Green Thumb Up My Nose: Lessons learned from 2023

Summary of the Year

Growing season was about like last year. It started out cold — not hitting 70F until early May — and then turned scorching hot, with record-breaking warm into early October before crashing to killer frost at the end of the month.

Lessons Learned from 2023  

1. Add screws to furring stakes before you put them in. Makes it easy for plants to grow up them
2. Either don’t plant the center row, or plant them early, so they don’t get shaded out.
3. Put down more fertilizer earlier — as soon as I can work the ground.
4. Harvest winter Tromboncinos as soon as they turn brown.
5. Don’t bother planting potatoes.
6. Plant more Delicata squash. Only planted one, and that only had one fruit.
7. Don’t bother with Zucchini. Cocozelle is better.
8. Don’t bother with Pattypan. Hard to cook and tastes about like Summer squash.
9. Don’t use old cocoa or chips containers for seedlings. The metal rims make it hard to transplant.
10. Weed whackers with plastic cutters work well on chopping up tomato and squash remnants. I can bury the detritus into the soil, or into grow-bags.

Results of Lessons Learned from 2022

1.  For some reason, possibly because of shade from plants on the furring stakes, the plants in the middle column didn’t do well. That means we should only plant 8 plants per section, or maybe plant the central row early. I forgot to do this, and had the same problem.
2.  Planting singleton potatoes in 10″ pots didn’t work out. Possibly too cold. Planted potatoes in Section 4 and got lousy yields.
3.  Planting carrots in a cooler works pretty well. Did not try that this year. 
4.  If I want to plant late harvest (October) determinate tomatoes, I need to plant out seedlings in early/mid July (except that the nurseries close out in mid June). Or buy seeds and start them in early-mid May. Forgot to try this.
5.  Cut spaghetti squash along the lines of latitude and cook the ensuing donuts. This works very well and makes nice single servings.
6.  Soaker hose doesn’t cover a lot of ground, so young seedlings a few inches away get dehydrated. Maybe try a sprinkler hose, instead. Tried sprinkler hoses, but they all leaked.

Green Thumb Up My Nose: Lessons learned from 2022

Summary of the Year

Yields for 2022 were disappointing, only half of last year’s record. Growing season started out cold — not hitting 70F until the end of May — and ended up scorching hot, with record-breaking warm into early October before crashing to frost at the of the month.

Lessons Learned from 2022

1.  For some reason, possibly because of shade from plants on the furring stakes, the plants in the middle column didn’t do well. That means we should only plant 8 plants per section, or maybe plant the central row early.
2.  Planting singleton potatoes in 10″ pots didn’t work out. Possibly too cold
3.  Planting carrots in a cooler works pretty well
4.  If I want to plant late harvest (October) determinate tomatoes, I need to plant out seedlings in early/mid July (except that the nurseries close out in mid June). Or buy seeds and start them in early-mid May.
5.  Cut spaghetti squash along the lines of latitude and cook the ensuing donuts.
6.  Soaker hose doesn’t cover a lot of ground, so young seedlings a few inches away get dehydrated. Maybe try a sprinkler hose, instead.

Results of Lessons Learned from 2021

1. Using 8ft furring strips for tomatoes in the main garden works best if you start them early and train the plants up. Start them earlier than that
2. Stake each of the cornstalks in the greenhouse. Do it early. Doesn’t have to be tall, but must attach. Didn’t plant corn.
3. Don’t plant squash in the middle of the bed. They get shaded out. How true.
4. Weed a couple of times a couple of weeks before planting. It helped.
5. Use bigger plant signs, particularly for the squash. Bigger than that. No, BIGGER, I said… Not big enough.
6. Photograph and map the initial planting better than I did last year. Maybe I’ll do that in ’23
7. In line with Item 10 from last year, don’t bother with bush varieties of tomato. The  fruit comes out plum-sized and acidulous. Didn’t do bush.
8. And while we’re at it, don’t bother growing vegetable crops on the deck. The containers are too small and the ‘bush’ varieties not particularly good. Maybe go with herbs. As a result, lots more room for my kamado grill.
9. Don’t worry about pollinating the corn until the female tassels appear then get in a big box fan. Didn’t do corn.
10. Greenhouse seems to work for corn and sweet potatoes, but not both at the same time. Try planting sweet potatoes in Section 3 and corn by itself in the greenhouse. Didn’t do corn and didn’t use the greenhouse.
11. And speaking of sweet potatoes, cutting up store-bought only gave us about as many as we planted. Let’s order some commercial sets for 2022. Didn’t order commercial stuff. Didn’t get much of a harvest.
12. Only order seeds from well-known US seed companies. When ordering through Amazon, check sourcing. Not making any accusations, but don’t buy from GardenSeedsMarket again. Didn’t order from them and it turned out fine.

