Look ... baby basil in my basement! I also have one little container of heirloom tomatoes poking their little heads up, too.
YIPPIE!!!!!!!
I figured I'd use this as a springboard to talk about gardening. A friend of mine asked for some advice about gardening. I know some of our regular blog readers are gardeners (holla to Jackie and Michelle!), but others might need a little inspiration to start. So here we go. I'm going to work in tiers, from the easiest to the more advanced. Just START WHERE YOU'RE AT!!!! Gardening is all about baby steps. And long-term investment.
1. Container gardeningLet me first say that Erik excels at this type of gardening. And my mom is getting pretty good at it, too.
It's pretty simple, actually! To get started, you'll need some pots. The bigger, the better! If they're a foot or less deep, just fill 'em with soil (side note, my farmer friends tell me dirt is the stuff that is stuck under your fingernails, and soil is what the ground is made of). SO get soil (not dirt). It could be potting soil or stuff from your own yard. Whatever.
If your pots are larger, you might want to start off with a layer of rocks at the bottom. A few inches deep. Then fill the rest with soil. Rocks help to let water drain. If you want to sprinkle some in the less deep pots, you can, but be sure there is plenty of soil in there.
Ok, now that your pot is filled, put a few plants in it! It's THAT simple!
Container gardens work well if you are living in an apartment and have a small patio or deck, but no yard. Or if you want to ease into gardening slowly. :)
Some suggestions for container gardening:
• TOMATOES! You WILL want to get a little cage for them so they'll grow up the funnel and have some support, though.
• Also, I think peppers would work well.
• I grow a plethora of herbs in mid-sized pots on the front porch. Oregano, chives, mint. Some herbs (like mint) will go crazy and start to take over your yard, so it's good to contain them in a pot.
• This year, I'm going to try growing decorative gourds in a large pot. Well, more about that when I actually do it. But I think these would work well in a BIG container because they simply spread out and overtook the garden last summer. This should help me keep them at bay. And a special note, the decorative gourds come in a seed packet. But they're EASY to grow. Especially if you have kids, they're awesome! The leaves are really big and the gourds come in all shapes and sizes ... totally fun for kids!
• If anyone else has a good suggestion about what to put in a container garden, leave a comment!
Oh, and
HERE is a post about Erik's foray into container gardening.
Also,
HERE is another great idea and a space saver! :)
2. Just sick 'em in the ground.Up until last summer, this is what my mom did. She'd get tomato plants near the end of the season and plant them right next to the air conditioner. Why, you ask? So the AC drain hose would water them. :)
There was really no ground prep or weeding or any concern of that sort. VERY low key.
If you're not anal retentive like I am, and don't mind gobs of weeds or other grass in with your plants, this is a good way to go.
Tomatoes are pretty hardy and survive this well. I would NOT recommend it for smaller plants, like Basil or herbs. Especially NOT mint. This is an open invite for mint to take over your yard.
3. A "traditional" garden.This is what most people probably think of when they think "garden." There is a separate part of the yard that you designate as your "garden." If you have an area that you think has already been a garden, it might be easier. But let's just pretend you don't have a garden and want to start one.
• First, you'll want to consider how much light the parts of your yard get. Some plants do well in the shade, but many (tomatoes!) need sunlight to do their thing. So you want to select an area of the yard that gets ample sunlight. Now, you don't have to sit in a lawn chair and watch your backyard all day, just stick your nose out in the morning, at noon, and afternoon to see what is in sun and what is in shade. I'd suggest selecting a sunny spot!
• Next, you'll need to prepare the ground. Decide how large you want your garden to be. If you are not sure, I suggest starting small. Erik and I started small the first year. Roughly 7 feet by 7 feet. It was enough for tomatoes, basil and to start our strawberry patch. I selected an area that was small at first, but had the potential to expand if/when I was ready.
• Now, you don't HAVE to do this next step, but it would be a good suggestion to consider. I would recommend finding out if you have a K-State Research & Extension office in your area. The Extension office does SOIL SAMPLE TESTING! (Mike, I KNOW you're totally rolling your eyes right now). I actually had this done at the end of the 2009 growing season, and it was pretty valuable. I know I have good organic compound (3.1%, the goal is 5%), but do NOT need to add any more manure to the garden. Good to know! I'd search the phone book for "county extension" and then give them a call and ask if they do soil sample testing. I think mine ran in the $7 to $12 range. I had to dig down 6 inches in about 6-8 different areas of the garden and take the soil, then mix it all together.
