The weather is so cold and miserable that I need to start dreaming of my garden in order to get warm. But seriously, I am actually right on time to start these plans.
The first thing I did was look up last frost dates again. The last frost day is between April 17th and 24th. But I will say that I remember years that we have had frost up till and even in May. My best advice is to use a 10-day forecast on either of those dates before planting outside. Eight weeks before April 17th is February 21. This is when I plan to start my pepper plants inside. Six weeks before April 17th is March 6th. This will be my plan date to start my tomatoes.
I feel comfortable using the earliest possible date because of a couple of reasons, first April 17th falls on a Thursday this year. I seriously doubt I will be planting outside on that day. The following week including April 24th is my Spring Break. There is a strong possibility that I will have time to plant outside that week. The second reason is that both my peppers and tomato plants usually take more time to grow than what is expected. I can’t explain why but that is usually the case.
Now on to my plans!
I want to try and plant a area of corn behind the chicken coop. (This will be my only in ground crop).
I will plant garlic as soon as it arrives in front of where I plan to plant squash and/or zucchini. Ideally, I would like 2 squash plants and 10 zucchini plants in the 12-foot bed at the back of the building.
Tomatoes will be in the front 2 beds. The bed closest to the road will be slicing tomatoes and the second bed will be Amish paste tomatoes. I am not planning to plant any Cherokee purple this year as they are slow to produce and not great! I will be planting a cherry tomato in the short bed across from the deck. I am planning to add a cattle panel to the center of the second bed to make things neater and more organized. The other thing I would like to add is an arch over the top between the two beds to grow loofah sponges on.
Beside the new deck, I am planning to purchase new bags of dirt and cut the sides and tops off. I already have a layer of paper there. This will be the area for watermelon to spread and grow. I somehow ended up with 3 types of cantaloupe seeds. My plan is to plant one in the round barrel that are on the ground. I may take a chance and plant a second kind in back of my cucumbers to see what they taste like. I will be planting onions as soon as they arrive in the next week or so. I am hopefully we will have enough cold days to support them.
The other items I want to grow are cucumbers and green beans. I am going to plan to plant a 10-foot bed with green beans. I think I will plant cucumbers in the front of my office as we already have a panel for the front of that bed. I may plant some lettuce, and radishes in one of the beds followed up with either cantaloupe or more of what I think we need after the heat kills these plants off. I have a ton of radish seeds so I may attempt to grow this as supplemental food for the dog and chickens.
I am hoping to start some dill and basil in the greenstalk vertical planter in the front of my house. I also have some lemon balm and Chamille seeds that need to get used. I am hopeful that strawberries will survive the winter and return in one of my planers but buying flowers to fill the planter is always an option as well!
Finally, I have some morning glory seeds that will be thrown in the side flower beds. I am struggling to find shade plants to fill this area!
So far this year I have purchased 2 new starting trays from Greenstalk and a bunch of seeds from Hoss and some seeds from SheperdingPeppersFarm.com . I still need to purchase basil seeds but hope to not purchase any plants this year! I will also need to purchase probably 10 bags of soil for the watermelon area.