Green Thumb Up My Nose: Lessons learned from 2021

Summary of the Year

Oh, the life of the gentleman gardener.  Nice start to Summer, horrible heat waves in the middle, near zero temps early Winter when we were hoping for some late lettuce. On the other hand, record level yields of tomatoes. The corn and sweet potatoes grew well in the greenhouse, they just didn’t produce any ears/spuds. Our indoor late Fall/early Winter carrots produced bumper crops of … grass. Someone at the seed company has been exceedingly dishonest.

Lessons Learned from 2021

1. Using 8ft furring strips for tomatoes in the main garden works best if you start them early and train the plants up.
2. Stake each of the cornstalks in the greenhouse. Do it early. Doesn’t have to be tall, but must attach.
   
3. Don’t plant squash in the middle of the bed. They get shaded out.
   
4. Weed a couple of times a couple of weeks before planting.
5. Use bigger plant signs, particularly for the squash. Bigger than that. No, BIGGER, I said…
6. Photograph and map the initial planting better than I did last year.
7. In line with Item 10 from last year, don’t bother with bush varieties of tomato. The  fruit comes out plum-sized and acidulous.
8. And while we’re at it, don’t bother growing vegetable crops on the deck. The containers are too small and the ‘bush’ varieties not particularly good. Maybe go with herbs.
9. Don’t worry about pollinating the corn until the female tassels appear then get in a big box fan.
10. Greenhouse seems to work for corn and sweet potatoes, but not both at the same time. Try planting sweet potatoes in Section 3 and corn by itself in the greenhouse.
    
11. And speaking of sweet potatoes, cutting up store-bought only gave us about as many as we planted. Let’s order some commercial sets for 2022.
12. Only order seeds from well-known US seed companies. When ordering through Amazon, check sourcing. Not making any accusations, but don’t buy from GardenSeedsMarket again.
    

Results of Lessons Learned from 2020

1. In preparation for a Covid continuance, start all my own seedlings. Order seeds before Christmas. This only works if you label all the seedlings at each stage, and I’ve already missed the Christmas order date. This year I think I’ll make a couple of trips to Home Depot instead of starting seeds at home, IF the expected spring drop in Covid comes along.
2. Don’t bother with any brassicae, of any shape or form. I know I’ve said this before, but this time I mean it!  Didn’t miss them, won’t try them again.
3. Don’t bother with Lemon Cucumber. We couldn’t find a useful use for it. Didn’t miss them.
4. Carrots on tape work well. Lettuce also, if you can get the right kind. But you have to find a way to solve the weed problem. Wire grids helped.
5. We’ve kindof gone off chard. Still not back to it.
6. Don’t bother with putting anything in the front of the house. It’s more trouble than it’s worth. Enjoyed the extra time.
7. Better signage and documentation. Yes, Yes, YES!
8. Build a ‘Planter Tracker’ page that you update and link to it from later Green Thumbs. This works if you do it right.
9. This from 2019: Tomatoes planted on the E side of the house get the most sun and have the highest yields. Bags are better than containers. I plan to continue this practice.
10. This also from 2019: Don’t bother with deck tomatoes. They gave the lowest weight of all locations. Still true, but I didn’t listen.

Green Thumb Up My Nose: Lessons learned from 2020

Summary of the Year

This year had a short growing season — late frosts and early snows. Plus, we kindof got blindsided by the whole Covid thing, being a good month into the pandemic before the ground was warm enough to dig. As a result there were not a lot of seedlings at the stores, so we ended up with multiple Lemon Cucumber plants and almost no squash, of any variety. Reasonable number of tomato varieties. Because of that, I didn’t field a full garden. Sections 1 (tomatoes) and 2 (squash), with some taped carrots and chard and lettuce in Section 3. Section 4 was fallow. I had planned to put in some Asparagus sets, but the hardware store didn’t have any.  Tomatoes did very well. Zucchini did well (no Summer Squash). Acorn, Spaghetti, Pumpkin, and Delicata were all failures. Meanwhile, we got a bunch of Red Cabbage seedlings from the nursery that sold us our shrubberies — they had ordered them by mistake and were giving them away. Planted some in the garden (barely surviving the frosts, no sign of heads) and in pots on the deck, ready to be moved into the house if it frosted (two now growing fine indoors — but no heads as of Thanksgiving — two et up by aphids).

