Anyone Want Some Lettuce?

Boy, do we have lettuce!  It is grown, ready to pick, and delicious, but we haven't even made it through one row yet.  It stays good in the fridge for quite a while, as well.  The lettuce is the first we've consumed from the garden so far.  All else still looks healthy - even the Red Ruben Basil will make a comeback, I believe.




In the east garden the strawberry plants are still growing well, there has been no squirrel or any other critter doing any damage.  Some are still struggling a bit, but are still alive.  My wife has had to trim the blossoms quite often lately.  Hopefully it will pay dividends next year.

Replacing Strawberry Plants

Lori, a friend from work, brought me in some June-bearing strawberry plants for our garden.  She said she got them but has no place to put them, so I thought it was nice of her to think of us!

At one time we thought we had lost 12 of the 24 strawberry plants planted due to the squirrels.  Now, though, several are showing signs of life and trying to come back.  After filling in some spots with the new plants, there is only 1 dead spot in the grid, top row second from right.  If you click the pic you'll see the large version and might even be able to pick it out!

The west bed is looking well still.  Most of the herbs look healthy if not growing much.  The Red Ruben Basil has me a little worried, however.  The garlic is still thriving and I find myself wondering how big they will get by fall.  And at the bottom, the lettuce looks like its ready to be picked...maybe.  We've never grown lettuce before so we'll have to look that up online, I guess.

Well, so far so good, I say.  Even when I was building it, I didn't realize how much enjoyment we would get from watching things grow.  Even better, we have only just begun!

Basil Replacement

Just a small update today.  I planted a new basil plant, the one right in the middle.  We had Sweet Danny Basil there first, but it didn't survive.  Here's a listing of all you can see here:  Along the top is regular Chives, Italian Parsley, and Garlic Chives.  Across the middle are 3 basils; Red Ruben Basil,  Cinnamon Basil and Sweet Basil.  The two herbs below are Sage and Thyme.

Frost Warning

... the last 2 nights.

Thankfully, we had some ratty old sheets on hand to cover the gardens.  I'm not really sure if it did frost either night, but we were prepared just in case.

In the east garden, the strawberry plants are low enough I just had to lay a sheet over everything.  Simple enough.  By the way, we are still looking for some more plants to fill in the gaps made by the squirrels.  I'm sure we'll get some more soon, there is just alot of other things on our minds lately as well.

The west garden was a little trickier.  I wound up using a bunch of unused flower pots upside down over most of the herbs in the top half.  Then some sideways tomatoe cages among the fragile new garlic shoots so the sheet wouldn't break them - and I didn't harm a one!  The lettuce on the bottom is low enough I let the sheet just lay over it.

This is May!   It's not supposed to frost anymore! I don't think there's anything to worry about, but the weather has turned cool and damp lately.  I'm sure we will have some nice growing weather soon! (X-fingers!)

Early Growth and Squirrels

Here is the left (west) garden box.  The herbs in the top half are still alive except the one in the middle, one of the basils.  Below that, no sign of life from the garlic yet.  Along the bottom you can see two rows of lettuce just starting to grow.









And here is the right (east) garden box, the potential strawberry field.  The dang squirrels like to dig them up so we have to do some replanting now and again, but most are looking healthy yet small.  If you look close, you can see the blanks in the grid where the squirrels killed some.  Hopefully we can replace them soon.  It would be nice to have a lush, growing strawberry patch!