Before you go, you better check out this page I found by the Nature Conservancy. They have some great articles and resources on this topic. What are you going to do?