Results of 2019 Lessons Learned

1. Don’t plant any yellow tomatoes. Never missed them.
2. Fertilize Fall and Spring. Did that thing. Worked well. Beefsteak tomatoes were Beefsteak tomato-sized.
3. Give up on cherry tomatoes and hanging tomatoes. Never missed them.
4. Weed a couple of times a couple of weeks before planting. Maybe need to do some additional weeding.
5. Use bigger plant signs, particularly for the squash. Bigger than that. No, bigger…
6. Photograph and map the initial planting.  Yeah, shoulda done this.

Lessons Learned from 2020

1. In preparation for a Covid continuance, start all my own seedlings. Order seeds before Christmas.
2. Don’t bother with any brassicae, of any shape or form. I know I’ve said this before, but this time I mean it!
3. Don’t bother with Lemon Cucumber. We couldn’t find a useful use for it.
4. Carrots on tape work well. Lettuce also, if you can get the right kind.
5. We’ve kindof gone off chard.
6. Don’t bother with putting anything in the front of the house. It’s more trouble than it’s worth.
7. Better signage and documentation.
8. Build a ‘Planter Tracker’ page that you update and link to it from later Green Thumbs

Green Thumb Up My Nose: Lessons Learned from 2019

Lessons Learned from 2019

1. Don’t plant any yellow tomatoes. Don’t plant any purple tomatoes. No horticultural reason, we find we just don’t like them as much. We prefer the plain vanilla …er…tomatoes.

2. Fertilize Fall and Spring.

3. Give up on cherry tomatoes and hanging tomatoes.

4. Weed a couple of times a couple of weeks before planting.

5. Use bigger plant signs, particularly for the squash.

6. Photograph and label the initial planting.

Results of 2018 Lessons Learned:

1. Don’t plant: Carolina Gold, any purple tomato. Planted Cherokee Purples in the garden. Didn’t work out

2. Some versions of Champion and Big Boy and Brandywine are determinates. Try staggering the planting. Not sure if staggering the seedling purchase will work. Did not do this. Big Boy did well

3. Process the dirt —  turn over the fallow, fertilize early. Did not process the dirt but did fertilize early (Fall and Spring). Worked well.

4. Until you’ve done (3), don’t use the fallow dirt. Did not use fallow dirt. Used part of it on the front lawn.

5. Try using seed tapes on the carrots and lettuce, et al. Container lettuce worked well. Some of the garden spots worked also, others overcome with weeds. Carrots worked well

6. Be sure you check your plan so you don’t use last year’s planting pattern. I checked.

7. Don’t bother trying to grow plants indoors next winter. Soil temps in the so-called Sun Room never got over 58F. I may try it with lettucoi.

Here’s the results of the 2019 planting pattern:

Section 1
Peas, squash, melons. Plant the peas early, so they gain some height over the squash. Squash worked out well. Did not plant peas

Section 2
Tomatoes. Tomatoes did exceptionally well.

Section 3
Peas, chard, lettuce, carrots maybe cabbage. Not much luck here. Overcome with weeds. Carrots worked well. We are somewhat disillusioned with peas.

Section 4
Asparagus, maybe amaranth. As with Section 3, the weeds did me in. Even the second planting of lettuce didn’t work.

Deck Containers
The usual tomatoes. Early peas. Maybe try some shallow container lettuce and radish. Tomatoes fair. I’m going to give up on cherries. Cucumber gave one cuke.

House Containers (Eastside)
Tomatoes, cucumbers. Tomatoes did well. Long beans did OK, but MJ doesn’t like them. Cukes did nothing.

Southside
Try some container tomatoes with new dirt. Plant more Boston Ivy. Ivy is growing slowly. Put in some Amaranth, which looks nice. Abandoning Southside as a food source.

Gantt Chart for 2019

Green Thumb Up My Nose: Lessons Learned and Plans for 2019

Lessons Learned from 2018 and plans for 2019

Lessons Learned:

1. Don’t plant: Carolina Gold, any purple tomato

2. Some versions of Champion and Big Boy and Brandywine are determinates. Try staggering the planting. Not sure if staggering the seedling purchase will work.

3. Process the dirt —  turn over the fallow, fertilize early.

4. Until you’ve done (3), don’t use the fallow dirt.

5. Try using seed tapes on the carrots and lettuce, et al.

6. Be sure you check your plan so you don’t use last year’s planting pattern.

7. Don’t bother trying to grow plants indoors next winter. Soil temps in the so-called Sun Room never got over 58F, and three months after planting my indoor cabbage had six leaves.

