Not in the Plan

I'm the type of person that has lots of ideas for projects in the garden and in the house, but I have to be in the mood to work on them, so when the mood strikes I have to go for it. Today's plan was to do some seed starting as well as adding shut off valves to beds 2, 3, and 4.

I went to the hardware store and picked up the valves and other parts that I needed to install them and made my way home. I pulled out all  of my tools and started the water line project... well that was the plan.

While I was figuring out how to add the valves I kept thinking how I wanted to redo the square foot grid on the beds. The current grid is just not working for me. I don't like the way they look and I'm always moving them when I don't mean to.

Before I knew it I was at Home Depot picking up 1x1's.

I installed the shut off valve on bed 4...

... and then removed the old grid, leveled out the bed, and put the drip lines back in place.

I cut the 1x1's and laid out the grid...

Now I just need to secure the grid to the bed. That will be tomorrow's project as well as updating beds 2 and 3 with the new grid.

OK I feel better now. The new grid is just what I wanted and looks much nicer.

Seed starting tomorrow for sure... right?

~Happy Gardening~

Clay Pot Watering System: Efficient, Ancient, and Easy

I saw this on the Urban Homesteading Is A Way Of Life Not A Copyright FaceBook page and thought it was worth sharing.

Clay Pot Watering System: Efficient, Ancient, and Easy

Wetpot Demonstration

Enjoy!

Catching Up

Last Saturday I continued working on my never ending water project. I now have soaker hoses in beds 3 and 4. Not that I need them with all the rain we have been having this week. But there will be a time in the near future that I will be happy I took the time to get the yard "hooked up". This will save me lots of time this summer and I will not need to rely on family to come over to water when I'm on vacation. My son was really happy to see me put the water lines in... as he said to me " it took me 45 mins to an hour to water your garden every other day when you were away". Ha ha! Tell me about it!

I still have more to do to get everything in the yard "hooked up". Bed 2 needs soaker hoses added to it. It currently had over head sprinklers. Beds 1, 5 and 6 still need water lines as well as all the potted plants. The photos below are of bed 4 with the soaker hoses.

Click on photos for a larger view

Square foot garden bed with water lines

The two tools I could not live without during this project...

Hose hole punches

If you are thinking about adding water lines to your beds I was doing some research on line and came across this video from the Garden Girl Patty Moreno on how to install a drip irrigation system. Which I found helpful even though I'm working with an existing sprinkler system.

On Thursday (March 17th) I about scared myself to death. I was working from home and about 9:00am the sun was shining on the patio so I thought I would take the tomato and cucumber seedlings out of the greenhouse and give them a little morning sun. So out they came and I went back to work. I walked by the window about 10:00am and looked at the cucumbers and saw this....

 Oh no! what have I done! I've killed all my cucumber starts! So what was it.... was it too much sun? No it was cool out... that's it... it was too cold and a bit too windy... I moved the cucumbers back into the greenhouse and gave them some water. After about an hour they came back. Boy was I lucky!

The tomatoes had no problems with the cool air and wind. In the photo below you can see some blooms on this cherry tomato.

 I really should pot these up one more time before they go out into the garden.

Tomato starts

Even though the weather has been cool the bok choy and pak choy is already starting to bolt. I will need to pull them as soon as it stops raining long enough for me to get out into the garden.

The carrots that I started in the greenhouse are doing so well. Who said you can't start carrot seeds indoors and transplant them out into the garden?

The sweet and hot peppers are doing much better than I thought they would in this cool weather. They have been off the heat mats for about three weeks now.

The raspberries seemed to have sprouted overnight.

And the nectarine is in full bloom.

The first apple leaf...

And finally the sweet potatoes. They are rooting very well. I updated my Sweet Potato post with some new photos. Scroll to the bottom of the post for the update.

As I finish up this post the winds are started to pickup and the rain is coming down. Be sure to check out my post on the hail storm we had this morning. Here is the link if you missed it.... Hail post

That's it for now. Happy First day of Spring!

It's February Right?

To all my Gardening Friends up North, please forgive me....

What a beautiful weekend with temperatures reaching into the 70's it is hard to believe it's still February. I spent Saturday morning in the Haven garden and the rest of the day in mine.

Saturday

The main project for this weekend was moving the arch away from bed 3 to give me a little more space to get to the back of the bed. This meant removing the strawberry bed linked to bed 5. The berries are not doing very well in this area so they and the bed were removed so the arch could be moved over giving me more room. The photos below are the progression of the project. Click on the photos for a larger view.

Area to be reworked.

The wall comes down.

Repositioned  the end wall of bed 5.

Moved the arch to give me more room at the end of bed 3.

Added some wood chips.

I think I will grow some cucumbers or vining squash in the new area.

Beds 2 and 5

The carrots that I started in cell packs and transplanted into bed 2 are doing so well. So well in fact I started a second sowing for bed 3. This might be my best carrot year to date.

Carrots in bed 2

The pak choy is staring to take shape. This is the first time I have tried to grow pak choy and am pleased at how easy they are to grow.

Pak Choy

Sunday

Sunday was all about seedlings. I potted up peppers and cucumbers. Fed them as well as the tomatoes with a weak solution of fish emulsion.

Cucumbers

Spinach

Lettuce

Tomatoes and Cucumbers

Peppers

After tending to the seedings I planted the onion sets in bed 4 but first I added soaker hoses to the row.

Random photos from the weekend

Sleeping Angel

Lemons

Blueberry Blooms

Sunset 02/05/2011

A Day Off

I had the day off from work today and was looking forward to working in the garden. So up and out of bed by 7:00 and this is what I saw.... Fog... very dense fog...

What happened to the sunny day that was forecast?

The sun did finally burn off the fog about 1:00 this afternoon and guess what I did after lunch?  

Bed 1 was my focus today. I finished setting up the water line.

Overhead sprinklers to start with. Once the seedlings are a little bigger I will add soaker hoses .
The sprinklers have an on and off switch so I can control what area of the bed is watered.

After making sure everything was in working order it was time to do some transplanting.

Testing the watering system.

I planted the carrots, the bok and pak choy.

Pak Choy and Bok Choy

I hope the carrots don't go into shock from transplanting the seedlings I started in the greenhouse. This is the first time I'm trying this method.

Carrots 

I also completed the water lines in bed 3. Now beds 2, 3 and 4 are all ready to be set on the timer.
 

In other gardening news the lettuce seeds I planted in bed 2 are starting to sprout. In the greenhouse all the tomatoes have sprouted. I'm still waiting for the peppers. I know most of you are thinking it's way too early to start pepper seeds. In our area it is time to indoor sow peppers and in a few weeks or so it will be time for the tomatoes. Yes I did get a jump on the tomatoes but I have never had a problem starting this early and the plants are nice and big by the time I plant them in the garden. I will also be starting my cucumbers and squash seeds next weekend. I picked up my red onion sets today and will plant them next weekend as well. I also need to get started on my sweet potato slips. I have a few sweet potatoes in the pantry that have started to sprout so I just need to put them in a glass of water.

For more information on starting peppers here in the Bay Area check out this weeks Love Apple Farm newsletter "Tip of the Week".