Getting the garden ready!

We have been busy building raised garden beds for the garden in the backyard and the crop rows out front.

Out back we leveled out the old garden that was there, expanded it to about twice the size, laid down some weed block, gravel and then fenced it in (yes this is a mini yard within the yard to keep the dogs out and deter deer). Since we weren’t sure what had been planted there in the past, we wanted to start with a clean slate… and I really wanted raised beds lol.

Since we never like to see things go to waste and we repurpose anything we can, most of the beds in the back are made from recycled garage door panels! This was one of Russ’ amazing ideas and puts the veggies at the perfect height! Since they are so deep, we used a method called Hügelkultur to fill them. This is basically a variation of composting where you take downed trees, branches and yard clippings, then top it off with compost and soil. For my garden, you guessed it we grabbed branches from the trees we cut down for the poles and put them in the bottom of the bed. This was then topped with grass clippings, some bark, tossed in some compost from the kitchen and then 3-way soil. This created the perfect mix of minerals and nutrients for the plant to grow really big.

We were building these as we had materials, so we started with two 4x12 and one 2x6 foot wide beds. Two more 4x4 beds were set in place to be used the next year, these are the ones pictured above. In keeping with the idea of Hügelkultur we tossed the compost and grass clipping into the beds. I also used these beds to toss all the suckers from the tomatoes, and any other green material we had in the garden. At the end of the season, I even took the plants I had pulled up, chopped them up into little pieces and tossed them into the beds. Then I added some coffee grounds to get some acid added, a good amount of bark and some dirt on top.

The three filled beds were set up with a pressure drip system off the spigot in the back. In addition to the beds in the main back garden area we had two raised beds on the patio and some plants in pots, most of this was also set up on the drip system as well. I loved having the drip system, it made it so easy to just turn it on while I was out pinching suckers off the tomatoes and harvesting and then just shut it off when I was done. I’ll admit the tomatillos got away from me that first year and my neighbor called me to ask what the giant bushes were in the back LOL. She was excited to learn they were tomatillos and was happy to receive a big batch of them! And when I say they got away from me these things got to be about 6 ft tall or so! Naturally this resulted in over 100lbs of tomatillos from one little bed…

Stay tuned to hear about my first canning adventure!