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Some of the plants in the garden which over-wintered and went into a kind of sleepy dormant stage in December are starting to wake up. The Kholrabi are starting to look alive again. This photo shows what they looked like this morning, the one on the left is much younger than the one on the [...] I certainly don’t see one of these very often. He was perched on my back fence facing a small creek that runs behind my property line. It had been raining during the day, and temps were cold and getting colder. My son, who is eleven, was the first to recognize it: it’s an owl. I [...] I am very proud of my husband who built me this potato box. Working with wood is not a strong point with him, he is much more comfortable working with cars. So, I know how lucky I am to get one of these. The potato box is new for me and will be an experiment. [...] Recent activities have focused on getting seeds in the ground. I plant using two planting schedules, one by Clemson Home Garden Information Center, and one published by the local independent garden center, Hyam’s. The Hyam’s plan is more forgiving, with wider planting windows. According to them, I have plenty of time, at least 3 months [...] The harvest is smaller, but much appreciated. I know how these vegetables were grown and prefer them over store bought. They might not actually taste better, but I enjoy them more. A few warm days, some sunshine, and a little rain makes the lettuce healthy again. This plan captures most of the winter and spring garden plan, and includes some summer plans too. This is the “artistic” version with little actual information. The detailed plan, with legend, irrigation, and more is available from the small thumbnail below. While the detailed plan is very busy, it tries to capture inter-planting and succession [...] The record cold wave in the first half of January took about 33% of the lettuce. I spent some time removing ruined leaves and getting the straw off the surviving lettuce. Lettuce hates wet soil and straw as much as the cold. We had lots of rain yesterday. The survivors should help provide many salads [...] The winter harvest, starting at the upper left corner: mixed lettuces of mostly romain and buttercrunch, (moving to the right)carrot tops and carrots, one turnip, there are a few springs of flat leaf parsley (lower right) next to the broccoli side shoots, then some curly leaf parsley(lower middle), and finally some cilantro, and above that [...] This month has seen record low temperatures. While the garden is purposefully filled with cold hardy plants which can easily thrive in January in my zone, 8B, the long cold “wave” seen in the first half of the month has challenged both gardener and plants. Luckily, I have a small garden and can try to [...] |
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