8. However, here’s some hints on starting seeds indoors

Here’s the preliminary 2019 planting pattern:*

Section 1
Peas, squash, melons. Plant the peas early, so they gain some height over the squash.

Section 2
Tomatoes. Start seeds indoors early March, transplant early May. Depending on what’s at the nursery, put out seedlings in early May.

Section 3
Peas, chard, lettuce, carrots maybe cabbage. Start planting chard, lettuce, and carrots in early April. Plant more every three weeks.

Section 4
Asparagus, maybe amaranth. Looking for something permanent, that can take a fair amount of shade.

Deck Containers
The usual tomatoes. Early peas. Maybe try some shallow container lettuce and radish

House Containers (Eastside)
Tomatoes, cucumbers.

Southside
Try some container tomatoes with new dirt. Plant more Boston Ivy.

*which is mostly the 2018 plan, because I didn’t do (6.)

This is looking to be an El Nino year, so I think I can get started early on the planting.

Gantt Chart for 2019

My third trip to Japan: Lessons Learned and Recommendations

Not much that is new this trip. Mostly a reaffirmation of what the previous two trips had taught me.

UPDATE 2024: As of this update, Japan is stopping the use of PASMO/SUICA cards, due to the non-availability of chips. Not sure what the current situation is.

1. Japan Rail Pass is your friend. As I write this, it’s $250 for a 7-day pass, or $35 per day. Given that a two-hour trip across the width of the country is about $100, you can see that it’s a bargain. You have to order it while in the US, and they FedEx an authorization you can use to get the pass at your first major JR station. UPDATE 2024: Prices for the JR pass are going way up.
2. You don’t have to activate your JR Pass when when you pick it up. I spent the first part of the trip upcountry, where the pass was invaluable in getting around. It ran out on the last two days, but by then I was in Tokyo, and could use the PASMO. PASMO or Suica don’t save you any money, but sure save hassle. On the other hand, if I was going to spend the first part of the trip in Tokyo, and leave from Kansai or somewhere, then I’d hold off on activating the pass
3. In Tokyo, use a PASMO, or Suica card to get around. They are cash cards — you put cash on them at any kombini, and then just flash the card to ride the metro or buy lunch. This keeps you from having to fumble with the JR ticket machines or ending up with pockets full of change.
4. Bring money. As in, cash. All my hotel charges were paid for through online booking, and my major purchases in Tokyo were on the credit card, but almost everything else was at places where it was easier to pay cash (or put cash on your PASMO card). I left home with $1000 in yen and a PASMO with $18 on it, and came home with $30 in yen and $14 on the PASMO.
5. Get a pocket wifi hotspot. The same company that does the JR Pass will rent you a hotspot for for less than $10 a day. Turn it on, stick it in a pocket of your cargo pants, and hook up your tablet. You have on-line map and translation service all day, if you pay attention to your batteries. Send it back before you go through outbound security at the airport, because there are no mailboxes past them.
6. Smaller hotels are nice. And they’re cheap. All my hotel rooms were smaller than cruise ship staterooms. There was room for the bed and the desk and the TV, but you couldn’t do your radio taiso exercises in them. This is fine, assuming you don’t plan to spend a lot of time in the room, and since you are in Japan, why would you?
7. In Tokyo, you don’t have to stay in the center of town, but you should stay next to a train station. Off-rush hour prices were only about $3 per trip to get three stops away from Tokyo Station, and it did wonders for hotel pricing. Of course, in the provinces, the train station is the center of town.
8. Early September is still too hot to walk around most of Japan. Say, anything south of Sendai. And the humidity numbers match the temperature. My next trip I’m going to shoot for early October.
9. My experience is that ramen restaurants are usually the take-a-ticket kind, that what we would call family style restaurants expect you to pay the cashier, and that real, formal, sit-down restaurants expect you to call for the check.
10. Here’s a link to portable trash bags

Green Thumb Up My Nose: Lessons Learned – 2015

Looks like the garden is done for the year. I don’t think the peas will survive 18hrs of frost, dipping to 18F, three days after the 18th.  Here’s a commentary on this year’s plans:

General
1. Hit hard by powdery mildew this summer. Garden plants, ground cover plants, and plants in the front yard were infected. Go for mildew resistant strains of everything.

PM wasn’t a problem this year. Maybe it was drier. I put up a shield so my neighbor’s sprinkler wouldn’t dampen the squash, and that helped.

