Planting Seeds of Love and Learning, Lafayette Style!

March 2020

We were inspired to start a garden this Spring.  The kids are home, and my husband and I are working from home.  Since we are not going anywhere, we have more time than ever to work in the yard.  And there's no better time to consider growing some food.  One thing that I have realized over the past month is that learning comes in so many ways.  My daughters are 5 and 7 and I am excited for them to experience growing vegetables and the valuable lessons that will come along the way. Here's to Victory Gardens!

My mother, Patty, has had raised vegetable beds for many years, and she has enjoyed having my girls over to help her in the garden.  She gave us some great advice as did a few lovely neighbors who have fantastic gardens.  The funny part is that, once we were excited about getting started, we were out for a walk and saw our neighbor making raised veggie beds.  He was so sweet to text me the list of supplies and offered to help us build ours. 

So with lots of excitement and encouragement, tips and tricks from dear family and friends, we got started.  Here is the advice that we gathered:

The Beds:

·         Raised beds are the way to go.  Redwood or cedar, not pressure treated.

·         Approximately 12"-16" tall sides are a good height, especially if you want to amend the soil a lot.  Build something that fits your gardeners well.

·         Gopher wire at the bottom is a must - which is open to the soil below to allow for good drainage.

·         Consider lining the inside of the box with landscape fabric, in order to lengthen the life of the wood.

·         Local nurseries have great recommendations for soil.  We had two yards delivered.

·         My neighbor decided to lay landscape fabric on the ground, under the beds - in order to help control weeds and make it easier to access the beds.  Then he put rock or gravel on top, or you could do mulch or hardscape.  We are using bricks as we had some from an old fireplace, and a neighbor doing a remodel also had a pile of used bricks and was happy to see us collect some.

·         Trellising your vegetables is a great way to get high quality veggies.  If leaves lie on the ground they can get blight.

·         Marigolds are a natural way to keep pests out of the bed.  Consider planting one on each end as the bugs do not like them.

·         Look carefully at sun patterns and sun exposure before you choose a location.  Think about different times of year, trees that leaf out, trees or hedges that may grow taller, etc.

·         Rachio is a neat irrigation system that you can control on your phone.  My neighbor saw a 30-40% decrease in his water bill once he installed it.  One idea is to plumb a main line to each veggie bed, which helps maintain irrigation.

Planting!

·         Lafayette is in Zone 7, so make sure to check that plants suit our climate when shopping.

·         Our area has wonderful seasons, which makes it fun to be able to choose different vegetables to plant, depending on the season.  I know that my mom always gets excited to plant her winter garden.

·         It is likely best that we do not use seeds, since we don’t have a totally sunny space and therefore need to speed up the growing process.  If we do try seeds at some point, we will start them inside, then plant them once they are ready for the beds.

Patty's Veggie Tips:

·         It's fun to plant a variety of lettuces.  If you pick the outside leaves, you can keep the lettuce going for a long time. 

·         Every year different vegetables do well…some not so well.

·         Tomatoes – try to plant some early ones as well as later ones.  Cherry tomatoes always seem to do well and the little girls love to pick them and eat them right off the vine.

·         Cucumbers – need space but are good.

·         Peppers – mixed results but last year were great.  I had some very spicy ones, too.

·         Squash – zucchini, yellow, patty pan etc – last year squash didn’t do so well.  It was strange because even the stores and farmer’s markets had limited.  I always try a variety and I cut them up with garden herbs and bbq them in a basket – can add olive oil and basalmic vinegar.

·         Sugar snap peas are fun.

·         Pole beans or bush beans are usually easy to grow.

·         Eqqplant – some more limited success.

·         Corn, artichokes & asparagus – takes up too much room for my garden.

·         Winter garden – I now have lots of kale, spinach and delicious broccoli.

·         I plant several basil plants, chives, parsley.  I have other herbs just mixed in with my garden, including rosemary which is great for roasted  potatoes.

We need these Victory Gardens.  We are thankful for the inspiration to get this going.  And we love the book, We Are The Gardeners, by Joanna Gaines, so we plan to read that occasionally for ongoing motivation - especially when we have challenges, which can only be expected.  We are all in this together!  Happy Planting!