How Does My Garden Grow?

 This year I've been trying to do a better job of chronicling the garden through pictures.  It's something I've wanted to do for (*ahem*) a decade or more but never actually remember.  It's been hit and miss this year but at least I have enough to, I think, get the general gist of what the gardening season looks like.

I have my garden divided into roughly six sections: Northeast, Shed area (Southeast), middle North, middle South (and grapes and blackberries), Northwest, Southwest (and a fledgling raspberry patch).

In 2022 I devoted the Northeast section to strawberries and asparagus and a new compost bin.  There's a bit of room, at least until the strawberry bed and asparagus beds need to expand, for a row or two of other things.  This year it's a row of lettuce.  I began working on that section first this Spring, getting the strawberry bed cleaned up and last year's runners put into rows.

Early May

cleaning the strawberry bed

The Shed section is two smaller areas to the North and South of the garden shed.  Eventually the South side will have a greenhouse built against the shed wall there.  And I'm trying to figure out a (noninvasive) plan for herbs and a cottage garden type flower bed on the North side. But for now I planted cabbage (so far not doing well), dill, cilantro, zinnias and cosmos in the North bed and garlic, Brussels sprouts (critters keep eating), eggplant and beets in the South bed.  Other than the garlic, which was planted last Fall, this was the last section to get planted this Spring, so it was the designated spot for grandkids to play in the dirt in while I was planting other things.

Early May

K3 and Toad digging in the as yet unplanted section North of the shed

The middle South is where I planted all my potatoes this year, as well as a couple short rows of bush beans. It also has the grape arbor, then an empty spot that I assigned to pole beans and butternut squash, then some lilac bushes I'm trying to establish from transplanted suckers, and a wild blackberry thicket that decided to sprout several years ago.

In the Southwest section I put another row of (a different variety) bush beans, sweet corn, zucchini, pumpkins (to run in the corn rows), cucumbers, turnips and more zinnias.

Early June

South half, looking East

This year the middle North section is where I put the onions (5+ rows), peppers, and broccoli.

The Northwest section is mostly tomatoes, a (really spotty looking) row of carrots, a row of beets, then more cosmos and zinnias.  

Early June

North half, looking East

Late June

North half, looking West

Late June

South half, looking West

early July

tomato section (western North half, looking West)

mid-July

bean pole (and grape arbor to right, blackberry mess to left)

mid-July South of shed

garlic (on left) showing signs of being almost ready for harvest

mid-July

North half, looking West (onions need weeding between rows)

mid-July

South half, looking West 

potatoes doing well, corn starting to tassel

And there you have it. My approximately 1/4 acre garden as it looks so far this growing season.  We've eaten lettuce and green beans out of it, and the beans are really starting to come on.  I'll have to get out my canner this week.  Cukes are slow, but finally seeing some little cucumbers on the vines.  Zucchini is apparently a crop failure this year; that's how it goes for me and zucchini: a good year followed by a failure year--and that's why there's shredded zucchini in my freezer from last year still!  The garlic will definitely be ready to harvest by the end of this week.  Seeing lots of green tomatoes, but they typically don't turn red until mid-August for me, so it'll be a couple weeks yet before we get to enjoy a warm sun ripened tomato off the vine.

This is the first year that I've had a water hydrant in the garden (DH and I ran the water line from the well and installed it last Fall), and it has made a HUGE difference in the effectiveness of my sprinklers.  With just 100' of hose and a tripod sprinkler, I can reach pretty much anywhere in the garden (I have about 8 spots I rotate the sprinkler to).  Previously, it took over 100' of hose just to get to the garden from the faucet on the outside of the house, and if I wanted to water the Southwest corner of the Southwest section, that required three 100' hoses and the sprinkler didn't spray nearly as far as it does now on one 100' hose.  Best garden improvement ever!