Tilling, Transplanting, and Sowing for The Month of May

 This is when the garden season gets quite busy is during this month because of the many things that need to be done.  First of all tilling the rest of the garden needs to be done before I can start transplanting or sowing seeds into the garden.  I also like to wait a few days after tilling the garden before I actually start planting any seeds or adding any plants into the garden soil.  I like to let the birds in the area find as many caterpillars and bugs in the soil as they can before any planting is done.  

One of the first seeds planted into the garden were my bean seeds.  I like to have just two ten foot rows of bean plants because I find that pole bean will yield plenty of beans with this many plants.  This will definitely be enough for a summer harvest as long as most of the beans sprout.  I am hoping that this rain will get them sprouting real soon.  

June is just around the corner and this means that my June bearing strawberries should be ready for a good harvest with all this rain.  Although some of them have started turning red and even a few of them are pretty much ready for picking.   The bigger and largest harvests of strawberries will definitely come in June rather than the end of May.  Once we get a little bit more sun I am sure most of the berries will ripen and deliver a good and hopefully decent harvest for this year.

 I have two rows of corn planted, one short row of potatoes, and another large row full of cantaloupe, pumpkin, and zucchini seeds.  I planted my squash and melon seeds a little bit later because I wanted to make sure that I got my beans, corn, and tomato plants into the garden as soon as possible.  zucchini plants tend to grow fast and they don't need as much time as melons or eggplants for example.  

I still have peppers and eggplants that I need to transplant into the garden.  I was hoping to get my eggplants into the garden by this week, but ended up getting a little busy with my tomatoes instead.   This week I will at least add my eggplants into the garden and probably some of the more mature peppers as well.  Some of the younger peppers I will wait some time before adding them to the garden.

Now the Garden Season has Started with The First Transplants in The Garden

 Early to mid April happens to be the best time to start transplanting cool weather plants into the garden.  If you are using cold frames or placing row covers over your plants you can even start transplanting much sooner.  This is also a great way to extend the garden season especially in areas that are much cooler such as in northern states.  I like to do the first tiling sometime in April and do enough for adding all my springtime crops.

 

 This year I have decided on growing spinach, lettuce, potatoes, onions, and sun king broccoli which should be able to withstand the hot months and produce a decent crop.  I am still working on whether I should grow peas and or radishes.  Most likely I will plant pea because I bought a whole packet of seeds in the beginning of the year and would be a waste not to use them.

Even though these are normally springtime plants I can still plant them later and use them for a fall time crop instead.  Normally I plant kale and broccoli for a fall crop, but I decided that I would use them for a springtime crop instead.  I want to see if I can get a much better crop during the spring or if the fall is where I should keep my kale and broccoli plants.

This week was the perfect time to get my spinach and kale into the garden and the weather is still cool enough that they should be able to provide some great leaves for consumption.  I still have my lettuce and broccoli growing in pots outside, but they are not quite ready for planting.  I still have some time before the hot weather comes around and ends the spring season.  I would say in less than a month I will be putting my lettuce into the garden.  

 

I still have seeds that need to be planted indoors including many flowers that include cosmos, statice, calendula, amaranthus, queen annes lace, and some more wildflowers.  I already have six containers of both dill and alyssum at the moment, but I need to start growing many of the other flowers that I need to support my garden and plants.  I will hopefully start getting them planted indoors and placing them under lights this week.

Getting Seeds to Sprout is Much Easier with Coconut Pellets Hopefully

 Using coconut pellets is what I have started to use this year to get my seeds to start sprouting quickly and easily.  Hopefully this will get my plants off to a very good start and will be much healthier when I start placing them in the garden.  Although that is very from far now since it is still cold to place anything outside just yet I want to make sure that they start out right.  Hopefully these pellets will prove to be a worthwhile investment.

Previously I had planted some alyssum, dill, and wildflowers seeds into large plastic containers and they have been sprouting quite.  I would say this year they have all sprouted more successfully than any other that I had planted these same flowers.  I usually plant them in between rows to attract the insects that are needed in the garden.  These particular flowers end up bringing some of the best insects that any gardener could ask for.

