April's Last Workday

Finishing up, Saturday, April 28th

April's Last Workday

Mary Katherine tightening up

We had a great turnout on Saturday, and we almost finished planting everything on the list.  All the construction was completed.  Poles for pole beans are all strung and tightened up, and seeds planted. 

We sowed Swiss chard, radishes and arugula in the same row--all from seed.  Eggplants were set out in a row by themselves, and a dozen more tomato plants were planted, completing the tomato garden for our first crop. 

The only veggie remaining to be planted this spring is crowder peas....not because we ran out of time, but because we ran out of rows.   We actually lost a row! When we started to sow the seeds for the crowder peas, there were no rows left!  I think somebody miscalculated the layout, using that fancy garden planner software.  No pointing fingers, folks!!

Garden Beautification

Ed's sister, Diane, a seasoned gardner who was visiting from Winston Salem, came with the rest of the Gagnon family, and she, Alicia and Emma finished preparing the dirt for our little corner flower garden.  It has a snazzy rock border, and they sowed zinnia and marigold seeds and some marigold plants.  Diane is welcome to come back anytime to  help out in our garden.  Thanks, Diane!  The flowers are beautiful.  Bring on the bees!  

SPCC Garden Security Division

Ann Fields and Jen Sulivan welcomed the newest member of SPCC's Almost Organic Garden.  Mr. Scare E. Crow unceremoniously took his post and immediately began keeping away unwanted critters.  No one saw a single crow or deer after he went on duty.  Actually I don't remember seeing any elephants, lions or tigers either.  He's doing a great job. 

We have completed so much of our garden schedule, and everyone has been so willing to contribute to the hard work of making it, that we do not need to schedule a workday on Saturday, May 5th. 

We still have to pin the bottom of the fence fabric to the ground so bunnies can't get in.  I'll probably come in next Saturday and finish that, but it's kind of a one-man job.   We can start staking tomatoes the following Saturday (5/12).

The Dirty Dozen (yeah, I know...I can't count but it sounded so good!)

Thanks again to everybody for all your hard work!

Labor of Love

While We Wait for our dirt to dry:

I just thought you all would be pleased to see some pictures of Henry Graham's beautiful vegetable garden.  Those of us with a good amount of garden experience know full well how much work and how many years it takes to achieve a garden with good, workable dirt, functional construction like Henry's nicely built walkway and fencing, and a reliable layout that works well year after year.  Those of us who are just getting started with vegetable gardening have learned a lot about it too.  Especially with our first year of development at SPCC's Friendship Garden. 

Our dirt needs a lot of work.  It has an abundance of clay that makes it clump easily...and we have lots of clumps.  We'll just be patient and add plenty of soil amenities as we go.  BJ Simmons suggests after our garden is spent for the summer that plowing before winter, and having a good freeze or two with the dirt exposed to the cold air will go a long way to break up the clumps.  Imagine having dirt that is so workable that one of these commercial wheel hoes is all that is needed to make up consistent, straight planting rows...

Henry's garden dirt is so good, he can achieve the same results with a simple shovel and wheelbarrow contraption that he came up with.  Take a look at the raised rows he was able to make with it.  He tells me he is still working on the design, and that to work properly, the dirt has to be very dry.

It takes a lot of work and patience, but I feel that with the enthusiasm that our group has shown so far, we'll get there, and maybe with some luck thrown in, we'll have a pretty garden like Henry's one day.

I especially like the picture of the zinnias displayed in the foreground against the backdrop of okra.  Nice work, Henry!

Thanks for sharing.

Smaller Turnout - April 21st

Smaller turnout, but a very productive Saturday

Thanks to the few who turned out today, we now have squash in the ground, and we need only 10 more tomato plants to fill up the tomato section of our garden.  Henry Graham gave us a whole flat of tomato plants.

Jerry keeping 'em straight.

Jerry came in early this morning and took on the task of scratcing in some organic fertilizer around the cucumbers and bell peppers, then he took over from Stephanie, Lizzy and Ellie Adelman who had lots of other Saturday commitments for the day.  They planted some of Henry's tomatoes before they had to leave.  Jerry finished the rest.  It was about 30 tomato plants with 5 or 6 different varieties.  Thanks Henry!  The last row of tomatoes is almost filled, and the buckwheat has started to show itself.

We didn't expect the buckwheat to come up very thick on the first planting.  It's a little more sparse than I had hoped, however.  It always improves with each successive planting because it adds nitrogen to the soil and produces better and better dirt for all vegetables to grow in.

