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family garden 2002
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notes from may/june 2002we started on the garden much too early. we got excited when the weather hit 80 degrees F in mid-april and said to ourselves "well if we are going to garden, better start now!". wrong. we ordered bare-root plants from ebay and bought four full flats of plants from art & linda's wildflowers and then had nowhere to plant them. we didn't have any idea how to handle the bare-root plants we got and they suffered. the weather turned ugly (constant, driving rain and cold) and they suffered. several times we had to cover them at night due to frost warnings. we are shocked that they made it as well as they did. as of june 5, it was still raining in deluges and there had been no sun for weeks. maybe this was just what those poor suffering plants needed because by june 10 they were doing much better. notes from late june/early july 2002in late june and early july, the plants were doing very well since barely surviving our tough (rainy and cold) spring. the first part of the summer, it was over 100 degrees F and sunny for the weeks on end and no rain at all. from one extreme to the other, I guess. we have watered everything only once by july 5th, choosing instead to let the plants develop their "prairie roots" and dig down deep for moisture. so far, it must be working because we didn't lose anything to the lack of water. as a matter of fact, almost everything that was supposed to be blooming did bloom! all of the beds will need some reworking and rearranging of plants in the spring and we have a running of list of things that we want to change for next year. the plants in the right front corner of the front yard did awful as they were full sun plants and we have since found that the front right bed is only dappled shade all day. live and learn. we will replant woodland phlox, spiderwort, sedge and columbine in the spring. notes from late july/early august 2002all of the plants really started coming into their own in july and august. silly us, we kept adding plants during these hot summer months and some of them did not do too well. false sunflower didn't do too hot, we might need to replace it next spring. we'll see. we will be watching a short list of plants for life in the spring. we had pledged not to get into doing anything with the beds next to the house. they are raised beds and under yews and junipers, so they are very dry as well as shady. they do get some morning sun. the soil is sandy due to some well-meaning person adding sand to the beds years ago. against our will, we were driven to ripping out all of the landscaping plastic, amending the beds with over nine bags of mushroom compost and adding woodland plants that can take dry shade and sandy soil (not many plants in this category!). again, we'll see what happens in the spring. notes from september 2002we made a lot of notes for things to change for next season. hopefully we will grow our own plants this winter so that we don't need to buy so many next spring. hopefully we will have enough time to really get after the areas of the yard that desperately need work. hopefully we will be smart enough to buy large quantities of compost and mulch in the spring instead of buying it for $4/bag. hopefully someone will make the time to turn the compost pile in the parking area out back. hopefully we can make the soil in the raised beds next to the house acceptable to plant life.
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