Planting Time
In some parts of Northern California, we can get to work in the garden pretty early. I wouldn't be planting tomatoes and chilies right now, but cold weather vegetables should do pretty well, despite the continued rain.
Yesterday I made the leap from tomatoes to potatoes. Why? Sounds like fun! I'm not sure the soil here is exactly right for potatoes, but our local garden store does sell seed potatoes and I made sure to listen to a lecture from the gardener about how to plant and care for the dirty little buggers. She told me they'd do well. In any case, I planted an entire bed so some are bound to survive.
I conditioned my beds, used a shovel (broke my trowel) to dig a trench, and planted away. Somehow I had managed to count out exactly the correct number of seed potatoes for an 8 x 12 foot bed. So I need to remember to cover the shoots as they appear out of the soil and no harvesting until the flowers wilt and the plants begin to die back. Okay...got it.
Why not tomatoes? Here in California, where our soil smells like mildew - which is kind of disgusting - tomatoes grow so crazy that one plant uses up a huge bed. I've tried staking every which way over the years, but the plants still manage to spread like something from The Little Shop of Horrors. Despite my husband's objections, no tomatoes this year - I can buy all I want from the farmer's market.
Aside from the potatoes, I have a bed of root vegetables and one bed of leafy greens and beans. When the greens start to bolt in the heat, I'll pull them and plant chilies and egg plants.
I'm actually really excited. This is the first year in a decade of gardening that tomatoes will not eat up all the other veggies!
Yesterday I made the leap from tomatoes to potatoes. Why? Sounds like fun! I'm not sure the soil here is exactly right for potatoes, but our local garden store does sell seed potatoes and I made sure to listen to a lecture from the gardener about how to plant and care for the dirty little buggers. She told me they'd do well. In any case, I planted an entire bed so some are bound to survive.
I conditioned my beds, used a shovel (broke my trowel) to dig a trench, and planted away. Somehow I had managed to count out exactly the correct number of seed potatoes for an 8 x 12 foot bed. So I need to remember to cover the shoots as they appear out of the soil and no harvesting until the flowers wilt and the plants begin to die back. Okay...got it.
Why not tomatoes? Here in California, where our soil smells like mildew - which is kind of disgusting - tomatoes grow so crazy that one plant uses up a huge bed. I've tried staking every which way over the years, but the plants still manage to spread like something from The Little Shop of Horrors. Despite my husband's objections, no tomatoes this year - I can buy all I want from the farmer's market.
Aside from the potatoes, I have a bed of root vegetables and one bed of leafy greens and beans. When the greens start to bolt in the heat, I'll pull them and plant chilies and egg plants.
I'm actually really excited. This is the first year in a decade of gardening that tomatoes will not eat up all the other veggies!
3 comments:
How could I have guessed you're a gardener too?
I'm trying potatoes this year in a tire tower. I'll tell you how it works out. Envious you can turn the soil. Mine is still under snow, but it was 47 degrees today!
Let us know how the potatoes do.
Oh Rhobin, I want to hear how yours do.
I will, Sandra.
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