Wednesday, October 1, 2014

Lessons for Next Year's Garden

This post wasn't supposed to publish today, but it's the only draft pretty much ready to go, so here we go.

Next year we will do the garden a bit differently because of what we learned this year and because we will have more time to plan it out and MORE SPACE.  So here is a big list of our garden goals for 2015:

1.  We will have smaller RECTANGULAR garden beds.  It was so hard to check on the middle of the garden this year.  Which is why there were 2 huuuuuge zucchini that were escaping me.

2.  The snakey things like cucumber and butternut squash will be isolated so they don't take over.  We couldn't mow by the garden anymore and the squash got covered in grass.  And next year we will add in a pumpkin patch, too.

3.  We will plant waaaaay more tomatoes.  We will plant probably 5 times as many of the big heirloom ones, no medium sized ones, and the same amount of grape tomatoes.

4.  I will do better with weeding.  Since we left right after we planted everything got out of control and it got hard to tell what was what and catch up.

5.  We will plant more peppers.  We got 3 from 1 plant which was awesome and I want to see if we can be even more successful next year.

6.  I want to do seasonal plantings.  Starting with some fall plantings!  I need to look into that.  I know garlic gets planted in the fall and that's where my knowledge ends.

7.  Lettuce!  We kinda missed the boat on that this summer.  And carrots, more cucumber, more zucchini, rhubarb...

8.  I vow to do better with keeping up with trimming the basil. And I want to plant way, way more of it!

9.  I want to buy started plants whenever we can because I think it is what helped us a lot this year.  But I have a feeling with some things we'll have to start from seed because of availability.

10.  We want to move into the fruit arena.  We need to get fruit trees going and plant more berry bushes.

11.  I want to have mulched paths between the beds and around the edges of the garden area so that it makes mowing easier.

12.  Rain barrels. I want to water from them as much as we can.  I hate using up our well water for plants.

Now hopefully I will remember to reread this in the spring!


  1. Great list! If I can get it still, I will give you some of the superb rhubarb descended from the plants of your great grandmother LaBelle, to your grandfather and then to me, who had to plant it in friend's gardens when I lost my own. I have not checked lately to see if the plants survived. Unless you have a source already? It needs LOTS of compost and is a perennial that likes sun, so needs a thought or two when being planted.
    Yes, plant that garlic now. Talk to your cousin Brooke, she has mastered it. Plant it now like a flower bulb, harvest it about July, it is fun to watch it grow. I got it going when Jim was alive, he ate it raw... And I do not like it at all, but it was fun to get it growing.
    I used to get dozens of peppers from one plant. How did I do that?
    Huge zucchini will still surprise you, I think they grow that big overnight. But no reason not to keep trying.
    The little tomatoes might sprout on their own next spring, so watch for them. It is the big tomatoes that need transplants, unless you start them indoors, serious gardening, over my head.
    Do you remember all the work you did to get it so my carrots would grow, long years ago? Soil had too much clay, so sand was added, rather, you added sand and mixed it perfectly, and we got carrots! You can interplant radishes with carrots, as the radishes will be up and eaten by the time the slower carrot seeds sprout. And the radishes kind of make it easier for the tiny carrot seeds to sprout and live.
    Well, I have hit my favorite topic! I hope you two have lots of fun planning out next year's garden and have as much success as you did this year.
    I have an old metal A frame meant to hold up indeterminate tomatoes (or anything else vine-y. Yours if you want it. Plus a pole bean thingy that might still be worthwhile.

    1. Wow thank you for all the info Aunt Sarah! We might take you up on A frame come Spring. And if that rhubarb is still going I'd love some.