Gardening in April

Gardening in April on Hummingbird Hill

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I have a really strong desire to have a garden this year.  I just feel that with the economy the way it is I will be glad we did.  The economy isn't the only reason.  I an tired of eating packaged and overly processed foods that are laden with chemicals.  Our health will benefit from this too.  I ordered from Heirloom Seed this year.  I wanted to be able to save my seed to plant each year.  I also ordered some from Burpee.

These are my tomato, strawberry and marigold transplants.  I went ahead and bought plants for this year because my seed did not come in in time to start them from seed.

 Here are my cabbage plants, cucumber and sunflowers.  I planted 4 o'clock seed where the sunflowers were planted but they did not come up.

These are some of the containers that we are using.  My son-in-law got these for me from where he works.  They are 55 gallon barrels that we split and drilled drainage holes in.  I hope these work for some of the crops any way.  I hope Mr. Hummingbird will till up a larger area in the yard for some corn, squash and pink eyed purple hull peas.

Gardening Update

Just a short note to say that the cucumbers are pushing up.  The 4 o'clocks are a no go but that's okay because you can't eat flowers.  I am so excited about my cucumbers.  I need to decide where I want to put them and get a place prepped before its time to set them out.

Remember the seeds were 3 years old.

Hope you have a great day!

Linda

Gardening On Hummingbird Hill

I am having a hard time deciding how big I want my garden to be.  If we camp a lot like we usually do then it will be difficult to have a large one.  Maybe I can just have a couple of raised beds and grow a few things.

It is time to start seed indoors.  I am attempting to start some cucumber seed and some four-o-clock seed.  I used what I had on hand and didn’t purchase anything new to do this.  I am really not expecting a lot from this because my seed were packaged to plant in 2010.  I started them in empty toilet paper and paper towels rolls.  I saw this on Pinterest and some other sources.

 

This the garden of my dreams.....maybe one day.

http://www.ronamag.ca/news/companion-planting-tasty-harvests 

As you can see when they rolls get wet they come apart.  I tied some of them with string.  This might have worked better if I had used a smaller tray or packed it fuller.  We will see if they sprout.  If it fails then I have lost nothing but a little time.  I made the tray out of an old shoe box lid and aluminum foil.  I had the starting mix from 3 years ago.

I only planted 4 cucumbers because I think I will be planting them in a raised bed and with a trellis.  Maybe - if I can get someone to help me build them.

I tried the four o’clock seed in 2010 and had no luck so I don’t expect anything this time either.  By taking small steps at a time I am hoping to get a little closer to being more self-sufficient each day.



Thanks for taking the time to read my blog.

Linda
  Update:  I decided to add 4 more cucumbers to my starter tray.  If I do the square foot garden it says I can plant 2 plants per square.  This will fill up the back squares and I can run them on an attached trellis.