Progress in the Planting World

For the last few weeks, I've been absorbed largely with preparing for the Oregon Glass Guild's 9th annual Glass Gallery show at the Oregon Convention Center. The show was this last weekend, and my next scheduled show isn't until November, so I have a nice wide chunk of time where there are no pressing crafting deadlines. Convenient, now that spring is sproinging and I'm ready to start planting at least some of my year's crops!

My husband has been hard at work putting together our raised beds and filling them with a combination of a compost underlayment and a three-way mix fill (three-way being 1/3 compost, 1/3 topsoil, and 1/3 sand.) As he's filling the second of the three tiered beds I have designed, I'm busy following behind planting what he's filled.

One problem that faces some folks in areas such as mine, where the weather can be unseasonably cool right into June, is overeagerness. Someone told a gal on one of my gardening mailing lists that she could plant tomatoes starting April 1; another told the same gal she could plant them starting April 30th. She split the difference and was going to plant around April 15th, until a bunch of folks told her that was far too early for our area. The issue isn't so much whether or not we'll get a hard freeze, or even snow, as it is the ground hasn't warmed up yet. Tomatoes (and many of our other summer crops) are tropical in nature, and really need the ground to be 55 degrees bare minimum, with 75-85 being ideal. That doesn't happen around here until June or so.

One reason I use raised beds, even where the soil is fairly decent, is to allow me to extend the growing season a bit. They warm up earlier in the spring, and they are easier to attach row covers and cloches to than the flat ground. I also like raised beds because I can sit on the edge and work towards the middle, and they are never so wide (by design) that I can't reach into at least the middle if not farther, so I never have to get into the beds. And with paths between instead of bare dirt, I battle far fewer weeds, and have an easy place to put my tools and wheel barrow and such. I've been asked if it's necessary to use raised beds, and of course it isn't. It isn't even necessary to rototill or amend your soil; you can use a lasagna layering method, or just strip off the sod and hope. Your results of course will vary on a number of things, including what you plant, the character of your native soil, how you fertilize and water, and even the lay of your land. Raised beds just bring more of the variables within your control.

Today I planted two lavenders, a rosemary, and a feverfew in the center Herb bed. I also acquired a pineapple sage for that bed, though she won't be planted outside until June, and I have some chives and oregano as well. In the middle tier I planted Walla Walla sweet onions, white onions, red onions, 20 asparagus crowns, and three rhubarb plants with room for a fourth. I have room in that bed reserved for strawberries, beans, peas, carrots, radishes, and lettuce. The outside bed will be corn, squash, cucumbers, cauliflower, tomatoes, celery, and perhaps a few other things.

While I was at it, I also planted two new columbine plants and a winter Daphne as well as three ferns and a hardy fuschia for the hummingbirds. I've started my Orphan Plant section too, with three healthy Ivy plants and three small cedar trees.