Am I the only VJer with a garden?

[spookyturtle 9,466]

I have a garden, compost my waste and recycle.

I rape, plunder and pillage.

[Danno 1,228]

The squirrels love to chew on the wood trim in my home, another PITA, slowly converting to plastic.

Wouldn't surprise me if there wasn't some treatment on the market to discourage squirrels from chewing.

On occasion I would get a dog that liked to chew and I found a good treatment would be to get something like

Texas Pete or something even hotter and paint it on the areas you don't want chewed on. Might work for squirrels too as they typically like to chew into the "pork chop" section of the soffit or up by the gable vent.

[maya62 7]

We have a garden... we grow garlic, daikon radishes, heirloom tomatoes, onions, corn (sometimes), beans, cucumbers, chard, spinach, lettuce, lots of strawberries, coriander/cilantro, blueberries, plums, peaches, peas (sometimes), and lots of flowers, and a few herbs. My husband is the main gardener, and he does a lovely job.

Pics here:

**

ETA: We also have 2 goats, 10 chickens, 6 cats, and 2 dogs, and recycle obsessively! And we don't eat our chickens, we eat Polyface Farm (Joel Salatin of Omnivore's Dilemma fame) chickens.

Edited May 16, 2009 by Captain Ewok

[Hilarious Clinton 452]

I have a garden, compost my waste and recycle.

I rape, plunder and pillage.

We should have a party. I'll bring the veggies.

[~*Maria*~ 1]

We don't have a garden, we got something much better than that lol a lake at the end of our backyard with a beach attached. uh huh, you guessed it, we live on a lake

I guess i don't have to venture too far for a swim this summer.

[peejay 327]

The squirrels love to chew on the wood trim in my home, another PITA, slowly converting to plastic.

Wouldn't surprise me if there wasn't some treatment on the market to discourage squirrels from chewing.

It's called a pellet gun (air gun). It works as well as a .22, but without the noise. If you live in the middle of the city like I do, thinning the herd with a .22 rifle could get you in trouble. With an air gun nobody notices, not even the squirrels. They never know what hit 'em.

[Mary Lou 682]

We have a garden... we grow garlic, daikon radishes, heirloom tomatoes, onions, corn (sometimes), beans, cucumbers, chard, spinach, lettuce, lots of strawberries, coriander/cilantro, blueberries, plums, peaches, peas (sometimes), and lots of flowers, and a few herbs. My husband is the main gardener, and he does a lovely job.

Pics here:

**

ETA: We also have 2 goats, 10 chickens, 6 cats, and 2 dogs, and recycle obsessively! And we don't eat our chickens, we eat Polyface Farm (Joel Salatin of Omnivore's Dilemma fame) chickens.

Beautiful photos Maya.

Love your raised beds for the garden.

[sara535 15]

We have a small garden this year too. Tomatoes, few kinds of peppers, eggplant, cucumber, potatoes and melons. My mom gardened a lot when I was a kid but this is the first time I've done it as an adult. I am optimistic about the results but I have to say, just working out there has been some nice family time as we include the kids and its kind of become a family project, which is pretty invaluable when you have an adolescent

I am pretty envious about the bees. well, no not the bees but the fresh honey. how fantastic!

[Danno 1,228]

We have a small garden this year too. Tomatoes, few kinds of peppers, eggplant, cucumber, potatoes and melons. My mom gardened a lot when I was a kid but this is the first time I've done it as an adult. I am optimistic about the results but I have to say, just working out there has been some nice family time as we include the kids and its kind of become a family project, which is pretty invaluable when you have an adolescent

I am pretty envious about the bees. well, no not the bees but the fresh honey. how fantastic!

With your potatoes, did you buy special "seed potatoes" , I was going to cut up some old ones I had left over but i read somewhere you need to get "seed potatoes" since I am working with limited space anyway, I decided not to bother.

[Amby 490]

We have a small garden this year too. Tomatoes, few kinds of peppers, eggplant, cucumber, potatoes and melons. My mom gardened a lot when I was a kid but this is the first time I've done it as an adult. I am optimistic about the results but I have to say, just working out there has been some nice family time as we include the kids and its kind of become a family project, which is pretty invaluable when you have an adolescent

I am pretty envious about the bees. well, no not the bees but the fresh honey. how fantastic!

