(This was written in December/January 2021)
We got our garden catalogs a couple of weeks ago. We received our first order of seeds, even. (Seen here just part of the order. Sharon - keeper of flowers - snagged up the flower seeds and filed them.)
Now, it might seem a bit early to you for the catalogs to come out in December. (Shouldn't they wait until after Christmas?) You might think that the point of sending out those catalogs so early is to get snowbound people to buy more seeds than they need. And you would not be wrong.
But really, December is the time to start next year's garden. Especially this year. Last year, there was a seed shortage. They were rarer than toilet paper! If you went online to order seeds any time after April, and it was "Out of Stock... Out of Stock... Out of Stock...."
Luckily for us, we had already stocked up before Covid hit. (Same with toilet paper - keeping a robust pantry is part of the Grandchildren of Homesteaders mindset.) So yes, fear of scarcity is one of the reasons to buy early, but not at all the only one.
The big reason is Winter Sowing. That's a technique whereby you start your seeds in used milk jugs to get a jump on planting season, without all the hassle and expense of a greenhouse.
As I said last time, the year's garden starts in December.
We got our Burpee and Baker Creek catalogs already, and though I don't order much from the big commercial firms, there are always a couple of things in each catalog that you can only get from that place.
So yes, we have ordered and recieved our first seeds already. This year, Burpee had a few things we wanted that were unique, and they had a SALE.
But most of December and January are mainly planning time. You get the catalogs, watch videos, read books and magazines and figure out what you want to do. Supposedly you look through your old seeds, and review last year's successes and failures. However, most of us start ordering seeds before that part....
Anyway, some of the plans for this year:
Expand the Container Garden
Last year, the only thing that did really good in the food gardens were the container plants. They were not destroyed by the critters, and it was easy to care for them, and when the weather got hotter or dryer or wetter, I could move them.
I have a bunch of self watering pots in which I grew Peppers, Alpine Strawberries and Potatoes. These were all a success. As was my experiment in growing sweet potatoes from the end of one I bought at the store.
This year we're going to expand the potato crop. I did one grow bag for two crops, one from a really inferior Yukon Gold seed potato I got at Meijers, which had all but one rotted. The second crop from a russet that had started to sprout in a bag of eating potatoes. This year we've ordered quality seed stock from xxxxxxxxxxxx, and will be trying four varieties. I don't know if we'll get two crops out of any or all of them. Some are shorter season than others.
The peppers I will do more with as well. I planted my favorite from seed variety in the garden, and the woodchuck took it out instantly. So this year, I'll do some of each in the garden and some in pots. Sweet peppers make great raw veg crunchy snacks, which is something I will acutally eat if available. When I buy them from the store, they moulder in the fridge, becuase "out of sight, out of mind."
I never get much in the way of strawberries from my three pots of Alpines. A few each day. But I'm the only one in the house who can eat them, so it's best not to have enough to bring into the house. This year Significant Otter got me a grow tower for Xmas, and I'm going to put my Alpines in there, as well as maybe a couple of lettuces or herbs. I might even try carrots.
The Raised Bed
I designed the raised bed I built last March so that I could add another layer of height to it. Lockdown prevented me from going to get more boards. I hope to get more boards this year, to do a single layer new bed, and raise the existing one. I hope that raising it a little higher will help discourage the critters. (Also, it will be easier to put netting over the top and fasten it.)
Last year we broke a lot of new ground, and S.O.'s favorite mulch - Cedar - is too expensive to put everywhere, and also better for shrubs and trees and perrenials than for intensive veggie gardening. So we used my favorite purchased mulch - straw. Last year's straw will make a good thing to fill the raised bed with. It is used in "Core" gardening, which uses semi-rotted straw as organic filler, which holds moisture and feeds roots and worms. Put soil and compost over the top.
Friut Shrubs
We aren't really doing any fruit trees, but we put in some elderberries and haskap (honey berries). We will be adding some blueberries.
Trellising
I have loved all the videos of the lovely arched trellises people have made out of cattle panels. Unfortunately, even rolled up, a cattle panel will never fit in my Honda Fit. But then I heard of ladder mesh, also called masonry reinforcement remesh and variations of all the above lists of words. It's basically a little tiny fence (or ladder) of heavy-duty wire, 10 feet long by 8 inches wide. If I can get an 8 foot 2 by 10 into my car, I can easily get ten feet of bendable wire.
So I'm going to grow my cukes on that, as well as some melon and maybe peas or beans. I have my 10 foot bamboo poles to make tipis out of for the beans too.
Mushrooms
I've been hoping to create a little micro-habitat for morels sometime soon, but they are fussy and take years before you know if you succeeded. Most other mushrooms require so much fuss - carefully controlled environments, lots of indoor space dedicated.
Then I saw this video on YouTube, and realized there are some Mushrooms You Can Grow in Your Garden. Oyster and wine cap, mainly. And this video shows a great way to just grow a Bucket of Oyster Mushrooms. And if you want to go to more effort all sorts of videos on how to make your own grain spawn. (Most of these involve a pressure canner, but this one shows how to do Prep Mushroom Spawn in an Oven.)
It's too early to even begin that, though I have been looking for suppliers and such.
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