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Re: [Gardening with Excel]

Square Foot Gardening List - http://www.flinet.com/~gallus/sqft.html

Cheri wrote:

>Dear Bill,
>I am very interested in your weather data etc. being saved on a spreadsheet. 

<snip>

>Could you be more detailed in what you record and in what fashion.  I have
just purchased
>Excel and am anxious to get started.  I will start keeping notes by hand
until it arrives.  I
>am new to gardening...just need to know what I should be recording, and
the purpose for it.

Bill, I'd like to hear about your records as well. 

I happen to be allergic to Excel (numbers and spreadsheet programs in
general -- yecch), but I do keep a gardening journal. I was just going
through it a little earlier this evening and regretting I didn't make more
extensive entries for EACH AND EVERY DAY last year. But there were so many
days that I wasn't doin' nuttin' -- and it didn't occur to me I'd be AVIDLY
interested in what was going on last year with the weather -- even if I
wasn't doing anything, the weather was! 

I'm using a little spiral-bound journal, the "Five Year Gardening Notebook"
I bought through Cook's Garden for about $22 -- pricey, IMO, but somewhat
useful. It has a page for each day, divided into 5 parts so you can make
entries for that day of the year for 5 years. There are fields where you
can enter date, hi and lo temps and weather info. There's also some blank
space for other notes, but not quite enough for me on just one-fifth of a 5
x 8-1/2" page. Sometimes I have a lot to say, and other times not much.
There were a lot of days last year I didn't even record temps, let alone
anything else about the weather. :-(   REALLY wish I hadn't have been so
lazy. 

Btw, a min/max outdoor thermometer is a great aid for this, unless you can
take your local weather forecaster's word for it on the nightly news. As
soon as we get a barometer (and I hope hygrometer), I'll start including
that info as well.

As I flipped through it, some of the things I was glad I'd recorded included:

* -- hi / low temps, rainfall (this year I'm keeping a monthly cumulative
total and an annual cumulative total -- I was able to get some terrific and
detailed info about average rainfalls and temps including first and last
frosts from our county extension agent, so it's neat to compare), and
general notes about the weather: "sunny, balmy, not as humid"

* when I planted what, including ornamentals, when things sprouted
* general garden activities -- when we pruned the grapes and how long it
took, when I started / turned the compost, when we mulched what and with what
* when we fertilized what
* when I noticed the Japanese bettle infestation (oh horrible day)  
* that our apple trees were already in bloom a week ago last year during
our very warm winter (and subsequently got zapped by temps in the 20s) --
and this year it's nowhere close yet
* when I noticed various things in bloom, even things not on our property
-- spring bulbs of various kinds, magnolias, crepe myrtles, goldenrod, etc.
(This will be increasingly helpful as I work to have something blooming
year round.)
* first and last frost, of course! Also the *threat of frost* a week or so
after that last spring
* when veggies started blooming; when I noticed them setting fruit
* when I harvested what veggies -- and even how much I canned from the harvest

There are things I did (or dealt with) last year I didn't record -- exactly
how I built the soil in my sq. ft. beds; when I fertilized what and with
what; my powdery mildew problem -- not a word about that in the whole thing
-- sure would've loved dates and better weather info surrounding those
dates to study the thing. And so forth. 

For last year I also made a note in a different ink (red) on those days I
was supposed to start seeds indoors, both for spring and fall. I ended up
not finding this all that useful. For me, that kind of note is better on a
regular calendar and/or on a single page in chronological list form. Book
format isn't all that conducive to flipping ahead to see what I'm supposed
to be getting ready for.

Another thing I'm doing, but not in this journal, is developing my own
personal monthly garden activities calendar or plan -- one page for each
month -- what kinds of things I should do or consider doing in January,
February, etc. For those acivities associated with first and last frost
dates (starting seeds or early spring and late fall planting), they'll
include a specific date. 

Any other garden notes keepers out there? Other ideas?

Patricia
Zone 7b, West Georgia


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