Spring Planning

In theory I should have done this over the winter, but I just couldn't bring myself to think of spring when it was so far away. Now that the weather is warm, by which I mean above freezing most days, my soul yearns for the garden to begin. Mind you this is a very danger state of mind to be in while looking at plant porn from such places as Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds. Their website leaves something to be desired. Still, it is functional, and their seed catalog is a joy to read.


I went about the planning for this years garden with a full year of garden experience under my belt. Which means I fumbled at it again with only slightly more expertise. I did learn last year that you can actually plant all sorts of things around tomatoes and they could care less. They're the sky-scrapers of the vegetable kingdom and leave lots of room for those dwelling at street level. As such I prepared two plans for the 3rd row this year. Since it was the only row that didn't have any tomatoes plunked into it during the great bunny scouring of the garden in '08 it gets all the tomatoes this year. I only know that I'm growing Black Cherry and Amish Paste for sure, we'll see what fills in the remaining slots over the next month. Seedling strength will have something to do with it but I'm not sure which of the larger tomatoes I want for sure.



The bed that had been the pea bed last year will turn into a little potato field featuring both regular and sweet varieties. I think I will attempt to get my own slips, but I have dubious feelings as to how that will go.

The 1st and 2nd row will be well and true vegetable gardens this year assuming that the fence does its job and prevents the bunny scouring of '09. Being raised with orderly rows of plants it took a great deal of willpower to plan out the beds as they're laid out above. What keeps me on track is the knowledge I obtained last year from the results of mixing and matching different types of veggies. For instance, the carrots inter planted with the Swiss Chard did far better than those out by themselves. Referencing The Vegetable Gardener's Bible for plants that get along well together I came up with this plan and we'll see how it goes.

As with all planning it will be fun to look back in a couple months and see how far I ended up straying from this plan. The realities of life and nature may take us far away from this road map. Still I can see what it would look like in July in my and it is beautiful and tasty.