My Un-Shaker Garden, Part 1

When I first built and laid out my vegetable garden six-ish years ago, I based it on the Shaker style. (Hence, the name of this blog). I love the look of gardens I have seen in person at Shaker historic sites and in photographs. I love the order and practicality of them, but primarily, I love the aesthetic. It is very un-Shaker to create something for beauty’s sake, but since the vegetable garden is functional, it gets to slide. Flowers, however, are right out!

Just a rose by the window. Nothing to see here.

The Shakers eschewed planting flowerbeds if there was no reason to have them beyond enjoying something lovely to look at. There was a loophole, however, when it came to medicinal gardens. If flowers were helpful then it was okay for them to look nice, as long as you didn’t admire them too much for their beauty. I have to say that when I intentionally created my first flowerbed here, I did not care if the plants could do anything more than be pretty.

When we first moved here, we found some flowers pushing their way through the junk piled on the east side of the garage. There were peonies, daylilies, irises, and a rose bush. I wondered why the previous owner had planted these perennials on the back side of the garage, as it was, when you cannot see them from the house. It turns out, that the plants enjoyed the spot, so why not add to them?

The "before" view with old pool pieces and a plastic pond we dug up.

I started planning my new flowerbed in the winter of 2015-2016. I bought seeds to start orange milkweed, lavender, red chrysanthemums, and pink and white Echinacea. The autumn before that, my husband found wild purple bee balm seeds in a field while working and brought them home. I started them too. So, in May 2016, I cleared off the abandoned flowerbed, and dug out some extra room for the seedlings.

All cleaned up and ready for more plants.

My precious little seedlings ready for their new home.

Once in the ground, my little plants didn’t look like much, but a couple months later they had filled in nicely.

August 2016 - They're settling in well!

Then the deer found the garden. We have a decent population of suburban deer in our neighborhood, as can be seen in quite a few of my previous posts here. Well, I never did get to see the chrysanthemums bloom as the plants got devoured long before they could even think of sending up buds. The Echinacea was chomped right down to the ground too. The lavender did well, and the orange milkweed went gang-busters. I’ve got lovely patches of it all around the property now. The wild bee balm also did very well; almost too well. I have learned to treat it with little mercy so it doesn’t take over the entire bed.

2017 - How lush!

I have kept the flowerbed up, more or less, over the last few years. I added a couple more plants that grew from a mixed packet of seeds I planted in a second flowerbed (more about that bed in My Un-Shaker Garden, Part 2, coming soon). Each year, the flowerbed is different and lovely.

The flowerbed got a bit neglected in 2018, but it still looked nice!

 I didn’t really have a reason to plant the bed in the first place other than wanting some pretty flowers, but it has turned out to be a favorite spot for bees and butterflies. Its success in bringing in the pollinators inspired me to plant a second bed, right next to the vegetable garden. (Again, read all about it in Part 2.)

A bee in the bee balm. Makes sense.

I haven’t had a chance to get out and clean up the garage flowerbed yet this year. I was going to do it on a nice day about a week ago, but a dead tree is looming over it caught upon a mostly dead tree, and the windiness of the day made it feel unsafe to be there. I will get to it though, and maybe see what new flowers I would like to add this year.

Grandma always liked the orange milkweed, but it didn't grow that well on the mountain. I wish I could share it with her now.

Seedlings!

I just wanted to give a quick update on the progress of my seedlings. I planted Poblano pepper seeds on March 7. They were the only seeds we picked up before Covid-19 hit. When I got them, I figured I would just come back later to pick out the rest of the seeds. Alas, that has not and may not happen.

My lovely, strong Poblano seedlings

I started my tomato seeds on March 30. I had in mind what tomatoes I wanted to grow this year – Juliettes are a favorite of mine, and I was thinking of planting a Roma variety for sauces, and maybe a big beefsteak (even though I haven’t had that great luck with them in the past). Well, I had four variety of tomato seeds on hand from two years ago, so those are what got started – red cherry, black cherry, black vernissage, and pink brandywine. I grew them all last year rather unsuccessfully, but that was mostly due to my inattention and too much rain. They are good tomatoes, and I think it’s good that I’m giving them another chance. The seedlings are putting on their first sets of real leaves, and are looking well.

Assorted tomato seedlings

I also decided to start some sweet banana peppers as I had the seeds from last year. They came free with an order, and actually grew quite well. I started some basil as well. I wanted to start some parsley and other herbs, but I have no spare herb seeds from years past. I’ll just have to go without or see what I can find after stay-at-home orders are lifted.

