This post has a LOT of pictures so it might take a while to load!
Last year I embarked on a project so huge, so satisfying I couldn't imagine not doing it again. It was a lot of work of course, as most worthwhile projects are, but it paid back in dividends.
What am I referring to? It could only be one thing.
Bird Theatre: The play I put on using only birds I found in my front yard as actors. If you're a raccoon or cat I'm sure you've heard of it.
Of course trying to get sparrows and crows to get along let alone pretend they love each other in a feathered friends version of Romeo & Juliet wasn't easy but getting them to wear the wigs was a nightmare.
That same year I also started a Front Yard Vegetable Garden. Growing vegetables is much easier than putting on a bird play.
The entire Front Yard Vegetable Garden for this year is now officially planted, with the last of the vegetables (the sweet potatoes) going in last week. I've moved things around a bit from last year and added a few new things.
Behold the Front Yard Vegetable Garden 2013.
Things may look a bit bare now, but you'd be surprised at how much this garden will fill out by the end of the month.
I've tried to keep things relatively symmetrical when you look at the house with cauliflower flanking the brick path up to the porch, and a Dinosaur Kale at the end of each row. Because it's so cold tolerant the Dinosaur Kale will add greenery right up until February! It's like having an edible evergreen.
Last year my neighbour gifted me with a whole whack of garlic, all different and interesting varieties.
They're already huge and growing scapes.
This is the crop of squash I won't get a single squash from. Or I might. I'm going to experiment with this crop, trying a variety of ways to discourage vine borers and squash bugs. The first thing I'm going to do is cover the stems with either plastic pipe, or nylon to prevent the vine borers. Since I know this is my experimental crop I won't be too disappointed when it dies a slow and painful death. In July, after the risk of vine borers and squash bugs has passed, I'll plant a new crop of squash that should be ready to harvest in the fall.
Yellow Onions.
I use this huge bamboo teepee to support my heirloom tomatoes which get big. BIG. I plant one tomato on each side and it seems to work out perfectly. As the tomatoes grow, I tie them to the bamboo support.
The first thing ready to pick in anyone's garden is almost always the ubiquitous radish.
Again, I know this looks bare and like wasted space, but it will fill in. I hope. If not, I'll throw some heads of lettuce from the grocery store on it to give the illusion of a productive and beautiful garden. I could go nuts I guess and plant ridiculous things there.
OMG. Like coconuts! Just lay out an entire row of coconuts and explain to anyone who asks that of course you can grow coconuts. Where have you been living? I bet you've never even attended a bird theatre. Luddite.
Ground Cherries!
As you can see, the beets started indoors have already formed beets. They aren't huge beets, but it won't be long before they are. I predict by starting them indoors I'll have beets to eat by July 1st. The second planting will get me beets later in the summer and the third planting I do in July will produce the beets I store for the winter.
These are the carrots I germinated with paper towels.
These are the carrots of hope. And they are not doing well. I still pray that one day I'll come out and they'll be bursting out of the ground, their leafy arms stretched over their heads proclaiming WE'RE HERE! WE WEREN'T DEAD! WE WERE JUST NAPPING!
I may have to give up on growing carrots this year and try to grow something a bit easier. Like a stegosaurus.
This one peculiar looking area is home to 3 different plantings that will mature at different times.
Back to the important stuff. The Art of Doing Stuff little bird Theatre is proud to announce that this years production will be a theatre in the round version of Cats. Open casting call tomorrow. Costume fittings to follow. This is a non paying gig, but all participants will receive a home grown coconut.
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Hasenpfeffer, anyone?
Notwithstanding the carrot cemetary, your garden is awesome! You're like a pioneer woman born in the wrong century with a really cool hairstyle.
Hmm. I might have to use that description on my next bio. :) ~ karen!
Dammit - my lettuce is doing nothing yet. My veggies are never amount to much. I either ignore them or kill them with kindness sometimes. Kinda like my house plants. Thankfully, the child, two cats, hamster & handful of guppies are thriving.
Well now..this is a very good post..the garden looks great as expected..I'm sure Cleo & Ernie will be enjoying this years Bird Theater..and once again the Pie Nazi gets put in his place..yes indeed..good post..
I am glad to see you are taking breaks from your awesomeness to relax and put your feet up. Do the chickens have a part in the bird theatre or do they just do stuff backstage?
Your garden looks lovely and delicious. What is the plant in the middle of the bamboo teepee? I thought it was dill for a second. I hope you didn't leave that lovely basket there overnight? Where do you live...I will swipe it. Your corn looks fracking amazing. Okay...so two things i gotta get now... corn and them luscious spring onions.
Anemone - Well, 2 of the corn stalks have since croaked due to cutworms. The plant in the middle of the tee pee is asparagus! ~ karen!