Ray and Ann helping it grow.

Where's that other worker bee?

Ray and Ann planted two full rows of crook neck squash seeds, then moved up to the tomato garden and applied organic fertilizer to all of those plants (about 70 in all).

I have been constructing the poles for our pole beans, and I've got one more row to stretch horizontally.   Then we'll run twine up and down for the beans to actually climb.

 The last chore today was watering all the plants and seeds, cleaning up the tools and putting the hose away.  I'm proud to say we are very much on schedule with one more April workday planned for next weekend.  We now have the following plants or seeds in the ground:

• tomatoes
• cucumbers
• peppers
• squash
• buckwheat

The following should be going in on (or just before) May 1st: 

• eggplant
• green beans
• crowder peas 
• Swiss chard 
• basil 

Next weekend I hope the younger folks with the strong backs show up again...stronger than mine anyway.  There are two rows that still need raking up, and one that just needs to be finished.  We still have lots of rocks and clumps that should be cleared out of the isles between the rows and taken to the woods.  If these tasks are finished by this coming Saturday, we will have finished all the hard work of building the garden.  We'll put in a bee-attracting flower garden, put Mr. Scare E. Crow in place, and the balance of the work will be simply maintaining it (until mid summer when we plant our second crop of tomatoes, squash and cucumbers).

Thanks for the hard work, everybody.  The garden is looking so good!

Culinary Arts Graduation

Culinary Arts School

Friendship Trays - Class #42 Graduation Videos

Not sure if you know how far-reaching Friendship Trays/Gardens is, but here's some video of their most recent graduation ceremony for their Culinary Arts Class.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DIoNA-0yvKI&feature=player_embedded

I asked what was involved in enrolling in their Food Prep/Knife Skills Class, and the answer was "come on".  The payment for the class would be volunteering for 6 months in the Friendship Trays Kitchen, prepearing the over 750 meals a day we've heard so much about. 

These folks were either unemployed or under-employed before they took this training.  Just think how much they'll give back and how portable their new skills are...for the rest of their lives, if they want.

Starting the Garden

Big Turnout on First Workday

Saturday, April 14th

I hardly know where to begin with this post.  We had a big turnout, and we accomplished much more than I ever thought we would on our first official workday last Saturday.  About 9:30 a.m. everyone started arriving with rakes and shovels in-hand; all kinds of hats and sunglasses and tubes of sun block, ready to start working.  I didn’t take an official count, but there were well over 20 people there (including the kids).  It was a beautiful day, and so the raking began.  

We had so much work to do, just managing rocks and clumps of dirt and shaping our rows, I never believed we would get far enough to put the first plant in the ground—but we did!  In fact, we planted all 40 tomato plants, all 25 cucumber plants and all 25 sweet pepper plants.  We even sowed 3 or 4 rows with buckwheat (a natural soil amenity) to prepare them for a second crop of tomatoes in July/August.  By the end of the day, almost all rows were shaped and ready for planting or at least ready for adding compost.  There are only a couple more rows left to make next Saturday, and one or two that need to be finished.  It actually looks like a garden now!

We found out that Paula Staudt is a Master Gardner, so we put her and Jim on the planting detail.  She knew just how deep to plant, how far apart they should be, and how to keep the rows straight as a string.  It’s a much prettier garden when everything is straight and symmetrical.

Jim Cowick kept the compost coming, and he stayed just ahead of Paula and Jim with a steady supply, ready for them to blend it in with the dirt and do their planting.

 

Our dirt has so many rocks in it that we solicited Alicia and her helpers, Carol Cowick and Lizzie and Ellie Adelman to collect them and to create a border for a bee-attracting flower bed.  A little dirt added to the area, and soon we will have some colorful flowers in one corner of our beautiful garden.  All the kids were amazing!  Covert hung in there raking rows and aligning them with his Dad.  Kali and Emma worked wherever they were needed, and Michael took charge of the wheelbarrow.

Jerry Whitt raked and raked. There were so many rocks at the entrance to the garden, and he made countless trips to dispose of them down in the woods.  I lost count of how many boxes he toted down there after about a dozen or so. 