Basil seedling – taken with the new macro lens on my phone

I don’t plan on starting any other seeds. I will be able to direct sow everything else. I am hesitant to make a full garden plan that uses just the seeds I have on hand because I hope to actually get some of the varieties I had originally wanted for this year’s garden. I generally don’t plant the bulk of the garden until the end of May, so there may still be time to buy some more seeds; if they aren’t all gone from the stores by them. Victory Gardens, or at least earnest attempts to start Victory Gardens, seem to be a thing this year.

I really do love this new lens!

The Magic Compost Bin

I think we got our composter in August 2016. I’m not really sure. I usually write things like that down, but I either didn’t or just can’t find it. Not that the precise date matters. The earliest picture I have of our lovely compost bin was taken August 26, 2016.

Composter settled in nicely by the garden.

When we first moved into the new house, my husband made a do-it-yourself compost bin out of a large plastic trash bin. He drilled holes, and set it on a platform behind the garage, and it worked reasonably well. It did have a tendency to blow over when there were high winds, however. Somehow, we found out that County Stormwater Coalition had composters for sale at a discount price for county residents. We went and picked up one at a truly reasonable price, and never looked back.

A closer look at the shiny new bin.

Now, back when we lived on the mountain, we tried composting. When we had chickens, it worked well enough, but before that the climate was just not conducive to composting. It took forever to breakdown, and there was never much to spread in the garden. That seemed perfectly normal to me as that was where I grew up; in the land of weak composters.

Here things are different. There are actually worms here! I still celebrate a little every time I dig a worm while working in the garden (they were so very rare in the mountains), but the celebrations peter out around the tenth worm or so. This composter works so very well. It seems it can compost everything. Never has it been more than 2/3 full because everything breaks down so quickly, and we (meaning my husband) have only emptied it twice.

The first time emptying the compost bin.

The second emptying happened last week. It was a nice day, but I was working from home and stuck inside. My husband went out, emptied the bin, and cleaned up the garden as well. I had not put the garden to bed last fall so it was in a sad state. There was enough compost to spread over nearly two full raised beds. I’m sure that will make the veggies happy this year.

Out of the bin…

…and onto the garden.

 The compost bin is refreshed, reset, and ready for more green and browns. It was a job well-done, and I appreciate that my husband did it, though I am a tad bit sad that I couldn’t be out there working with him. But, there will be plenty more time for that as the season progresses.

One more shot of the compost bin, but mostly of the little deer who came to visit.

Back with Renewed Ambition

My last post here was September 20, 2017. I never intended to drop this blog for more than two years, but here we are. Nothing major has changed in my life. We live in the same house we did two years ago, and I planted gardens in 2018 and 2019. I just haven’t taken the time to post anything.

July 2018

August 2019

For each of the last two years, I started out with the promise to myself that I would maintain the garden and record what I was doing, and each year I didn’t live up to that promise. 2019 was a particularly bad season for me. I neglected my garden so much that a family of rabbits took up residence in my pak choi bed.

What's that clump of stuff in among my neglected pak choi? A rabbit nest!

There were six baby bunnies! We let them stay.

I can make excuses about why I gave up on my gardening duties – the season was too wet; I was busy with work; I had fallen into a depression from the death of my grandmother – but the truth is that I just turned lazy.

Last year would have been a particularly interesting year to document. I got a bunch of heirloom seeds left over from a local historical site’s garden, so it was one big experiment in growing black peppers and red peas and warty squash. I took pictures, so I could go back and describe the experience, but I don’t think I will.

I planted three different types of carrots in 2019.

Instead of looking back, I’m going to commit to doing better in the future. I’ve started planning my garden for the 2020 season. I have a list of specific varieties of vegetables and herbs I want to grow with the goal to put up as much as possible. I’m trying to eat more locally and seasonally. I started Poblano pepper seeds about three weeks ago, and they seem to be growing well.

This year's fresh Poblano seedlings

I have run into a bit of a snag in my plans, however. As I type this, we are in the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic. Essential businesses are still open, but I’m working from home. We’re not in a quarantine situation yet, but going out to find particular varieties of seeds doesn’t seem like a good idea. In fact, it feels irresponsible and selfish. Likewise, I don’t really want to shop online and make someone transport such a small thing for me when so many people are in need of essentials delivered to their homes. So, I will wait and see how this thing plays out. Plans can and will change, I’m sure. It’s the perfect time to practice flexibility. 

