Wednesday, May 23, 2012

Gardening Complications

Every year I think "This is gonna be the year my garden works" and every year I am wrong. First I asked the guy who put our yard in to NOT seed the garden area...he did anyway with the promise to come back in the spring and till it up. Well, I am sure you can imagine that I wasn't surprised when he did not come back.

Next my garden didn't do well there so my hubby went back to the peat bog on Mom's property and got some to add to the garden. Nope, still not enough. Out on our Windy Hill it dried too quickly and just didn't thrive.

Idea number 1 a failure, on to number 2. Oh! Move it down by the pond, sheltered, near the water, etc.

Only thing that thrived there was the WEEDS! UGH! Okay, so after two years of gardening down there (and yes, I could have continued but....) I had a baby! Okay, so that year I just gave up. No garden. But this year...he is 2. I should be able to garden with him....oh, but I don't think I want to garden by the pond with an active 2 year old boy helping! Okay, where to move the garden!? Oh, we have gotten rid of the big horses and we have the old horse pasture up against the barn, full of year old manure and right next to the swingset and play area. This looks promising! So I ask my hubby to start working the ground! Most years this is minimal at most as he is so busy! This year he worked, and worked, and worked the ground! It was GORGEOUS!













After hours of working, I got busy planting! My Mom came over and helped and we got the WHOLE thing planted in one afternoon! That was definitely a feat! The onions were doing great and everything else is planted! Should be a fabulous garden year this year...right? WRONG!
Of course, everything started popping through and I was so excited! I had planted onions, peas, radishes, carrots, cherry tomatoes, egg plants, green beans, corn, yellow squash, zucchini, tomatoes, cantaloupe, watermelon and pumpkin.
As the beans started to peek through, they were curled over (which is normal) and I faithfully watched the moisture level since the rain didn't happen. I watered the suggested one inch per week over the entire garden, and was rewarded with peeking seeds.
Beans and corn were first, then came the hills of squash. Strong little plants, able to lift the soil!

And when you lifted the cracked part, you found the beginnings of the squash plants!
The problem is that only about HALF of the corn came up. And while my hills are thriving, my beans didn't come up well! Fully 1/3 of them are STILL curled up 3 weeks later! Tomorrow the garden will have been in the ground 4 weeks and yet this pic was taken yesterday.
Lots more weeds, still a curled bean! And if you pull on it, there are leaves forming underground! When you add up the 1/3 or so that didn't come up and the 1/3 that are still curled, I didn't get many up! So, yesterday was a day spent weeding and weeding and weeding and trying to figure out what all needed replanted.

So far, a disappointing garden year. My onions look great but are starting to blossom so I have to pick them small. The radishes are thriving! The carrots took 3 full weeks to sprout, the cherry tomato seeds appear to have completely vanished. I see NO sign of eggplant at all. My scallions never grew at all. Overall, only about half the garden seems to have even started! And the beans that are up were RAVAGED by bugs overnight about a week ago. I have sprayed them with Neem Oil and that seems to have taken care of it, but not before the damage was done!

Anyone else having a rough garden year?



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