Name: Spreading the Feast Gathering
Start: 2025-07-11T00:00:00-05:00
End: 2025-07-12T23:59:59-05:00
Location: LaGrange, KY

Tagged: gardening

This topic has 28 replies, 13 voices, and was last updated 13 years, 10 months ago by Wings2fly.

Viewing 14 posts - 16 through 29 (of 29 total)

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January 22, 2011 at 4:27 am
dcilmom
Participant
One book that I have found at my library that is very good is Rodale’s All-New Encyclopedia of Organic Gardening: The Indispensable Resource for Every Gardener, you can find it at Amazon.com for a penny used, up to $25.00 brand new. It has really helped me better understand gardening, especially orangic ways. Another good book, purely for information and a good read is Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barabra Kingsolver, I usually read it this time of year. One seed site that is just plain awesome is Seed Savers Exchange, the site is http://www.seedsavers.org, I just love looking through their catalog with all of the heirloom seeds, I wish I could plant every single thing. Start out small, we will be planting corn, green beans, tomatoes- slicing and paste, plus strawberrie. Each one we use throughout the year and will be able to either freeze or can.
Beth
January 22, 2011 at 11:10 pm
missingtheshire
Member
All great ideas ladies and thanks for the other seed companies, I always love looking at new catalogs and planning my plots and pots. Linda
July 17, 2011 at 2:08 am
Wings2fly
Participant
Lindsey – How is your garden? Did you do a raised bed garden?
I don’t know much about gardening, but I plan to start one next spring. I have this year to read up about it and make plans. The land I have for gardening is an estimated 15 feet by 50 feet. It is what we call “the bottoms” as our land is not level and there is standing water there all spring. So I am not sure how suitable it is for which vegetables. Raised bed sounds nice, but sounds expensive for that much land. Although I would like to eat healthier, my primary reasons for gardening is to save money on groceries and for the kids to help with and learn about. So I need to keep my costs down. I will check into some of the books. Did you find any others resources you recommend? Any tips?
I would also like to plant some fruit trees and berries.
July 17, 2011 at 2:20 am
LindseyD
Participant
Sarah,
Our garden is not. My hubby built three 8’x4′ raised beds. He did such a great job. We filled them with good, organic soil and compost. We planted. And then we had 60 mph winds. And then we didn’t have any rain.
Seriously, we tried hard. We live in West Texas, and our area has been experiencing the worst draught ever. Like seriously in history, this is the worst draught we’ve ever had. Spring brought us high winds almost everyday and no rain, and summer has brought us 100+ temperatures almost everyday and still no rain.
It was a fight to keep the garden alive, and even when we watered twice a day, our plants were still wilting. We even planted some squash and zucchini seeds, and they didn’t even sprout!
I wish I could offer you more, but we failed miserably and are unqualified to advise. LOL
July 17, 2011 at 2:25 am
Wings2fly
Participant
So sorry to hear that, Lindsey. We got your rain, and I regret that I did not start a garden this year even though I have not read up on it or made a plan. I trust you will try it again next year.
July 17, 2011 at 4:00 am
Sue
Participant
I wish I knew what (if anything) we could plant as a late crop in northeast Ohio within the next week. We have had an old, ugly, held-together-by-duct-tape ’77 Chevette parked and sinking into the lawn in our backyard for about 4 years. It belongs to my elderly father, and he just could not bring himself to junk the car. He was convinced that some “collector” would want it, but no one has claimed it….until now.
You see, it is blocking access to the best place (really, only place) where we could successfully plant a garden. So this spring, my children and I have been praying what we call “The Daily Chevette Prayer.” We would ask God to bring someone to take the Chevette off our hands and make my dad content with it. Believe it or not, our next door neighbor, who has seen that thing sitting there all of this time, decided to buy it for slightly more than what we’d get at a junkyard. So, in a few days, it will be gone, and we can begin to clear out the nearly two-foot weeds beyond it.
Well, if not this year, at least we can plant a garden next year!
July 17, 2011 at 11:51 am
Rachel White
Participant
@sue_mom23-do you know your zone? For NE Ohio, from waht I can see on the zone map, your zone 5; I just don’t knw whether a or b (zone 6 starts in more southernly Ohio):http://www.garden.org/zipzone/index.php?img=neusa
Here’s a zone 5 and 6 planting schedule. There are things you can palnt for Fall and/or winter; esp. if you can use cold frames or other protective measures. This schedule uses N.Missouri as a mid point, so you’d probably be 2 wks. soooner in the fall (it depends upon your first frost date):
http://www.thevegetablegarden.info/resources/planting-schedules/zones-5-6-planting-schedule
Eliot COleman’s books teach about growing food in the Winter; you may find them at your library:
Four Season HArvest: Organic Vegetables from your HOme GArden All Year Long
and
The Winter HArvest HAndbook: Year ROund Vegetable PRoduction Using Deep Organic Techniques and UNheated Greenhouses
@Sarah-start preparing your soil now for spring time. Plant any fruit trees now. My favorite soource for fruit trees is a farm in Arkansas. If you want the info on them, I can dig it up.
I grow for many purposes: good stewardship, self-sufficiency, knowing what kind of food we are eating, teaching my children hrad work and responsibilty, experiencing the satisfaction of growing; but ultimately it must save us money as my husband is disabled and that’s what we live on.
Rachel
July 17, 2011 at 12:01 pm
Gem
Participant
Lindsey – I feel your pain – we are in SW Arkansas and it is painfully dry, and I have been watching Texas with a heavy heart. Louisiana too. Bad bad growing conditions.
But I encourage you to make plans for planting in the fall when temps start to cool down, you will find it easier to handle the watering. The fall and winter garden is my favorite, you can plant all kinds of lettuces, spinach, bok choy, carrots, radishes, english and sugar peas, kale, all sorts of greens, brocolli, turnips, swiss chard… a lot of wonderful possibilities! If your region is temperate, you might even get in a late crop of squash or cucumbers, I try to do that every year.
Good luck!
Gem
July 17, 2011 at 12:14 pm
Rachel White
Participant
I completely agree. I actually prefer a Fall/winter garden over a spring one. The plants that aren’t completley harvested will go dormant and then reappear in the spring without the extra work (at least here, zone 7, they should in TX, too) and the best part is you don’t have the bug problems that you have in the spring.
Rachel
July 17, 2011 at 1:53 pm
ruth
Participant
We live in southern Louisiana and Iknow what you are going through. Many of my plants are in self-watering containers and are doing well. The plants that don’t need water so much are in the ground. You can make your own self-watering containers fairly easily and inexpensively. We have had a reprieve from the drought and finally got some rain. Durring the drought my plants in the containers would still get wilted looking, but by evening they perked back up. I too am looking forward to fall so I can plant lettuces, carrots, green onion and so much more than I can now. The only thing growing now is the cucumber plants, but I have a lot of pickles!
July 17, 2011 at 2:43 pm
missingtheshire
Member
Here in SW Illinois, we had too much rain and that did a lot of damage to our vegetable garden – the flowers did great, but the vegetables got waterlogged too early and then the humidity kicked in and so it has not been a good year here for us either. We have a community garden at a farm we go to, and that has been badly affected by the weather especially all the rain in the spring. The only people who I have seen have success this year in my area are those who planted in pots, and their stuff just did great. I think next year I will try pots and raised beds and mix it up. It is so disappointing when this happens, but for all of us novices it is hard to know what to do when the weather is so brutal and changeable. Keep on trying is my motto, and I too will be planting fall/winter crops to see what happens with those. If we could just balance out the sun and rain amongst us all, we would have great gardens. Lindsey, sorry about your garden, the draught has been dreadful for all of you guys and your hubby worked so hard – still keep moving forward and one day we will all have success. Linda
July 17, 2011 at 3:11 pm
Wings2fly
Participant
Rachel – What do you mean by “-start preparing your soil now for spring time”?
I want some fruit trees. I’m not sure which ones. I read up last fall on the Internet about apple trees and how you need 2 kinds to cross pollenate. I have read 2 different opinions. One said to plant in fall about October, another said spring about March. That is confusing.
July 21, 2011 at 12:16 am
Rachel White
Participant
Preparing soil-
determining where you want to plant what
do soil tests if you want
apply amendments-lime, compost, wood ash, etc, what’s needed in your area to give you a balanced soil
a legume cover crop if you need to loosen the soil and add in nitrogen
I’d recommend checking in with your local extension office to inquire about your soil type, if you don’t already know, and read up on ways to prepare your soil with the appropriate organic amendments for the crops you want to raise. Being in Ga. with our clay soil, preparing the soil is of vital importance.
As for planting fruit trees, I think it depends on what zone you live in. Here in Zone 7, planting in the fall works really well because it allows the palnt to get in some strong roots, then come spring, the tree is almost a whole season ahead. Plus, our springs can be rough with fungus and such. When planting strawberries in the fall, in springtime, they think they’ve been in the ground a whole year already adn you get a harvest; wheras if palnted in spring, you have to wait.
Happy researching!
Rachel

July 21, 2011 at 4:56 am
Wings2fly
Participant
Thanks Rachel. I see I have much to learn.