Having a soil test done will tell you right from the start what you're dealing with. If you should add more organic matter, or if you are lacking in any nutrients.
Ok, so you don't HAVE to have a soil sample, it's just a suggestion.
• So, you have the area you want to make into a garden. I would next mark it off. You can do this with stakes and string, or just get out some spray paint. :)
• You'll next want to prepare the ground. I borrowed a tiller from a friend. Then a few weeks later I totally got a steal on our VERY OWN garden tiller. But YOU DO NOT HAVE TO PURCHASE ONE!!!!! If your garden is pretty small, you can just dig it up. If it's larger, say 4x4 or bigger, I'd suggest a tiller. Maybe talk with the neighbors. Does anyone have one you could borrow? Or, many hardware stores have equipment for rent. From 1 to 3 hours. And the rates are pretty darn reasonable.
When preparing the ground, you'll want to get the soil broken up and get rid of the grass (if there is any present). When I first broke ground on our garden, we (ok, Coop did all of the hard work) ran the tiller over it several times, then picked out the big clumps of grass, then raked out the smaller sections. Then Coop tilled again.
I think I also put some peat into the garden when we broke ground. Just to get some more organic-ish stuff going on in there. We tilled that in.
• Next, you'll need to figure out what you want to plant. And if you have the SPACE to plant it. For example, in our first 7x7 garden, there really wasn't a lot of room for cucumbers or zucchini to grow around the ground. And the squash plants were HUGE! They were monster space eaters! (OR you might first think about what you want to plant, then make a space big enough for it!).
• If you're just starting out, I'd suggest going to a nursery and getting baby plants from there. Tomato, cucumber, pepper, basil are all good starters. But beware of cucumbers, they can be space eaters! I'd get plants that have been started already, because they have a good head start. If you're awesome and want to start a few things from seed, corn and squash and zucchini all grow well from seed. But if you grow corn/sweet corn, you might have to contend with coons, which is why I've never planted it.
I honestly think the key to planting a garden is to look at what you eat — or like to eat, then consider planting those sorts of things. For example, the last 2 years, I've planted beans. Honestly, we just don't eat them. And there were never enough ripe beans at one time TO eat. So I'm not putting them in this year.
• Plant it, water regularly (or for the KC people, they get ample rain, and their tomatoes grow more quickly than mine, ahem, Vern), and enjoy!
• Ongoing care: with this option, you might want to weed the garden occasionally. The first two years, I had stones surrounding the garden:
(tomatoes in the front, the big leafy thing is zucchini, peppers and beans in the back, along with some basil in there somewhere ... and strawberries crawling on the ground).
My struggle was that weeds would creep in through the cracks in the stones. I'll post more about this year's possible solution to it. I'm just sayin' if your garden is "in" the yard, you might want to think about a barrier of some sort.
• Lastly, I'm going to talk about ground covering. Once your plants get rockin' I'd suggest mulch of some sort. But DO NOT run to the store and get mulch. Just use grass clippings to cover the ground. It does several things. 1) helps prevent weeds from poking through. 2) helps to retain water if/when it rains, or when you water.
• Oh, one last-last tip. This is more of a pet peeve from when I lived in Hays. People, PLEASE water your gardens in the MORNING. DO NOT water in the afternoon. The water will just evaporate more quickly and be less effective. On watering, you don't have to water every day. Every couple of days (3 times a week-ish) should do fine.
4. Plants from seed. (This is for crazy people like me.)Our garden started to get large, and filling it with plants from the nursery became expensive. So I have started to purchase seed packs, and in mid-to-late-January, start them in my former aquarium. This is NOT for everyone, and takes more TLC on these little guys than most people are willing to give. I'm just saying this IS an option for gardening. But it's a bit more advanced. If after a few years, you have a great grasp on gardening, give this a try!
ALRIGHTLY.
That's a TON of info ... I hope it's been a tiny bit helpful. I also want to talk about composting, but will do so in another post. And also RAIN BARRELS. But again, will do that in a different post. Both of these things are sort of supplemental to gardening. Composting is SO easy, and there are some REAL benefits to doing it! And it involves little to NO skill. :) Rain barrels, however, involve more skill and time.
Oh, I'm growing baby tomatoes, eggplant, basil and such. I always plant more than I need, in case not everything grows, but there is a GOOD chance I'll have some extra heirloom tomato plants. So if you're in the Salina or Wichita area and want some of my extra plants, DO be sure to let me know, and when spring is here, I'll be happy to share my extras. :)
