I just can’t seem to help myself when it comes to moving things around in the yard. I swear its never the same for 2 months in a row.
A couple weeks ago (give or take) I decided to pick up a mini greenhouse so I could start putting seed starts outside more. I had been working on hardening off the peppers and eggplants.
I started them way too early, but they WERE doing great. That is until this last cold snap. I was out of town for 5 days, while I was gone they got too warm in the green house, then there was a cold snap where the temps where into low 20s, for about 24 hours. It was just too much. All the plants in the above picture died off. Opps…
As you can see there isn’t much to this “greenhouse”. It really isn’t going to do much for prolonged freezing temps. It does heat up quickly.
I really don’t have a better place to put it, I think it needs some shade. I ordered some shade cloth for it. I’ll have to see what I can rig to keep the temps a bit more reasonable in there.
The raised bed that I put into place last month, has strawberries, onions, and shallots planted in it. They are grow great already.
The strawberries I planted were bareroot, it’s the first time I tried those. I’ll have to see how they do. The ones from last year did fine through the winter, So if I need to I can move some of the runners over to this bed.
I also moved the three troughs that have herbs in them.
I have to say they are all doing great!! Things are already starting to come back from last year. Moving these three gave me more room to add another 4×2 raised bed and a large whiskey barrel to that open corner where those turquoise bin are in the picture. I decided to put those to use storing the hoses that were every where. I also spent hours sifting the gravel so that it would look better around the green house and these troughs. No more bare dirt!! Also this way all the run off from those hanging baskets will run into the troughs and not onto the ground. I’m pretty sure the lil rodent that had a dirt mound next to the brick wall wasn’t happy with this change.
When I picked up the greenhouse I also found the perfect plant stand for the ginger and pineapple that I have growing in the house. I think it works nicely there, much better than having those on the floor.
That Meyer lemon/limequat bush is flowering like mad!!! It’s looking promising for getting some fruit off of it. It is dropping a lot of the flowers, but from what I’ve read that is pretty normal.
The garlic in the North Community Garden plot is doing fantastic. I have to say I am surprised and very pleased with how well it is looking. There is hard neck and soft neck planted there. I have no idea anymore which is which. I only two of the tags stayed in place over the winter. This plot is going to be mostly perennial plants. Like the walking onions in the bottom right corner, I need to plant those soon. This also has Greek Oregano, rosemary, asparagus, and rhubarb. I’ll be planting more herbs where the garlic is once I harvest it. That way I won’t have to do much with this one from year to year.
Since I had the room after moving the others to the green house, I decided to start some more stuff in the house to give it a jump start.
They’ll all be going outside in another few weeks. So the plant stand won’t look so lonely. Yes, I did trim that butterfly bush back to almost nothing. That thing is a weed and by the end of the year. I’m sure it will be 5ft tall again and over growing into the walkway like it did last year.
I also started some of the things that had died off again, hopefully this time they’ll make into the garden plot. I didn’t plant as many as I did the first go around. Just 3 cells instead of 6 for most.
I’m thrill with the elevated bed, it’s actually got stuff coming up? Carrots, arugula, lettuce mix, and spinach. It’s my first time ever growing these things.
Next thing for me to tackle is the south side way flower bed, The rosemary is happy, but I need to clean it up a lot.
Somewhere under that debris and compost are flagstone steps. So I can step over the bed without walking all the way around.
All the pots I move next to the garage are doing really well. There are number of pansies that are coming back already.
