Planting 2011

Typically we are harvesting lettuce by now but the squirrels keep digging into our lettuce bed and baby spinach.  Our crop is small at this time.  We typically have this container full.

Last Year~ One of our Lettuce beds (5/13/10)

What we have as of today

 

This is all we have this year so far. The past years we are typically starting our second tub in order to keep a cycle of lettuce growing.  Todd is trying this method to keep the squirrels out for now (he just placed our tomato cage over the tub last Wednesday.) but as you can see we do not have even one tub nearly half full. 

We love keeping the lettuce and baby spinach on our deck.  It is so great to walk out onto our deck cut the lettuce or baby spinach at dinner time, wash it. Nothing taste better then fresh picked veggies.  NOTHING.  We really do not want to move this garden area, 

Last summer's garden on the deck (5/23/10)

Notice the nice tub of lettuce on the far right.  Center is the tub of baby spinach and the far left the beginning of the second tub of lettuce. 

One of my planters I planted last year.

I also have beautiful flower containers and fear the little pest will do damage to these as well.  I planned all winter to start an herbal garden on the deck as well.  I have not planted my flowers yet, plan to this week or next weekend.  I did start with the herbs.  I tried to start some by seeds inside but most of my seeds did not take.  I plan to read over the winter this year to better our odds next year for our seedlings.  I read that putting a container such as a tube of Mini M&Ms with holes in the lid buried in the garden with vinegar in it will discourage the squirrels.  Instead of tubes of Mini M&Ms I thought I would use the 3 oz tubes one can buy at the store for vacationing, holes are already in it.  I took the lids off of the bottles.  I read that you are to bury the container in the garden up to the lids, however my smaller tubes even were too big for the window seal boxes I was going to use for my herbal garden.  I did bury them as deep as I could, I hope it works.

I planted Cilantro in this box.  I am hoping we have fresh Cilantro to add to our salsa we make this fall.  I would love to have fresh salsa with all the products from grown by us.

In the back container with the blue lid I have just planted Chives, none of my seedlings took of my chives.  The front container on the left is where I planted a few more Basil seeds.  I had 4 seedlings that took and are doing well.  On the right side of the container I planted more seeds of parsley.  I only had one seedling that took but did not make it into the picture.

Todd was concern that we would not be able to get everything in our garden this year.  We are trying a few new things and plan on putting all the squash, zucchini, and cucumbers this year.  I worked on a plan with checking out the sites listed prior and I am thrilled that Todd is going by my planting plan.  Our main garden is nearly planted. We have started so late this year with planting.  I do not think that our corn will be knee high by the 4th of July since none of the seeds are in the soil as of yet. We still need to plant the corn, pole beans, squash, and peppers as well as the Diva Cucumbers in one of the tire gardens.  Todd has all the tomatoes, zucchinis, cucumbers, celery, broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage, some sort of other type of cabbage, peas are in the main garden as of this weekend.  We still need to plant the peppers and tomatoes in the containers and hanging containers.

Our onions are thriving in their new home.