Design

It's amazing how good 'soil' (in this case, commercial compost and composted manure) can support excellent growth. The lettuce, tomatoes, and other vegetables in my raised beds in the mountains are flourishing. Now these are permanent beds with stone, but you don't need them to have raised beds. They can be formed without support, actually, and be wonderfully productive. But it reminds me, again, of how MUCH vegetables need nutrients (compared to trees, shrubs, and perennials). These lettuces are much bigger and more succulent than any of those I've grown before, obviously thanks to LOTS of extra nutrients in the compost! And these French breakfast radishes (seeds were from Renee's Garden Seeds) look great!

I'm anxious to get going, but the weather is still unsettled. In the mountains of North Carolina (Zone 6), where my main summer garden will be this year, it's going to be close to freezing tonight. NOT weather for tomatoes, peppers, or eggplant, nor time to plant beans, squash, or cucumbers. In our main Piedmont vegetable garden (the satellite garden), I've put in asparagus crowns and artichokes (nice perennial vegetables) to accompany the onions, garlic, and leeks already planted. But it should be excellent weather to finish the last two raised beds (in the mountains) and fill them with soil, and hopefully plant some hardy herbs in the corners of the beds above the house. I'm also planning to sow beets, turnips, 'small' carrots, an Asian green mix, summer-mix lettuce, and late spinach, too, as an experiment -- you never know, it might be a long cool spring!

Traveling used to be about getting away and disconnecting. It still is, but digital connectivity is a seductive pull. I've enjoyed sharing real-time photos and reflections while traveling with a vehicle and laptop, on other trips, but hanging around hotel computers is hardly why you travel. Interestingly, we've been connected via email and voice messages (and Skype) with family while traveling in Southern Vietnam, via our iPod Touch, but photo downloading, not to mention uploading, hasn't been possible because of slow Internet connections and lack of working USB ports. I had brought a back-up portable drive, but without either a fast connection and/or USB, it's just serving as a back-up. Curiously, as well, the text composition on Blogspot doesn't work with the simple keyboard interface on the iPod Touch. I only just discovered that if you select HTML mode, it does work. But I'm still tapping out this letter by letter, so hardly optimal (but, we're taking ...

It's a good thing that we're not totally dependent on my potato harvest for sustenance, although South Carolina is hardly a prime potato growing location. 'Caribe' potatoes seem to do the best, although I've had harvests from all the varieties I've tried. I'm still learning about potatoes - in my second year of growing them, my ecological instincts (about native plants) don't necessarily serve me well with nutrient and water-hungry crops. And, certainly, dry weather doesn't help. But we had some delicious fresh potatoes (along with new garlic and onions) for dinner, so I'm happy with that. But, I'm enjoying thinking about rotations, and what to put in the potato beds after they're done. (They still have small developing potatoes at the end of underground stems -- do I water and side-dress with compost and hope for more potatoes -- or do I dig up everything and plant beans, or wait until mid-July and plant fall-maturing cole crops, or ...

I was reminded about A Growing Challenge recently -- what a great incentive to add new edibles to your garden. I just 'stuck' onion plants in the satellite garden - Stockton Red, Walla Walla Sweet, and another sweet onion. These were new to me - I grew onions last year for the first time, and surprised kids by pulling up lovely large red onions from the raised beds at the garden. What fun! Unfortunately, the woodchuck population is growing there, too, and the den below the former camellia greenhouse has been more than active. Hhrmph. At least they don't like onions! And my potatoes hopefully will produce well in their nicely amended beds in the satellite garden. King Harry, supposedly pest-resistant, Canola Red, a favorite of home growers, All-Blue, just for fun, Red Dale, and Caribe were my selections this year. I've sown a flat of Red Deer Tongue lettuce from Nichols Garden Nursery, and have lots more seeds to sow outside. My 'Spigarello' broccoli see...