View Full Version : April Gardening
It's not yet April, but the weather seems to have turned for the better here. This week's forecast is for sun and no rain, the ground is drying, and here in SoCal, there are many weeds to pull. That is my task for this week - to get the main veg garden mostly cleared of large weeds - some of the lush ones in the back corner already are taller than I am. Gasp! I filled 2 full cans yesterday afternoon.
Gotta get that cleared to put out more tomatoes and all the chile plants, and squash... but it's just been too wet to work the soil. The earthworms are loving it however.
This morning I planted a couple more flats of lettuce (16 seedlings each). Love my 'salad tables'. :)
I know many have had a long, cold winter, but are you getting close to going outside and working in the soil?
I am the queen of seedlings this week :) Under the lights and in every sunny window, I have tomatoes, peppers, onions, kale, bok choy, collards, rapini, lettuce, and much more. I need to get the greens outside under cover so I can re-use the space they're currently occupying.
I peeled the winter mulch off the garden beds last week so the soil will warm up, and am thinking of putting black landscape fabric on parts of it to hurry up the process.
We constructed a huge gorgeous new compost pile at the community garden this spring (almost too hot at its center to leave your hand in there long), and fenced off a new garden area last week.
So things are happening here in Colorado, but no actual growing (in the soil) yet for us --- not for another week or two!
The remaining snow should melt this week, but the forecast calls for significant rain in the next 10 days, so I won't be able to get into the garden for a couple of weeks. Usually I plant seeds for peas and greens in mid-April, though. And we should be cutting asparagus by early May.
Glad to hear gardening outside is getting closer for you two.
I was going to weed today, but ended up refurbishing one of my older salad tables. It will hold 12 nursery flats. I was able to put into it 6 flats of previously harvested lettuce - I just cut it all off just above the growing bud and then let it re-grow, which I then feed to the fish. I only like to eat really young lettuce.
I also planted 3 flats of redbeet seedlings, again, 16 plants to each 16X16" flat. Then covered it all with it's wire covering. There are enough seedlings to plant 3 more, but I just didn't have time. I have a real craving for beets right now. :D
I did notice 4 cuke seedlings I had replanted have succumbed. Only 1 left. We got almost 9 inches of rain last week, and even though they were somewhat sheltered from the direct downpours, I think it was jsut too damp for them. Dang. Guess I'll have to plant some more seed. Didn't get very good germination anyway. This is the second batch that has not been successful this year already, though I was able to eat two small cukes before the others gave up the ghost, also after too much rain. I know I've been planting early, but that can work here some years. And it's 'only' seed.
My husband jokes that I'm responsible for the bitter cold weather of the last 2 weeks because I planted a bunch of stuff in my low tunnels: lettuce, beets, asian greens, broccoli, calendula. Hearty stuff. The lettuce is doing well, but the other plants look a little stressed. It must be difficult to go from below freezing to quite warm during the day (under plastic, but ventilated). Whenever I plant early, the weather seems to go back to winter. I need it to warm up because I have another couple of flats ready to go-- I had backup in case these first plants didn't make it.
herbgreek, we too are from New England and I'm itching to go out and start some stuff. Dug up the parsnips and will prepare some today. Parsley from seeds and shallots from seeds growing inside the house and waiting until May.
earthshepherd
3-29-11, 8:14am
here in OH, I am being stymied by a stubborn run of freezing temperatures. I'm waiting for a good stretch of above-freezing nights to move my cauliflower, broccoli and romaine lettuce plants outdoors. I have peas already growing, but this freeze has arrested them for the time being.
I am sooo envious! And jealous too! http://th38.photobucket.com/albums/e105/CommentCrazyGirl/Smileys%20Emotions/Snarky%20Mad/th_Dammit.gifI'm hoping real soon, like in the next week or so I'll be able to get outside and get started.
I almost feel guilty posting this pic - but not that much. :moon: Here is some of the best lettuce I've ever grown. I think it's gorgeous. Hopefully it will survive the heat predicted for tomorrow. (80's) I might have to cover it with greenhouse cloth so it's tender leaves won't fry. Then it will cool back down into the low 70's with light cloud cover.
(Click on thumbnail to enlarge picture.)
Looks mouthwatering delicious Gina! http://th251.photobucket.com/albums/gg287/turtl3-73/Emoticon/th_eating.jpg
And no, I wasn't referring to the smiley as being the delicious addition to your post! :laff: Hmmm, with fresh grown garden lettuce on my mind, I'm going to make my way to the http://www.smileysnetwork.com/manger/manger9.gifand pull out a few things in preparation for the feast I'm planning on as of tonight- courtesy of good old Gina! Hmmm, let's see now, a selection of cold cuts, some mustard, some mayo, a little spice, and then wait for Gina to tip off for the night so I can snafu a little of that delectable lettuce she has! I'm such a http://th51.photobucket.com/albums/f351/charonn0/th_smartass.gifaren't I!
