Temp has dropped twenty degrees in the past hour.New herbs that I received from a friend and avid gardener are now in the ground. Here is hoping that the awesome soil they came in can amend the existing soil enough for the plants to thrive. If so, I will have one awesome herb garden.
The herbs that I have received are the following: oregano, thyme, sage, chives, lemon verbena, bee balm, horehound, sweet marjoram, sweet woodruff. These join what I have already planted of basil, oregano, rosemary.
The basil took a bit of a beating this week with the extreme temps. By Tuesday evening, the leaves were in a downward slope. After today's rain, the leaves have sprung back to life and I have removed the one yellowed leaf that was on the bottom of the plant. I have to wonder if this leaf yellowed because of the heat, the soil or because of the mulch that has been around it.
Listening to WHYY's You Bet Your Garden http://www.whyy.org/91FM/ybyg/index.html, I learned not to use wood chips as mulch around herbs and vegetables. This is mostly due to the wood that wants to decompose competing in the same soil as the plant that wants to grow. They suggested items like ground leaves and newspaper.
Pumpkins, beans and one tomato plant are shooting up nicely but the others are struggling to emerge. I planted the pumpkins and bush beans from seed about 1.5 weeks ago. They have sprouted quite nicely. Of the three tomato starts, only one survives and that is in a container. How do you kill a container plant with fresh garden soil?
The lettuce barely grew and I have yet to see a pea. I have the plants that have sprouted, but no pods.
Eggplant, butternut squash, peppers, carrots and the basil all from seed each have emerged from the ground and are now so tiny. They have been in the ground almost a month now and I fear for their future. I have one cucumber plant that is growing nicely. These are all in the square foot garden that I prepared by hand earlier this spring.
I am hoping that my plants grow and thrive and that we will have some vegetables come harvest time to preserve for the winter. I have a feeling that we will have a lot of beans so plans are in place for stringing, freezing and canning.
In the front, I have planted perennial flowers. I was given a hummingbird garden from "The Bluebird Man" on Migratory Bird Day. I started a little patch next to the Butterfly Bush. Being all native seeds, there is no certainty as to when these plants will emerge. In the larger section, where I cut down the yew bushes last year, I have planted chamomile, lavender, shasta daisy and foxglove. I may or may not see growth this year, we shall see.
Another local gardener this past week offered up some extra lettuce and chives that were overtaking her space. After a hectic weekend and start to the week, my husband was finally able to help her with her dilemma and take some lettuce and chives off of her hands. She also gave us some spearmint. I look forward to having fresh chives handy and saving some for our cooking adventures. I plan on saving a leaf or two of the spearmint to start growing and maintaining in a container year round. Spearmint tea is in the plans as well as working on making oils. I also found a neat recipe for creating a paste for certain herbs and freezing them. Here is the link for that information: http://www.bhg.com/recipes/how-to/food-storage-safety/freezing-herbs/
This is my first year for my garden. I am trying to work with the space that I have the best that I can. Please let me know what suggestions you may have for this. I can see gardening becoming an enjoyable hobby as well as a need for sustenance. After listening to countless hours of podcasts on gardens and reading a hefty stack of books on the subject, it is looking like I may be turning my brown thumb green. Time will tell. In the mean time, I sure do enjoy putting my bare hands into the soil and watching a plant sprout. Thank you.