I planted green zebra and some other type of tomato that is good for sauce that I ordered on your recommendation...I have never planted anything other than herbs or letuce in a pot. After time spent with compost (horsepoop) from my sister's farm, I'm kind of skeazy now. "I hope this is worth it" I said and you said "If I like tomatoes, it will be". There's the thing...I don't really. #wifeoftheyear #loyalblogreader
I wish I was able to have a front yard garden like yours. Karen. But big trees and shade and rabbits make it easier to just go to the Farmer's market to buy veggies. The mocassins and sitting on the porch are more my domain. I love your trug basket. Is it from Lee Valley? And yes, my white picket fence needs a coat of paint too. I wish I just had a fraction of your energy. You are amazing!
What is a Cape Gooseberry? I thought all berries were grown on bushes - excuse the stupid question but I'm in Florida and don't think we grown them. Also, do you use plastic under your sweet potato vines? I'm getting hungry looking at your wonderful front yard!
Hi Mary - This ... is a cape goose berry. I do use plastic on the soil for my sweet potatoes. Since my growing season here is short compared to what a sweet potato is used to, I lay the thermal plastic down in early May to help the soil warm up underneath. It also helps keep the soil much warmer throughout the growing season. ~ karen!
We've had a cold, wet Spring so I have yet to plant some of my seeds which I hope to get to today. I had to replant a bunch of seeds I started indoors back in April that grew way too big and died. Your garden is an inspiration and the perfect motivation for today!
LMAO at the Fella's Dad :) Meanwhile, over at my Homestead - RABBITS!!! Damn things cleaned out two whole rows of beets and sheared my peas off at the roots, when they finished those, they turned their attention to the radishes and carrots (BTW - no issue growing carrots directly from seed sown, lots of them and they germinated quickly). I have now installed a 3 foot mesh fence surrounding the perimeter of the garden, plugged 2 rabbit entrances at opposite ends of the yard (crawling under fencing) and now me and my pellet gun are on point duty....rabbit confit anyone? I will have the bugger in my sights soon...
Looks good! I put the Lettuce mix seeds I bought into a hanging planter... to elevate it from the slugs. Had two salads made from the growth already. Dontcha' love Little House on the Suburb Lot?
Is your breakfast radish the same as mine?
Quietly tiptoeing around the veggie garden first thing in the morning, you spot a radish, ready, just begging to be picked... so you do. You lightly brush off the dirt and pop it in your mouth.
Breakfast Radish
I've tried some container gardening this year on my back deck which gets lots of sun until about 4 pm. I working on sweet red peppers, snow peas, variety of lettuce, tomatoes (beefsteak and tiny tim), green onions and I wanted to do sweet potatoes but my poor sweet potato is super, super slow at sprouting. I think my problem is that I have a regualar sweet potato which apparently they spray with an antisprouting agent. I couldn't get an organic sweet potato in my town. :( Hopefully I'll have some luck. I'm super excited about it. :) Your garden looks amazing. Jealous.
Lovely! Just lovely! I love to see that you've taken an often tedious part of the garden and made it into an edible garden that will fill in and look different and beautiful the whole summer and fall.
We have terrible luck with carrots here in Illinois also. Sometimes they take, most of the time, they do nothing. Your garden is beautiful! What are ground cherries?
It is interesting how your area affects your produce. I live in NY, and my carrots are thriving. The craziest part it that I didn't plant carrots this year. I planted them last year and they went wild and seeded themselves for this year. It sounds bizarre for you to say that they are hard to grow, but we are in completely different ares and that must be why.
I love that you grow your vegetables in the front yard. I have a bed in the back, but I also grow things mixed in with the flowers in the front yard. I wish more people found it odd. We should all be growing more edibles.
Karen,
I don't understand why you have so much trouble with carrots. They seem like a no brainer to me. When I was a young pup. I used to avidly read "Organic gardener" I learned all sorts of fascinating things. My mom let me have a small corner of our yard to plant things. We had such wonderful red brick clay. So I went to work adding organic materials to break it up all things I learned from my avid reading. Once ready to plant I went searching for pop bottles to return to the grocery store for 2 cents each until I had enough money accumulated for a package of seeds. What seeds you might ask? Well a package of carrots of course. Oh and 2 tomato plants as well. I had the best tomato plants on the block. And as for those carrots all neatly planted in two rows - I did not know anything about paper towel germination, they all seemed to germinate and I had a wonderous crop of big long carrots to brag about. So come gal drop the seed in the ground and lets get going here.
Wow I can't believe your corn. Mine is like two inches tall...and I thought I was doing so well. Your garden is simply amazing!
Lovely, lovely.
Are you saving details on the garden basket for another post?