Asparagus, Radishes and Pavers!

Today I got myself into the garden and remembered to take the camera! Yea me! I checked my garden and noticed the radishes have begun to come up under protective custody.

It was nice to see these under their chicken wire cover…

The spinach and lettuces are also starting under the protection of the white row cover. Unfortunately, the seeds in the cold frame and the pop-up tent seem to be hunkering down until warmer weather.

from the back: the bean enclosure, to foil rabbits and voles; the row cover, where spinach and lettuce sprouts hide; the pop-up tent, where there are three kinds of tomato seed planted; and the cold frame, where the pepper and eggplant seeds are hunkering down.

I spent most of the time in the large outside garden. Jane is taking care of the small inside garden for Plot Against Hunger. Doesn’t it look fabulous?

Jane has exceeded herself again! Little pavers allow access to the plantings, and she planted the sidewalk edge as well.

Last year she built beds in the outside garden and this year, she pilfered the timbers she had bought and cut and installed to rebuild the small garden bed. That left the beds in the outside garden unenclosed, but my garden neighbor Patrick was getting rid of pavers in his garden and I snatched them to rebuild and enclose the beds in the large garden.

There’s a lot going on here–older ties supplemented by the pavers. I neglected to take an overall picture, but I did use up 50 pavers on the beds!

There has been a bit going on there. We have a blackberry, courtesy of AFAC, and I bought two small blueberry plants. I also have promises of raspberries to come.

This bed has the small blueberry bushes and the blackberry. It will acquire some raspberries in a few weeks.

My plan has been to plant perennials there, so that the garden produces without the clearing and planting required normally. The rest will go into flowers for the gardeners to cut during the summer.

These were a surprise. I had no idea!

I found asparagus roots at a local garden center. I would like to have an asparagus patch there. Yum!! I bought purple passion and Jersey Knight. I hope they do well.

Apparently some asparagus are more disease resistant than others. I’ll see how these do.

I have never grown asparagus, so followed the directions on the packages. They are one year to harvest asparagus–what a relief! Some are two or three years.  I dug trenches, as the packages of roots said and filled them in partially, then watered them. I notified other gardeners that the piles of soil left were not a mistake and that I’d have to fill in over the next few weeks.

Yup, looks like an unfinished project!

In the meantime, I took the lovely kale, or most of it–what a nice lot it was. It’s still a bit cool, but I’m encouraged by the radishes coming up, so sometime in the next two weeks or so, I’ll probably be able to start planting the flowers for the garden border and the large garden–and more lettuces and vegetables in my own garden. It’s a common problem that I start too early, but then again, sometimes the season cooperates and I have a fabulous early garden! Happy Easter to all who celebrate it. And happy spring to all and sundry!

I had to remove this as it turns out I needed two beds for the asparagus. But I’m sure it will be yummy.