On Friday morning Joe Sing, our part time gardener from Hyaets came to till the dirt for us, and he did a great job.  Even after having already been plowed once and tilled twice, the dirt was still very hard-packed.  He got over half of the garden done before Robert Suydam came in and picked up where he left off.   It was tilled a total of four times.  Late in the afternoon on Friday, just as Robert was tilling the next-to-last row, the tiller hit a big rock or maybe it was an old concrete foundation.  It was something very big and very immovable.  One tine broke off the rented tiller, and another was bent badly enough that it hit against the tiller housing every time it rotated.  Well, the damage was so bad that the job couldn’t be finished.  We returned a broken tiller to Home Depot Tool Rental.  Fortunately, our rental contract contained insurance just for such an eventuality, and we didn’t have to pay any extra for the damage.

 

Our gardeners worked so hard, and everyone deserves a lot of gratitude.  I’m afraid I’ll leave someone out, if I try to mention everyone.  I know there were some sore backs in church on Sunday morning.  But you should have seen the smiles on everyone’s faces when they left the garden on Saturday afternoon.  There was even some attaboys (and girls) shoulder-patting that went around...and around…and around.  We have some hard-working garden subscribers at SPCC. 

Thanks for coming out and making it all happen, everyone.  It looks like we’re going to have a terrific friendship garden.

I’d like to mention too, that we have some very accomplished and experienced gardeners at SPCC who are not members of our group.  They have been very helpful and have made themselves available with answers and advice whenever it was asked for.  Thanks Henry Graham and BJ Simmons.

 

 

 

 

Lost and Found:

• A soft brown sweater
• A nice stainless steel coffee cup

...were left at the garden on Saturday.  They are inside our garden shed waiting to be reclaimed.

Schedule for Saturday, April 21st:

• Two more rows to be raked up
• Compost added to the mix
• Planting about 60 more tomato plants
• Sowing Swiss chard seeds
• Sowing squash seeds
• Sowing green beans and finishing up the pole framework
• And…of course watering new seeds and plants
• Pinning the bottom of the fence fabric to the ground

Gone Fishin'

Gone Fishin'

As of noon on Monday, Gwen and I are headed to the beach.  The garden will be in my thoughts and prayers the whole time I'm gone, whether I'm relaxing on the beach, eating fresh seafood or just sunning.  Might have to do some shopping too, 'cause we're only taking one car.

This weekend's Workday (April 14th) should bring us back up-to-snuff as far as our garden development is concerned.  We'll be back on Thursday afternoon, and I'll pick up where you guys left off.  Thanks for everyone's help.  Y'all are the greatest!

See you this weekend.                                        

Dick





Workday

Saturday, April 14th

We're going to try again.

There's probably going to be a crusty top on our soil by Saturday, so I'm trying to get it tilled again so it will be a little more fluffy when we rake.  Hopefully it will be tilled again on Wednesday or Thursday and we can pick up where we left off.  The weather forcast looks good every day this week, so the garden should be good and dry.  I know you're anxious to see plants growing in our garden, and I hope lots of you will be able to bring your grass rakes and help rake this Saturday.  I'll be there early with garden plan in-hand, ready to lay out all the rows, so come early if you want to get an early start.  We may even stick a plant or two in the ground.

 

Big Disappointment!

Too Wet to Plow

The rain was pretty heavy last night, and our garden is soaked.  We have to postpone our work day that was scheduled for tomorrow (Saturday, 4/7).  We were hoping we would have all the rows raked up and in place for planting by April 14th, but we'll just have to consider ourselves a little behind schedule.  The dirt may be dry enough to rake by Wednesday or Thursday of this week, and if anyone wants to meet on one of those days to help get caught up a little, let me know.  There's a final plan for the garden layout, and I'll bring it along and meet you there on either of those days, otherwise we'll just do it on the next Saturday (4/14).

Here's the link to the garden plan:  http://www.growveg.com/garden-plan.aspx?p=219296

Have a wonderful Easter, and a fun weekend.

Update

Weekend Plan ...

This coming Saturday (April 7th) we'll need as many subscribers to help out with making rows in our garden as we can get.  Yes, this is the one where you'll need to bring those grass rakes with you, if you have them.  We'll stretch a string in a nice straight line to to help guide the direction and symmetry of the rows.  It's going to be a pretty veggie garden! 

I plant to get there early in the cool of the morning.  We'll have an orderly plan of attack for this weekend's project.  Hope to see you there.

Thanks,

Dick

Oh, here's a recently produced video by Friendship Trays that I hope you'll find inspiring:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=0c0KyAynOnc