Is Anyone Else Getting Exciting about The 2013 Gardening Season??

[lisaandmike]

Spring is in the air and I'm getting excited about my plans for this year.  Anyone else?

Here is a recap of last year.  Maybe some of you can give me some ides for a better trellis for my pole beans and also tomato cages??

I added a new story today about gardening and we will soon start on the 2013 chapters.

http://mikeandlisaworld.blogspot.com/2013/03/chapter-134gardening-for-2012.html

[mgramann]

I really liked this idea from Organic Gardening.  I suspect rebar grid may also work.

http://www.organicgardening.com/learn-and-grow/super-sturdy-tomato-cage

I've also heard that beans should be planted near corn-as the beans will climb the stalks.  I plan on giving this a try in the future.

[MushCreek]

I'm excited about spring, especially after camping in my barn all winter! The garden is just going to be my little 4' by 8' plot again this year, as I'm busy building a house. I have decided where to put in the big garden, though, and may plow it up sometime during this season, till in some compost, and let it rest until next year.

[NM_Shooter]

Yup!  Count me in.  My daughter and I started our tomatoes from seed in early January.  I rigged a cheap little seed starter out of a clear storage bin from Lowes.  I cut a hole in the top and taped on a piece of fluorescent fixture plastic and it holds moisture and heat great.  It comes in on really cold nights.  Our tomato plants are about 12" tall and doing great. 

I love getting my garden going, but it looks nowhere as nice as yours!

We use rebar mesh rolled into 24"ish circles for our cages, and they are wired to T-posts driven into the ground for stability.  Here in NM the winds are brutal, so we wrap the bottom 3' of the cage in clear plastic.  The tomatoes will get planted soon in water walls. 

Peas need to get planted soon too.   

[Don_P]

She's got about 12 flats of veggies under lights now, the garden is mostly tilled. For 'maters we drive poles every 8' or so down the row and string the growing plants first from one side then the other weaving and trapping them in between.

[rick91351]

Up there where we are heading cold crops will do real well.  However'maters are a iffy deal.  I am still going to try them however with some modified hoops and ground covers.  Peppers are hardly do able but may work with the hoops and ground cover.  I read where you can put one of those Dietz Jupiter Lanterns under a row crop cover if you think it might get to cold and will keep it from freezing.  Of course in reason but on those night where it might or will dip few degrees below freezing.       

Spuds up there are very do able - hey this is Idaho right? 

We have more trees and berries coming here in a few weeks.  We are going to Yuba City, California in a month for our bees.  We have new hives waiting to be painted and populated.   

       

[Pine Cone]

Pretty excited at the progress we are making this year.  Last year we moved to a new place, cut down trees, hired someone to cut down more trees, had stumps ground, fencing put in, new pump for the well, etc.

Got two raised beds built last year.  This year we have 6 more raised beds, two to four more planned.

This year we got some grow lights and started some seeds about a month ago.  Tomatoes, cabbage, eggplants, and broccoli.  Put in some small hoops over raised beds, covered with plastic.  Started some seeds there, others in the house.  Planted potatoes about a month ago which are just starting to poke up as well.

Here's what it looked like on Easter


Floating row covers over onions and peas


Closeup on peas


Onions under the row cover (removed in picture), lettuce, carrots and chard under the hoops


Tomatoes under the hoops with red plastic mulch


The small hoop houses/low tunnels are this year's experiment after years of poor production here in western Washington.  When we lived in north California we could grow pretty much anything we wanted except dahlias.   Now we can grow all the dahlias we want, but barely get any tomatoes.  We hope to get a couple of months more growing season with the help of the covered hoop rows.

Last freeze should be in another two or three weeks.  We will be making a few more raised beds (on-site soil is glacial till, a mix of super sandy with pockets of clay.  No organic matter in sight...