Sabbath of The Land

The 2022 growing season fell right in the middle of the Shmita, the last year in the seven-year agricultural cycle when the land is allowed a rest from farming. With no big plans for cultivation, we decided to observe the sabbatical year. According to the Jewish Virtual Library, "Jewish law prohibits farming, tilling soil, planting seeds, plowing, harvesting, and pruning during the Shmita year." We are a mixed household, and since I am only Jew-ish (as designated by our rabbi), I chose not to follow the letter of the law. I do feel like I honored the spirit of Shmita, though.

A blank canvas

I had cleared out the garden the previous fall so had a figurative blank slate come spring. Our perennial plants - asparagus, rhubarb, chives, and horseradish - were left to do their thing without any harvesting. For the rest of the garden, I decided to plant flowers. I purchased several packets of "wildflower" seed blends as well as some zinnias, morning glories, and sweet peas.

The zinnias made a good showing.

We got one morning glory and zero sweet peas.

Some of the previous year's vegetables had seeded themselves too. Early on, tomato plants and various squashes appeared. Oddly, most of them disappeared again as the flowers came in. It's like they just gave up and dissolved away as  bright blooms surrounded them.

One small acorn squash that was soon overpowered by flowers.

The tomatoes looked lovely but I let them go.

As seems to be tradition, we had a family of bunnies enjoying the relative peacefulness of the untended garden. I wonder if the mama rabbit is the same every year or if it's one of the babies all grown up who comes back. Or maybe we've seen several generations since the first rabbit snuck into the garden. I'm just glad the sweet little things have found a safe place.

There was also a grand toad who had taken up residence. His movements in the beds left stream-like trails through the plants.

Always good to have a guard toad.

Overall, it was nice to see the garden going back to nature, so to speak. The flowers were lovely and I enjoyed the messy magic of the beds. I was glad to bring them back to orderly vegetables this year, but look forward to doing this again in seven years.

These babies enjoyed the peacefulness of the garden from the outside.