With your potatoes, did you buy special "seed potatoes" , I was going to cut up some old ones I had left over but i read somewhere you need to get "seed potatoes" since I am working with limited space anyway, I decided not to bother.

we bought the "special" ones from the co-op. they were REALLY cheap

[David-and-Mae 15]

We have a pretty good garden this year. Last year was our first attempt at it and we got more veggies than we knew what to do with. This year we enlarged a little so we could plant more of a variety, plus we're sharing gardening duties with my parents. So far this year we have 3 types of beans, 3 types of corn, 5 types of squash, green onions, sweet onions, garlic, broccoli, pumpkins, watermelon, dill, cilantro, tomatillos, green and yellow peppers, jalepeno and serrano peppers, and cantaloupe. We still need to plant our tomotoes and sweet potatoes. I can't wait to see how things grow this year.

I knew I forgot something!

Let us know how the broccoli goes. My uncle talked us out of planting it because it gets some bug on it?!

Broccoli should be fine after harvesting 5 little heads from one plant. After that, you will have to be very, very careful cleaning/eating/cooking it because the worms that get to it are like chameleon (spl?), you don't really see them but they're there... big, fat, ewww ones.

The squirrels love to chew on the wood trim in my home, another PITA, slowly converting to plastic.

Wouldn't surprise me if there wasn't some treatment on the market to discourage squirrels from chewing.

It's called a pellet gun (air gun). It works as well as a .22, but without the noise. If you live in the middle of the city like I do, thinning the herd with a .22 rifle could get you in trouble. With an air gun nobody notices, not even the squirrels. They never know what hit 'em.

Hubby just bought one (air gun) when they went on sale at Bass Pro. Last year, we used .22, but boy, we always had to check outside if the city people pulled up to get us.

Edited May 16, 2009 by David-Mae Forever

[HannahP 119]

We have a small garden this year too. Tomatoes, few kinds of peppers, eggplant, cucumber, potatoes and melons. My mom gardened a lot when I was a kid but this is the first time I've done it as an adult. I am optimistic about the results but I have to say, just working out there has been some nice family time as we include the kids and its kind of become a family project, which is pretty invaluable when you have an adolescent

I am pretty envious about the bees. well, no not the bees but the fresh honey. how fantastic!

With your potatoes, did you buy special "seed potatoes" , I was going to cut up some old ones I had left over but i read somewhere you need to get "seed potatoes" since I am working with limited space anyway, I decided not to bother.

Really? My dad just cuts the potatoes that no one wants to eat into halves & plants them cut side down into the ground. Voila! Potato goodness.

[sara535 15]

yeah thats what we did, just cut up some old ones from the kitchen. Havent harvested any yet but they are certainly growing quite robustly so we shall see I'll let you know....

[Danno 1,228]

yeah thats what we did, just cut up some old ones from the kitchen. Havent harvested any yet but they are certainly growing quite robustly so we shall see I'll let you know....

And how do you know when they are "ready"?

I planted a few carrots, beets and even onions, not sure how to know ehn to dig them up... is there a pop-up button

[lostinblue 1,989]

yeah thats what we did, just cut up some old ones from the kitchen. Havent harvested any yet but they are certainly growing quite robustly so we shall see I'll let you know....

And how do you know when they are "ready"?

I planted a few carrots, beets and even onions, not sure how to know ehn to dig them up... is there a pop-up button

The package of seed has a maturity date on it. You are looking at fall as to when these plants will mature. This is why many people plant a variety of different plants. Raddish growing season is very short. Many people plant sweet corn every few weeks so they can enjoy this crop all summer(80 days + ) maturity into fall. Your onions depend on what variety you have planted. (scallions versus spanish or cooking onions)With potatos you could plant now in the upper part of the united states and have salt potatoes by maybe by mid july. Let others mature as they will continue growing until fall or when they start dying on their own due to maturity. The weather has so much to do with the quality of your harvest. Dry hot weather VS a rainy cold summer. You and all the other farmers in the world are really at mothers natures whims. Except if you live in california and your water supply has been stopped due to the EPA and a little fish.