1/10/16

Grow Your Veggies?

Anyone else interested in turning one of the back courtyard plots into a vegetable garden? I think this spring may be our chance, because the Norway Maple is down, letting in a lot more sun. Here's my idea about how to do it:

1. We'd dig up the ivy and other ground cover in the bed closest to the entrance/elevator. (I can't remember the number and can't find the map. Can someone help me out?) Do people think that will get enough sun? With the sun being much higher in the sky during the summer, I am betting yes. We could move the ground cover and shrubs that are there to the curb strip along East 18th Street, which we should try to revive.

2. We'd probably need to put some sort of chicken wire around it to keep animals out.

3. We'd need to figure out a way to determining who could be a part of the veggie club. I recommend this: if you volunteer to move some of that ground cover and prepare the soil both on East 18th and in the garden plot, you get a few square feet to plant. (The size of the individual plots will be determined by the number of participants.) We could do this over two weekends and make allowances for anyone who really wanted to partake but couldn't make either date.  

4. The exchange of ground cover for vegetables would be ideal from a cost perspective: we wouldn't need to buy much, or any, ground cover for East 18th ... and vegetable seeds are cheap. Plus, if the ivy is left where it is, I am worried it will burn from the excess sunlight.

Another idea: let's plant another tree on the East 18th Street curb strip ... perhaps move the bush that's there and put it there, to the south of the lamp post? Another tree would provide more shade for that section of the strip, preventing the new ground cover from burning.    

What do you think? Chime in on comments below.

12/15/15

Getting Ready for Winter

A hardy crew of widely diverse ages has been out getting the garden ready for winter, should it ever come. This past weekend we mowed the front (again, having sharpened the other end of the rotor), raked, fertilized and seeded. (Yes, seeded, sounds crazy but with this warm wet weather continuing, I don't doubt we could get a head start on spring.) A few weeks ago, we packed up two large bags of leaves and set by the compost tumbler: we can use them over the winter to cover food scraps we put in there. (It was getting pretty nasty in there, but we threw a few handfuls of leaves in and tumbled it around; hopefully it's achieved a better balance between carbon and nitrogen.)

Yet to Do: Rake the back courtyard again; mulch the lawn strips along East 18th Street with mower (it does a nice job and will be good to help enrich the soil and prepare it for next spring's replanting); til that lawn strip; set the pavers that we removed from the tree pits along the Avenue H lawn strip.

Wish List for Christmas or When We Get Money: Rake, edge clippers (manual kind, not electric or gas).

10/29/15

Preparing the garden for the winter

October 31 10:30 am - Action in the garden!
The mature compost needs to be sieved and put away, so that we can use the large black composter bin again
Our watering system (hoses, timers and sprinklers) also need to be collected and put away

You can come wearing your favorite costume... ;)