 I also have spinach, kale, and some lettuce that are doing pretty well in the cool cellar that I keep them in until the weather temperatures are a little bit warmer.  Right now the weather is still too cold to start placing these plants outside, but it won't be long until I start hardening them out and preparing them to be placed in the garden.  For now I am going to be keeping them inside underneath some cheap fluorescent lights until time is right for outside growing.  

 I still have many more seeds to plant, but for now I have just started with some summer crop seeds for an early start.  I still have to plant pumpkins, zucchini, carrots, and many other flowers too.  I like to plant flowers early as well which include amaranthus, cosmos, statice, calendula, queen Anne's lace, and much more which are also used for insect attracting.

What Have I decided for the Springtime Crop for 2021?

 For the springtime I normally stick to cool weather crops because they happen to thrive better in the climate I live in.  The spring is also a good time to get my flowers ready which are great for attracting insects.  In a month or so I will start growing flowers and other vegetables that I will be planting for the summer, but for now I am just getting started with kale, spinach, and lettuce.

I have started with just sixteen pots and seedlings that will be under lights for about a month or so until the weather gets a little bit warmer and I can start placing them outside and benefit from the sunlight.  Since these are cool weather plants I can probably place them outside sooner because they thrive much better in cool temperatures and cooler climates.  At the moment it is still winter time and too cold for even spinach to survive outdoors.

 

while these seeds are being planted indoors this doesn't mean that this all my springtime plants that I will have growing in the garden.  I also will be planting potatoes, onions, peas, radishes, and possibly some sun king broccoli that can grow through the entire summer.  I haven't decided whether I will be growing broccoli or not, but it is something that I will be contemplating this month before I start tilling and planting seeds directly outdoors.

 

I also have not decided on a new plant or crop to start this season.  Normally I like to pick something new that I have not planted before each season.  This season I am not quite sure what would be very interesting to start growing for the first time.  I have thought about maybe planting some raspberries, but I am not sure if I have enough room for them.  I am hopefully looking forward to finally getting my grape plants into the ground after leaving them in large buckets for the past couple of years.

 

I will still be looking around for something new, but at the moment I don't have any ideas on what that new crop will be.   I still have plenty of time to decide, so I am not too worried that I won't find anything that catches my eye.

Changing of the Season Means New Harvests to Come

Now that most of my spring crops are done except for broccoli it is time to move onto the summer harvests that include pretty much everything in the garden right now.  Today I had a few harvests to do which include tomatoes, peppers, zucchini, beans, corn, and some broccoli.  Broccoli is the only spring crop that is left still producing vegetables that are good to pick.

When it is time to start picking tomatoes that is when you know you are at the peak of summer or getting close to the peak harvest season.  Right now I have plenty of cherry tomatoes, but they just have not turned red yet.  They are not quite ready to harvest, but a couple of plants do have some older fruit that have turned and enjoyed them in a salad a couple of days ago.  Those were the very first cherry tomatoes of the season so far.

A couple of days ago I also picked a couple of Roma and beefsteak tomatoes.  I like picking them just before they turn red because just before red they seem to last longer and are much more firm than if you were to pick them when they are bright red.  You could also pick them sooner and then place them on the window to continue ripening if you prefer.  Sometimes tomatoes that are not close to ripe drop on the ground and those I would place on the windowsill to hopefully ripen enough for consumption.

Corn is also another summer crop that happens to be ready around the begging of August and sometimes the end of July.  A couple of weeks ago some of the corn was ready and I began picking some of them.  I grew two types of strands of corn and for now only one of the types is ready for picking while the other still has a little bit more time to develop until it is ready to pick.  I would say another week or so and that corn will be ready.

I also plan to pick my onions and potatoes hopefully this weekend.  They are pretty much done and they are no longer growing or staying green.  This is the perfect time to start digging them up from the ground and enjoy their great flavor.