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checking off the weeks

My planting calendar starts in March (although Bobby had some helpers prep one of my garden areas in Feb). I spaced the pole beans out and planted one kind each week, in hopes that will stagger some of the heavier harvest times. And I'm excited that things are beginning to sprout and grow, and the planting is still on-going.

Pole Beans - Kentucky Wonder. They're large, flat green beans. Not Bobby's favorite but I love them because they are easy to grow and I think they taste good. I only have a small row of these this year. (This is what my geese kept eating last year.)

Pole Beans - Green Limas  I've never tried these before, and I'm excited at how they keep popping up. (See the small speck of green peaking through in the center top of the pic?) I guess I planted some seeds deeper than others as they're coming up in bunches every 3-4 days.

Pole Beans - blue lake stringless. Another green bean that is new to me but should be smaller than the Kentucky Wonder. Hoping Bobby will like this a little bit better.

Tomatoes (seedlings purchased from Ken's Produce) are now up to the lower rung. (Yes, I know I need to weed.)
 I only have 8 tomato plants this year.

Dwarf sugar snaps...the first thing that went in the ground...a "cool weather" crop.

Our helpers Josh and Jake assisted in putting up the fence to keep the chickens and geese out of this area. I can't till or dig down in this area because of the dog's underground fence and an electrical wire running through this area. So I'm using wheat straw. Since I didn't have it out all winter, I'm having to water it every day for 2 weeks to prep it for planting. I've used this method on a small scale twice before and was very pleased with the results (or until the baby chicks entered and scratched the straw apart!!!)

And my other cool weather crop - red potatoes - has been started and stopped 3x now thanks to geese and chickens. They are now in the fence area and at least 2 plants for every planter have survived the previous excavations.




Eggplants should start sprouting this week. Okra and some zipper peas went in the ground Saturday. Cantalopue and red peppers also went in their straw bales, and we started prep on the area where we'll plant corn Saturday as well. That area will not be fenced in, and I fear the deer and raccoons will totally ravish the crops, but I want to try. Next week I'll plant more zipper peas and the last week in April will be bush butterbeans (grey and green). And that will be all I can handle, if everything makes it to harvest.

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