May 4th was the ‘official’ Opening Day at the Roseville Community Garden, and I’ve got my plot 95% complete!
I was anxious to get a jump on the season, so on April 6th – the first Saturday the garden was open for ‘pre-season’ activity – I arrived bright & early, hauled in a half dozen wheel-barrows of fresh topsoil and fired up the Bolens roto-tiller.
Plot #63 at Roseville Community Garden on April 6, 2013: cleaned, tilled and all ready for the 2013 gardening season. Click image to enlarge.
Over the past four weeks I’ve been busy digging in the dirt while proceeding according to the well-thought and eagerly anticipated 2013 ‘Garden Plan’ for Plot 63. A plan that started while laying on the sofa watching a crackling fire (and listening to a crackling transistor radio) during the power outage in the week after Sandy, reflecting on the things learned – both good and bad – over the summer of 2012.
‘The Plan’ was then modified slightly when the Burpee Seed Catalog showed up in January, and a half dozen times since, right up to the moment I planted the various rows and hills and patches of seeds, shaking in a little bit of Miracle Gro Shake and Feed to give the seeds a better start. Here’s what the ‘planting map’ ended up looking like:
The ‘planting map’ for Plot #63 at Roseville Community Garden, May 4, 2013. Click image to enlarge.
I tried to optimize the space by planting early season radishes between rows of slower growing later season vegetables like Swiss Chard, beets, and numerous varieties of squash. The only things not yet planted are the three variety of peppers that I’ve started in seed starter kits, which will go into an area now growing and planned for two plantings of radish (at the bottom of the map) while the peppers grow big enough to transplant.
I decided to roll the dice and plant my tomatoes early – on April 27th, since I got such a deal on the plants (5 for $10) that I felt the risk of another frost was worth taking to have tomatoes on the Fourth of July! Fingers crossed! Here’s the now familiar ‘baseline’ photograph of the garden for the first weekly update.
Plot 63 at the Roseville Community Garden om May 4th, 2013…the ‘official’ opening day for the 2013 season. Click photo to enlarge.
Here are links to this year’s crop of garden flowers, herbs & vegetables:
Flowers:
Solar Flare Sunflower
State Fair Giant Zinnia
Herbs:
Sweet Basil
Fernleaf Dill
Flat Italian Parsley
Vegetables:
Chioggia Beets
Detroit Dark Red Morse’s Strain Beets
Early Wonder Beets
Sweet Treat Carrots
Bushmaster Green Beans
Cherry Belle Radish
Crimson Giant Radish
French Breakfast Radish
Short Top Icicle White Radish
Pink Beauty Radish
Neon Lights Mix Swiss Chard
Ruby Red Swiss Chard
Black Seeded Lettuce
Early Prolific Straightneck Squash
Black Beauty Summer Squash
Waltham Butternut Squash
Early Acorn Squash
Sweet Red Peppers
Hot Jalapeno Peppers
Pepperochini Hot Peppers
Tomatoes
Red Beefsteak Heirloom Tomato
Super Fantastic Tomato
Super Sweet 100 Tomato
Mr. Stripey Heirloom Tomato
Lemon Boy Yellow Tomato
Watch for more updates in the days and weeks to come!