Garden Fails

Garden Fails

Welcome to the start of a new gardening/yard year!  Every year I try new ideas.  Some I don't like, some don't work out, and some fail miserably.  These  fails are caused by different reasons.  Didn't do my research, pests in the yard, didn't like, whatever. So here is a list of some of my fails as well as why they didn't work. I hope by sharing these you can avoid my mistakes.

FAIL #1

Cute right?  I'm not a big fan of some of the hanging baskets and thought I could make do with some of the stuff I had around the house.  So here's where I went wrong:
1. Basil gets big. I saw these cute photos of herb pots growing inside and just had no idea.  My basil this year was over 2 feet tall and 2 feet wide.
2. Bad location/not enough sun.  I thought because it said that basil could grow in partial sun that this spot would work. Nope. Turns out it only got sun a couple hours a day for the summer and not enough to bring on the growth
3. Wet feet.  I didn't make my little container with enough drainage and so the soil remained wet leading to mold and a host of other issues including wet soil is HEAVY and it warped the container.

FAIL #2, 3

There are actually 2 fails in this photo. Bad support for the peas and bad support for the tomatoes. I liked the idea of the multicolored posts for the peas but they all should have been taller and there should have been more. using long lengths of PVC wasn't horrible but the length was too long (notice the bowing) and it really needed to have additional center support and possibly square shaped.  I was trying out the idea of running the tomatoes up a center line.Now I use the tomato towers from Garden Supply Company and have used them for the last 4 years. 

Fail #5 & 6

I thought I had such a great idea!  Put walk-able thyme between the stones around the firepit and grass around the large outside circle because, you know, fun photos on the internet.
1. The grass died.  First the lawn got a lovely infestation of larvae and cutworms.
2. Hello water bill. Because the sod went in in the fall, I hadn't been through a full Oregon gardening season yet and simply didn't realize how much water would be needed to keep the lawn and the thyme from becoming a massive fire hazard.  Talk about a lot of frustrating, hard work to put it in then take it back out. But then....
3. Settling.  The firepit was put in where the old pond used to be.  Half of the firepit is essentially on fill.  It settled.  In late 2017 I has to pull out all the step stones, thyme and re-level the whole darn think. Hint, Hint: Don't stint on support when putting in block, brick or firepit.

While I had already started replacing the grass with a rock pattern as seen below, this is before I had to re-level the pit. No doubt you can imagine my frustration at having to move many sections of that rock, brick, stone, and weed barrier to add more soil.

 Which leads me to another settling fail:

 1. No base. I didn't use sand.  I thought I could just use plain soil and tamp it down nicely. This led to settling and lots and lots of weeds.
2. The mole.  I learned to hate moles about 6 months after this went in. The mole dug it's tunnels under sections of the brick leading them to settle and collapse as our winter and rain season came through.
3. No spacing. I thought I could just put them really close together and everything would be lovely. Nope. With the freeze/thaw/rain I ended up with a lumpy, weedy mess.

 Yet another cute fail. 

1. Rain.  These teacup bird feeders were super easy to make and were great until the first rains of fall hit.  These are a disaster at my house in Oregon because we get upwards of 45 inches of rain a year.  Everything became a soggy, moldy, sprouting mess.  There wasn't any point in trying to use them for dry food because I simply couldn't keep the seed dry for any length of time.

2. The glue failed.  Why did the glue fail? Because I thought I could leave these out through winter. Nope. After the first couple of freezing nights, the plate went falling down.

Lessons learned:

1. Know your plants.  It's all about the research and understanding what each plant needs to grow and where they need to grow.

2. Don't ignore the experts when it comes to foundation work.  It can save you massive headaches, backaches and money.

3. Consider how weather and temperature will affect the product. Too often I have bought something only to have it fall apart over the winter.  Will the glue fail? Will the wood mold or fall apart?  Will it even last in the elements beyond a summer?

All that being said, I look forward to trying out more creative ideas on the road to creating my little plot of happiness.  Happy gardening in 2018!

Garden layouts, yard updates part 1

Welcome to SPRING!

While there may still be a frost day, the chances have decreased considerably. A variety of seedlings are starting to peek out of the soil.  Spinach, lettuce, peas, carrots and radish.  I had planted some sprouting potatoes in February and the warmer temperatures mean they are already  6-8 inches high and wide. Onions and garlic plants last fall and early winter are looking to be a bumper crop.

The yard is showing all of the hard work of fall and winter and I've enjoyed purchasing perennials online this winter and receiving them just last week for more planting fun.

check out www.bluestoneperennials.com for some great finds.

Plot Rotation

 One of the advantages of my garden is that I can rotate the location of various crops. This year I have built a new tomato bed, a wooden Tutuer (which my husband says looks like a medieval torture device) and created color coded stakes for companion planting.  I'm hoping these ideas will help me stay a bit more organized and create happier plants. Photos will be in my next post but to give you a general idea of the changes check out the photos below.



 As you can see, the rain garden is close to complete.  The iris plants in it are getting close to blooming, the clover has filled in as a low maintenance lawn replacement(we dont water the grass during the summer). As always, there is more to do but its getting closer to being drought and heat tolerant.  Last summer I added the supports for hardy kiwi and while it seemed for a while that a nasty infestation of spider mites had killed them off, they are thankfully going spring strong.  I also have 5 celery plants that survived the winter and are putting out new stalks. yummy....


 
check back soon for more photos, ideas and general gardening fun!

Burlap for seed starting and groundcover - Excellent!

Burlap

I love to walk out into the garden every day wandering around and watching the plant growth. Is it small, large, a sudden burst? How did the weather affect it? what about the techniques I'm trying?  I recently experimented with loosely woven burlap to cover a mammoth crimson clover ground cover group.  it worked wonderfully!  The next step is to determine how much will get eaten by garden pests.  I have sprinkled a layer of straw over it as well as slug bait and finally some diatomaceous earth (but with the rain heading my way the last isn't likely to last long.)  I've had to re-apply the slug bait once more since the original planting back in March and have added other areas of clover.

Mammoth Crimson Clover as cover crop

 These tiny seeds were simply scattered rather randomly over the barely worked earth that had been partially prepped last year (see previous blog re: no till earth prep)  You can see that it has taken well.  I wet down it down after planting, it rained about 36 hours later and a nice green carpet has emerged.  The burlap I have has a tighter weave unsuited once the seeds are up. The Burlap should be pulled up once sprouting has begun to prevent damaging seedlings by either crushing them underneath or pulling them out when it's removed.

 Wonderful!  Not only will the clover add Nitrogen to the soil but it will be lovely when it blooms. As you can see from the photos below, there have been been big changes since last year and the the clover is coming in well.

Now that the clover is in, I'm re-using the Burlap as a basic mulch and for Basil seedling germination. It worked very well with annual/perennial flower seeds now starting to bloom. Basically,  I highly recommend Burlap as a starter for seed!