I started my first real garden four weeks ago and I am really enjoying taking care of the plants and watching them grow. My 2 1/2 year old daughter was surprised to hear that some of the plants will grow strawberries that we can eat. It is going to be delightful to share the experience of eating food grown from the ground with my daughter and my 12 year old son. I dropped my perfectionist trip about doing it pure like John Jevons does in his wonderful “how to grow more fruits and vegetables” book and started from small plants I bought. I did break up and compost the soil under the wood portion of the raised beds and enjoyed how the soil gets more fluffy and light when you break it up and add compost. I can imagine the roots of the plants having a lot more room to move and grow in soil like this. I have soil about the depth and with some of the characteristics Jevons recommends and I have broken the ice between me and the world of edible plants on which my continued living depends, It feels good.
I planted zucchini, and yellow squash in the first planter box, strawberries and a melon of some kind in the second planter box, tomatoes and bush beans in the third planter box. I check them and give them small amounts of water if they look like they need it. On hot days they can look a little fried around the edges and I don’t see any bugs or snails messing with them yet. I have a lot to learn but I am on my way to a more intimate relationship with dirt, water, bugs, plants, and weather. I’m hoping that my kids will not grow up as estranged from the natural world we live in as I have.
More blossoms, new fruit, the plants all seem well established and happily growing. The new developments are the flowers on the melon, a small new tomato on the plant that didn’t have any yet, and new strawberries.
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