Saturday, July 9, 2011

Gardening: The Farm. Y'know, sort of.

Bwahaha.

We've got the new vegetable garden. OK, really, we've had it for three weeks now. Possibly four. I forget. I am a blogging slacker, or perhaps I've been too mud-covered and sore-muscled to type. I remain excited.

We hired a Garden Projects Guy to deal with the space, and in addition to adding sprinklers he prepped it by repeatedly tilling it and raking out Bermuda grass roots. And please don't tell me that using an oversized blender on persistent roots is not the very best idea and you can't get all the roots out without spending a year hand-sifting and that we'll be arguing with Bermuda grass until the end of time. Because we know. We knew before he tilled. We did it anyway. Watching the window for corn closing in front of your very eyes will do that to you. It's tilled and squashy and plantable, and so far I'm more or less keeping on top of the weeds in the planted areas, so I'm going to maintain my delusion of control until the grass lassos me and knocks some sense into me.

The very largest vegetable garden in my past was three hundred square feet. This one is roughly eight hundred linear feet of four-foot-wide row, or ten times that.

Bwahaha.

We're calling it The Farm, since the name The Garden is taken by the garden around the house. I do realize that some people work vegetable gardens of an acre or six, without giving them grand names. I choose not to care; it is The Farm.

And so far we've planted bush beans and tomatoes and peppers and cucumbers and melons and squash and lettuce and basil and strawberries and blueberries and artichokes and cardoons and corn and tepary beans and parch corn and chives and onions and herbs and beets and radishes. And the leek seedlings are growing along, and I'll be starting the seedlings for autumn-crop broccoli and cabbage and brussels sprouts and cauliflower soon. Oh, and planting peas.

I'm ignoring other realities, in addition to the Bermuda grass. I'm ignoring the moderate to high likelihood that several things, like the parch corn and the winter squash and the melons and the tepary beans and quite possibly the cucumbers, may not mature in time for us to eat them. I'm ignoring the fact that the onions went in about eight weeks late and will therefore be scallions, not bulbs. Don't care, nope nope nope.

I ate a blueberry today. I have banana peppers ready to eat and lettuce a week away from eating and lots of hard green tomatoes busily progressing and itty bitty barely-there green beans, and only two plants so far have been yanked into the Gopher Twilight Zone. So there.

Bwahaha.

Image: By Vitchybini. Wikimedia Commons.

8 comments:

  1. Thank you for your blog. A bit of humor is always appreciated; especially so after a tough day. I'm jealous of your farm, though, Bermuda grass and all. =)

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  2. Hey, Amy! I'm glad you enjoyed it. :)

    The farm the farm! I'm still ever so excited, yes, Bermuda grass and all. Even after weeding a whole lot of square feet today. I never used standing-upright weeding tools before; I'm still entertained by figuring out how to use a hoe.

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  3. Well, this is just terribly exciting. I confess to being a bit envious of all the cool things you've planted that I, in my coastal garden, could never do. Sigh.
    We'll be in Ashland for a weekend of plays in October. Can I come visit your garden, er, The Farm? :)

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  4. I just found your blog....it is great. Anyone who gardens in anyway has got to have a sense of humor..or a gun! I am no longer battling grass where I don't want it but the neighbour's cows have been a bit of a problem. They can crawl through 5 strand barbed wire that si tight enough to play a tune on! And they really like squash! I look forward to reading more

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  5. Hey, Christine! I admit that I am gloating about having, for the very first time, both space _and_ full sun. Not having to speculate whether we have enough sun for Russian tomatoes, or whether that eight-inch-by-six-inch spot between the roses will host a tomato, is a novel luxury.

    Woohoo! It sounds like a plan to me. Have you been to Ashland before?

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  6. Yo, Fiona! Thanks! Wow, your cows sound worse than our deer - and Ashland's deer were bad enough this year to rate their own entry in the 4th of july parade.

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  7. Well I never.

    I idly clicked on 'Next Blog' which I do only once in a blue moon before I shut the computer down and, for once, a readable blog appears; not a blog about the Bloggs family and their many children, not a blog about religion of some sort or another, not a one topic blog by a raving madwoman/man..........

    Pity you haven't got a followers' button, I'd be here again like a shot.

    Happy blogging.

    (I hope you are not a friends and family blogger only, if so, forgive the intrusion.

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  8. Hey, Friko! Come back, come back! Well, thanks for the compliment, even if you don't come back. :) (And, hey, I can go visit your blog.) And, no, definitely not only for friends and family.

    Follow button. Follow button? Why don't I have one? I'll have to go look at widgets now.

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