2. The small greenhouse worked well to get the plants through a variable Spring. Was positively humid inside, which attracted mosquitoes. Try hanging flypaper.

Didn’t need the greenhouse much, and never got to try the flypaper.

Yard Crops
1. Can’t do much with the area that’s in deep shade. Avoid next year (although part of that might have been the mildew).

I didn’t avoid, and it didn’t go well. Just don’t, OK?

2. Hops netting worked well, but was too narrow at the top. Need to reposition the hooks, or add new ones.

Added hooks, but it hourglassed in the middle. Gonna hafta build a full sized frame

Containers
1. Plant long beans and lemon cucumbers earlier

Long beans tended to go from freshripe to dry and crumbly in a couple of days. Had more lemon cukes than we could eat.

2. Try more miniatures

Couldn’t find any

3. Work even harder on getting the labeling right

Yeah, right

4. Daikon are not container plants, not even in big containers.

Or, as far as I can tell, not even in KHG’s. Give up.

Keyhole Garden
1. Abandon Section 4 as a berry farm. Too much work for too little return. Plant to peas and beans this year.

Got one good crop of beans, but the second planting didn’t make it

2. First pick of one pea plant last Summer gave about five pods, with four or five peas each — call it twenty peas per plant. One serving seems to be about 80-100 peas (I’ll confirm next dinner time), so we need 4 or 5 plants per person per meal. Which means I plant at least 20 plants next time. Six lima bean plants made two small servings.

Peas do not do well in deep shade, which is what we had behind the Santa Maria beans. Keep that in mind for next year. Beans and peas and tomatoes should go on the north end, and lower plants should go on the south end of each KHG section. In other news, we like limas better than green beans.

3. Replace all the covers with the redesigned versions.

Didn’t need them

4. Re-do all of the irrigation hose. Set it so each section can be watered individually.

Done, except the individually part

5. In early Spring, rebuild the SW corner of Section 1. Consider re-coring the center basket as well.

Done.

6. Plastic bottle cloche covers worked well.

Didn’t need them.

What didn’t work:
Pumpkins in the shade.
Amaranth. Planted too late, wrong varietal.
Brassicae. Any kind. Any where.
Santa Maria beans (pinquitos).

What did work:
Peppers out front.
Lemon cukes.
Hanging Zebras.
Wire shelving as an anti-squirrel measure.
Last minute summer-squash-inna-box.

Next week: next year

Green Thumb Up My Nose: Lessons Learned – 2014

So this is really, truly, 本当に the last garden report of the year. Our first hard freeze hit on November 11th, and the second one this weekend. Temperature 18″ down in the KHG on a 28F December 1st noon, after a 10F weekend, was 42F. Used up the last of the lettuce last week, and will use up the last of the tomatoes this week. Last year we had a smaller harvest, but we still had tomatoes ripening indoors in mid-December.

General
1. Hit hard by powdery mildew this summer. Garden plants, ground cover plants, and plants in the front yard were infected. Go for mildew resistant strains of everything.

2. The small greenhouse worked well to get the plants through a variable Spring. Was positively humid inside, which attracted mosquitoes. Try hanging flypaper.

Yard Crops
1. Can’t do much with the area that’s in deep shade. Avoid next year (although part of that might have been the mildew).
2. Hops netting worked well, but was too narrow at the top. Need to reposition the hooks, or add new ones.

Containers
1. Plant long beans and lemon cucumbers earlier

2. Try more miniatures

3. Work even harder on getting the labeling right

4. Daikon are not container plants, not even in big containers.

Keyhole Garden
1. Abandon Section 4 as a berry farm. Too much work for too little return. Plant to peas and beans this year.

2. First pick of one pea plant last Summer gave about five pods, with four or five peas each — call it twenty peas per plant. One serving seems to be about 80-100 peas (I’ll confirm next dinner time), so we need 4 or 5 plants per person per meal. Which means I plant at least 20 plants next time. Six lima bean plants made two small servings.