And here's a crow yelling, just because.

The 2017 Garden

I have to start by admitting that I didn’t really do as much as I should have with the garden this summer. Perhaps since this is the third year, the novelty has worn off some for me. Or perhaps I’m just more generally lazy this year. I did put in the full garden but I neglected it some and my husband ended up doing a lot of the work that I usually do. With all that being said, it was a fairly successful season, even if my enthusiasm was lacking.

My last post here was in May, so there is a lot of catching up to do. Here’s how things went this summer.

May

The perennial plants in the garden came back quite well after the winter. I was picking thyme, marjoram, and chives in April. The horseradish came back strong and the rhubarb grew well enough to put some in the freezer. The asparagus was pretty good this year as well. The strawberries came back better than ever. I plan on doing a whole post just on them.

Thyme, marjoram, and chives

I planted the cool-weather seeds – carrots, beets, chard, pak choi, turnip greens, and peas on May 13^th. They all sprouted within a week. The beets were a bit spotty, however. That could have been because I got a mix of different types of seeds to try this year or maybe because of the steady rains we had this spring and early summer. The beets we did get were very good, though.

The garden on May 13th after planting cool-weather seeds

Peas two weeks after planting

I planted the rest of the garden on May 29^th. Much of the garden space was given to old standards – green beans, zucchini, yellow squash, tomatoes, and peppers. We didn’t bother with corn and potatoes this year but added soy into the mix. We also tried out some different vegetables including parsnips, silver line melons, and okra. I also decided to try growing European cucumbers rather than the pickling ones I usually grew. I ended up being disappointed by that decision. The cucumbers had large seeds and didn’t produce that well. I’ll be going back to the smaller ones next year.

The garden on May 29th after everything was planted

All the plants that I transplanted into the garden at the end of May were ones that I had started earlier in the season. I started eggplant, Poblano pepper, Juliet tomato, and beefsteak tomato seeds. I transplanted the seedlings into peat pots at the end of March and then transplanted them again into larger pots in late April. I probably started them a little earlier than I need to but I was anxious to get things going in the depths of winter. The tomatoes, in particular, were a bit spindly when I finally got them into the garden but they adjusted well once in their permanent homes.

Thinned seedlings in early March

Lovely, strong tomato seedling at end of March

Tomato, eggplant and pepper seedlings transplanted into peat pots

Hardening off plants on the back porch in mid-May

June

It was a fairly wet start to the season but the garden didn’t seem to mind. By June, everything was coming along. At least a little bit of everything planted was growing. There was only one buttercup squash plant and that was attacked by stem borers before it got a chance to do much but otherwise things were going well. The pak choi was harvested and the few remaining plants were going to seed. The peppers and eggplants were setting fruit and I was taking fresh snap peas with me to work for lunch. I was pleasantly surprised by the turnip greens. They were a new addition to the garden. They grew fast and despite being quite prickly when picked, made for a very nice cooked green.

The garden on June 25th

July

In July, the garden really filled out. The peas were finishing up their run but everything else was going strong. The green beans were starting to produce as were the yellow squash and zucchini. Both the beefsteak and Juliets were covered in green tomatoes just waiting for some hot, sunny days to turn them red. 

Bright lights chard

Yellow Squash

Juliet tomato

Zucchini

As a special bonus, several plants sprouted from the composter. An abundance of Roma tomatoes and a strong acorn squash vine filled in around the base of the barrel.

 

"Wild" compost vegetables

The garden on July 29th

August

Harvest season was full upon us by August. The tomatoes had turned red and we almost had more than I knew what to do with. A week of rain made a lot of them split, however, and some of the large beefsteaks started to rot on the vine but another round of drier weather helped put a stop to that. The silver line melons ripened as did the cantaloupes. Both seemed watery and not as flavorful as we would have liked. Perhaps the soil wasn’t that good for melons.

Basket of produce

Beefsteak tomatoes

Silver line melon

Okra blossom

September

That finally brings us up to now, mid-September. The soy has grown well, despite the fact that a couple of young woodchucks managed to get into the garden and eat a good portion of the leaves. My husband just picked and processed it the other day and got almost two quart-size zip-lock bags of shelled beans.

Soybeans

There are still a lot of veggies in the garden that are ready and waiting to be picked – beets, carrots, chard, and turnip greens – and more still ripening – tomatoes, peppers, zucchini, onions, parsnips, cucumbers, and green beans. There is still plenty to do in the garden and lots of produce to harvested and put away for the winter.

The garden on September 10th