I've put in a few days of very heavy weeding in the veg garden. We've had great rains this year, but those come with a penulty. Just put out 3 more totally full and mashed cans of weeds for morning pick-up - which is great since I need the empty cans for more weeds... There are another 5 full cans waiting for their turn, but 3 is the max I can put out.
I've also turned up 3 more beds, put out more tomatoes, and enjoyed seeing all the nice lady bugs - lots this year. I would have loved to do more today, but it got too cool and breezy for it to be comfortable. And a rain shower.
I'm going to have to start laying out the soaker hoses too. Some of them will need to be repaired.
There are blueberries to be picked, and while I've been grazing, I need to do a serious picking and start drying them. Last year I dried close to 90 pounds fresh weight, then kept them in the freezer. This year I'd like to get that up to 100 pounds, but am not sure there will be enough. They are great out of hand dry, as well as in oatmeal.
Gina, instead of packing up your weeds to be carted away, have you thought about using them for fertilizer? Mother Earth News had a short blip about this recently- just soak weeks in a bucket of water for a couple of days and use that water to fertilize your plants. Being lazy, I just pull them before they seed and throw them directly on the garden bed, where they decompose and feed my soil. I'll be damned if those weeds are just going to eat my nutrients and not give back somehow. :)
Zone 6B here and I use raised beds for my garden. I pile on all the fallen leaves in the fall and have very few weeds to pull come spring time. A quick turn of the shovel moving all the broken down leaves to the bottom and its ready to go.I've got lettuce, beets, peas, radish, and something else (really need to make some markers) peaking up. I've got some tomato and pepper plants put in but waiting for the tomato guy at our tiny farmers market to bring some of his tomato and pepper plants to market. I still have 3 raised beds yet to be planted. Feel like I'm getting a slow start this year. I really need to come up with a fence or I'll lose a lot of garden to my chickens.
Cleaned up oak leaves from garden yesterday and noticed very cold soil under them. Planted with DH 2 kinds of beets and two kinds of kale. The garlic we planted is coming up looking just like the lily family that I think it belongs to. DH may throw some parsley seedlings out soon and we also have shallots to put out. Onions last year were disappointing but the shallots...ooh la la! I'm also going to look up and use more kale and chard in recipes this year.
I planted some peas about 10 days ago and they are starting to come up. Our last frost date is May 15th - so they say - and in town about April 15th...we had a good frost last night - so I am glad I didn't jump the gun!
My garlic is finally up! (zone 4a) My tomato seedlings are thriving under my new grow light and are about 4" tall now, along with the onions, peppers, and a ton of greens. I set up a little greenhouse against the south side of the house and will be hardening the greens off soon....so exciting.
It's wonderful: We had a meeting at our two-year-old community garden yesterday, having told the town that anyone who wanted a bed in the garden needed to show up for this work day. We had just a ton of people show up - three times the number we had last year. It was so fun to get out there turning the compost, digging new beds, getting manure into the soil, laughing. Made me SO happy.
Got some free compost yesterday from the county yard waste site, spread it on the veg beds, then seeded kale (2 kinds), carrots, snap and snow peas, lettuce (2 kinds), mache, bok choy, radishes, spinach and cauliflower. We had a drenching rain last night, more expected tonight. The strawberry plants are looking lively already.
Gina, instead of packing up your weeds to be carted away, have you thought about using them for fertilizer?
I used to put them all into the compost pile, or even stacked as mulch, but this year they are just going out. There are just too many of them, and they are also really big - many taller than I am. We've had really good rains this winter, and they have been growing since November. We also will be able to buy compost starting this summer from the dump (we already can get free mulch) so I'm going to be lazy about composting. I was feeling guilty about it, but there is so much work to do... I also like that the city compost is weed-free, and even though my compost would get up to 150*, that was not hot enough to kill weed-seeds in the outer layers.
Today I planted some greenbeans in sifted compost in 5 gallon black plastic pots. I started growing my beans in pots a couple years ago, and it works really well - and less critter damage. I was aiming to plant 10 of them, but ended up with 12.
Also transplanted 2 more flats of lettuce - 16 seedlings to a flat. And one flat of redbeets. These will be grown under wire. Also am planting more beet seeds in 4 plug flat sections (20 units each).
It was windy here today, so I had to keep a low outside profile. That and the danged rattle snake that's been hanging out in a very warm spot in the garden. 3 days in a row. But I did not see him today. Hope he has moved on, but probably not. If I see him again, I may call the county trapper to come out - if they don't kill him that is.
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