3. Replace all the covers with the redesigned versions.

4. Re-do all of the irrigation hose. Set it so each section can be watered individually.

5. In early Spring, rebuild the SW corner of Section 1. Consider re-coring the center basket as well.

6. Plastic bottle cloche covers worked well.

Review of Last Year’s Plans
1. Early fertilization helped. We don’t generate enough kitchen waste to support four KHGs. However, watch the nitrogen.
2. We did better on tracking dates, but not good enough.
3. Did not have as much of a blossom-end rot problem, but specific cultivars did poorly. More Ca.
4. Hops did well. Don’t think I’ll need any more plantings.
5. Planting squash in the ground cover zone didn’t work. Mildew was at least as much of a problem as location.
6. Didn’t plant long beans, and the lemon cucumbers got mildew.
7. The big cherries did well in the containers. Next year will try them in the hanging baskets. Also try some additional cherry varietals, to get a wide range of colors.
8. Removing the keyhole kneeholes worked, but one does need steps to get up on the dirt.
9. Labeling still needs work
10. Slugs not as much of a problem this year
11. Moving from 2×4 to 1×1 helped lighten the KHG covers. I think I need to separate the chickenwire from the plastic as well — second plantings need chickenwire.

Next Year’s Plan
Section 1
Tomatoes and squash. Try beefsteaks again, but with a different watering plan. Seriously look for mildew resistant varieties of everything.

Section 2
Brassicae. Cabbage, mostly. Make one last effort to grow daikon

Section 3
Peas and beans and greens (oh my). Plant lots earlier. Deb Tolman says to try amaranth, since some of those have a 30-day to harvest cycle.

Section 4
Not quite sure what to put in here. Maybe just a cover crop. Figure out the best way to fit it into the rotation.

The Schedule

Move everything up about a week
early Feb – Start seeds indoors
early April (60 days later) – move to greenhouse

early May — transplant
early July (70 days) – early varieties ripen
late July (90 days) – late varieties ripen

Green Thumb Up My Nose: Lessons Learned 2013

General
1. Think about the fertilization schedule. I may have done too much too late, and promoted too much foliage growth at the expense of vegetables
2. Better date tracking. Put harvest dates in as well as planting dates. Too much stuff was lost because I didn’t pay attention
3. Get more Ca into the soil, everybody needed it

Yard Crops
1. Happy with the hops. Get six more to fill in and extend. Buy early and bring along in an indoor container for a month before planting out

2. Make better use of the ground cover zone for squash. This year I did squash in containers, and they didn’t do well, due to crimping of the vine going over the edge. The ones planted directly in the soil did better. Have to cut way back on the ground cover, and remember to move the planting spots around each year.

Containers
1. Plant long beans and lemon cucumbers earlier

2. Happy with the miniature cucumbers. Nothing else worked out

3. Look for a bigger cherry tomato for the hanging containers. S-100s are OK but we’d like something more substantive

4. Better labeling. This year the labels were buried by the supplemental potting soil. Write on the container. By the time it’s covered with writing it will be time to dump it

Keyhole Garden
1. Take out the KHG kneeholes. Don’t really need them, and it makes watering awkward — too much stuff runs down the steps. Plus, I lose some planting real estate

2. Better slug control. I didn’t find any at night, but I would early in the morning. Diatomaceous earth only works on dry soil. Consider some form of slugbane.

3. Redesign the covers. They work, but they’re heavy

Review of Last Year’s Plans (keyed to original numbers)
1. squash numbers about right, but production was poor
2. Squash/tomato pairing worked
3. Planted lots instead of fewer. Production was poor
4. Early start helped, but I think the weather didn’t cooperate. Try again even earlier
5. Still getting blossom-end rot
6. No fix so far. Even big tomatoes were in the 2oz range
7. Still need a more formal watering plan

8. MJ doesn’t like the wrinkly heirlooms ’cause they’re so hard to cut
9. labeling still needs work
10. giving up on corn
11. greenhouse covers worked well
12. no change

This Year’s Plan
Section 1
Peas and beans and greens

Section 2
Tomatoes and Squash. Plant bigger varietals of tomatoes. Plant mostly summer squash and 8-ball squash. Maybe a Delicata. Rest of the winter squash go in the yard

Section 3
Brassicae. Plant lots earlier.

The Schedule

Move everything up about two weeks
mid Feb – Start seeds indoors
mid April (60 days later) – Transplant
early July (70 days) – early varieties ripen
late July (90 days) – late varieties ripen

Green Thumb Up My Nose: Lessons Learned 2012

So this was my first summer with a keyhole garden. Mistakes were made and lessons learned. Herewith some lessons, and a concept plan for next year:

SQUASH
1. Don’t oversquash. I had half of each of two sections in squash, and then I had two whole sections in squash, and then I had part of my backyard in squash. The only thing that could compete was the tomatoes.
2. Don’t plant anything but tomatoes alongside squash. The greens were overwhelmed, the onions stagnated, the blueberries died, the dill died. The beans barely survived.

TOMATOES