I celebrated New Year’s Day by planting the first seeds of the year; these were two varieties of everbearing strawberries, one is Pikan and the other is Toscana. Not only are they productive, compact plants ideal for growing in pots-at least that’s what I’ve read-but they have the added attraction of pink flowers: Toscana is dark pink and Pikan is mid-pink. A bit pricey when buying a small quantity so I hope they germinate!
We finally have a few dry days and the temperature has dropped enough to give us some decent frost. This morning I took my dog and drove up to the Commons to walk through the grounds and community gardens. I have a plot there to augment my home garden as the plot is good space to use for lower maintenance veggies such as pumpkins, potatoes, kidney beans, garlic, etc. Where I garden the plots are 400 square feet (15 feet by 25 feet mostly). My plot is pretty uninspiring right now; there are four permanent beds and the balance of the space is shaped depending on what is being planted. As I have a decent size home garden, I don’t plant intensively on my plot, but some of the gardeners do with amazing results (I also think they water regularly unlike myself). The pictures below show my plot and then a plot that is packed with beds about 3 feet wide and 1 foot paths between them.
I know I could grow much more intensively in my home garden-and I am trying to-but even when I address the soil challenges I am still limited by how much rainwater I can capture and hold until it’s needed in the summer. So it’s great having a plot in the local community garden too.
While I was walking today, I thought about how little space one can have and still grow an assortment of vegetables.   When we first moved into our place here, I put up an 8 foot by 8 foot pen in which I was going to place my deer intolerant plants that were getting devoured. I set up the pen and immediately visualized it with beds on three sides and promptly got to work making a vegetable garden within it. Of course I had to then find another secure holding place for my deer edibles. So, I think next blog I will explore making really small gardens that are still delightful spaces.
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