Stage lights fade up
to reveal a small patch of earth that has been neglected. A confused human is
holding his head in one hand and a camera in the other. He turns to acknowledge
the audience.
CONFUSED HUMAN: “Crap…”
The good, the bad, and
the beautiful.
Hello all and welcome to the first entry in Jeffrey’s Garden
Blog during the 2012 growing season. We had ups and downs last year, but we
have acquired a few acquisitions during the off-season and I’m hoping this year
we can make a run well into the post season. Thanks to everyone for the support
and questions about when the blog and the garden was going to start up again.
It’s nice to know that some folks are getting some enjoyment out of my
journaling.
The Good:
After having some mediocre success last year I decided to
expand the operation. I now have two garden plots. The second contains no barrier so it will be
interesting to see how big an impact the rabbits and other varmints have on the
operation. The reason for the second
plot was to have a good place to grow watermelon and other plants that vine
outward and take up lots of space. At
least 1/3 of the original plot was dedicated to watermelon last year, and it
seemed like I could allocate my space a little better. My family and I loved
having melons in the garden, so I decided the best thing to do was to plow up
some more ground and dedicate that space to Citrullus lanatus and maybe some pumpkins later in the season.
My pal from work, Mr. Spear, was nice enough to bring his tractor with a PTO
driven rear tiller and make us a generous sized expansion. It took him about 25
minutes… that included arriving, unloading, tilling, and loading back up to
leave. Afterwards I had serious tractor envy. We were able to beat Monday’s
¾ inch of rain and actually got 4 rows of potatoes and 2 rows of white onions
planted before the rain started. I refer to this as my experimental garden so I
plan on putting some different things in as the season progresses. I also may
turn into a rabbit/critter slayer so this should prove to be somewhat
interesting.
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| Taters in the ground, taters in the ground... eaten' real good with my taters in the ground. |
The Bad:
As alluded to during the beginning of this blog entry I’m a
little behind with my preparations. This week’s scheduled deluge has proved to
be ill timed because I had planned to prepare the main garden this week. I’m not too concerned because I’m still a
couple of weeks away from putting anything in the ground. This strange winter
and early spring has got me ready to pull the trigger now, but I’m still a
little skeptical about putting anything in the ground before mid April. Even
then I’m a little nervous, but I think that’s “go time” this year… better than
late May like last year!
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| Currently I'm growing tiny patches of fescue and empty metal cages in the garden. |
The Beautiful:
Over a weekend my good friend Rick Todd and I built a cold
frame. He had acquired a double paned
window that was just going to be thrown away, but was wise enough to save it from
the landfill and give it a second purpose. Along with that window, some
fasteners Rick had, and about $40 worth of supplies from a home improvement
store the cold frame was born.
 |
| Now I know how The Galactic Empire felt when they finished the Death Star |
It’s primarily made of 2x2’s and some thin plywood, but with
the Styrofoam walls and weather striping around the lid it has proved to be a
fine piece of equipment that can produce temperatures over 120°F
with the lid closed. I know this because
we installed a thermometer that reached 120°F and it exploded when I left
the lid closed on a 65°F afternoon. Yeah… it’s awesome.
It’s taken me about 2 weeks to figure out how to “play” the
cold frame but I’ve got a pretty good idea what it can do now. On a bright sunny day (approx. 70° F)
with about a 3-4 inch opening of the lid you can expect about 15-20°
increase of temperature inside the cold frame.
If you open the lid about 12 inches you can expect a 5-10°
increase of temperature inside. I have developed a couple different sizes of
2x4’s to prop the lid open to get my desired results. On a cool, cloudy day with the lid closed I
can expect about a 10-15° degree increase of the outside temperature inside the cold
frame. Done reading this yet…?
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| It looks like this after it rains... all sexy and gorgeous |
I have never seen the temperature below 42°F
inside the cold frame. Even on nights
were the temps got to around 32°F and small amounts of frost was on the
outside window. Ah snap!
So with this advantage I have started many plants extremely
early, and my plan is to harden them off inside the cold frame before planting
them after the last frost date of April 11th. Hopefully this will
result in earlier yields… especially concerning tomatoes. I have Early Girl Tomatoes that have already
sprouted and if all things go to plan we should have a harvest available around
May 7th. Bam!
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| Basil, dill and sunflowers are already enjoying some time in the cold frame Think of it as a hot tub for plants |
I have also started a different hybrid tomato that should
supplement later harvests as well as basil, dill, rosemary, long and pickling
cucumbers and green peppers. My hope is
that these plants will respond well to the transplant and the garden will have
a big jump on last year’s. I hope to
repay my obvious debt to Mr. Todd for designing and building most of the cold
frame in copious amounts of produce over the spring and summer. Thanks Rick.
Well there’s an over extended update and preview of
2012. I’m really excited about this
year, and I hope that folks continue to come back to the site again. Please feel free to suggest things or comment
whenever you like. One quick plug… if
you live in SW MO and you’re in the market for quality seeds and garden
supplies… and have a tendency to despise box stores like I do… please visit
Springfield Seed and Supply. They are
very polite and helpful to novice gardeners, and they have a great variety of
seeds at very competitive prices.
And now… a ukulele song.
