How Does Your Garden Grow

For many years The Farmer and I  put in a fairly nice sized garden. We planted about 12 tomato plants, 2 rows of green beans, some peppers, onions, watermelons, cantaloupes, cucumbers and whatever other plants my Dad would give me from his greenhouse

Personal plug:

My parents own A & N Greenhouse, out on Hwy 47 towards Potosi. (you know where that is if you live locally) It's too late this year, but that's the place to go when you want really good garden plants and flower baskets.

Ok, back to my story. As I was saying, we used to put in a nice sized garden. A couple of years ago, Daughter #1 enlightened me to the efficiency and ease of square foot gardening.  I really loved the idea. The Farmer made boxes for the plants, we put down a weed cloth to deter weed growth,  we sectioned off the boxes into 1 ft. squares, and then we planted the vegetables according to a chart that I had drawn up. I was really excited to do this, because square foot gardening was supposed to be easier (less weeding), until I saw The Farmer re-seeding the yard around the boxes. When he was finished, the garden was full of grass seed. It didn't take me long to lose interest in this gardening style (there were still weeds!)

So the gardening set idle for a season or two, until we determined that we were going to have fresh garden tomatoes on our BLTs. We both like the idea of having a garden, but he doesn't have time to weed the garden and I don't want to. :) So, necessity being the mother of invention, we came up with what I thought would be a simple plan--patio gardening.

Here's what we did:

Early one morning, The Farmer went out to get our special mix of highly organic soil.

This is the field where the cows winter.

  A visitor came as he was mixing the fertilized soil with peat moss

At one time these tubs contained protein supplement for the cows. I guess Otis (the bull) remembered.

 The Farmer mixes the soil and peat moss, and loads the tubs into the bucket of the tractor.

He lifts the tubs onto the deck using the bucket of the tractor.

You can see the remnants  of the square foot garden in the background.

We only did three tubs.

I planted 1 tomato plant and 2 pepper plants in each tub.

I later discovered that I should have planted the pepper plants in a tub by themselves.

Live and learn!

Have you planted a garden this year? Let me know how your garden is growing.

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