This is a public-interest archive. Personal data is pseudonymized and retained under GDPR Article 89.

This year's garden

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

I mostly just lurk, soaking in all the useful tips but I thought I would
throw out my experiences thus far this year.

This year's weather pattern seems to be shaping up like last year's with the
heat and dryness coming about a month early (normally the dryness doesn't
occur until mid to late June). I plant direct into the ground, no raised
beds or the like. The plot is aprroximately 15' x 5' with a walk way through
the middle. Always fighting the crab grass that likes to encroach. I've
erected a trellis approximately 10' long and 6' high with PVC pipe and hemp
twine. Pole beans are performing great, just about grabbing onto my trellis.
I'm having a hard time getting any cowpeas to grow, I'm on my third planting
and I've only got about a 30% success rate. Cucumbers are looking good as
are the cantaloupes. The acorn squash were slow getting started but they're
coming up good so far. The bell peppers are slow growing and all but one
looks healthy. I thought I was going to loose my tomatos when I first
planted them because it was so dry. A couple of days they were wilted and
almost laying on the ground but morning waterings persisted and they're now
filling out nicely with blooms on them. This is my third year square foot
gardening with last year being a failure due to the dry weather. I've grown
cucumbers on the trellis and that works out nicely. I attempted cantaloupes
both on the trellis and the ground and found the cantaloupes produced better
on the ground. I've never had a bad problem with any pests. The first year I
had a garter snake but I haven't seen it back. I've seen a rabbit this year
lurking near my garden but so far it appears that's all it's doing, just
looking. My main problem has been with birds in the past but they haven't
bothered anything yet this year. I believe the biggest obstacle this year
will again be the weather but maybe I'll be fortunate enough to be in the
path of enough summer showers to keep my garden lively.

Jeff
Lynchburg, VA


______________________________________________________________________
To unsubscribe, write to sqft-unsubscribe@listbot.com
Start Your Own FREE Email List at http://www.listbot.com/links/joinlb
Other Mailing lists | Author Index | Date Index | Subject Index | Thread Index