2023 gardens

Don’t think a thread has been started??

Never to early

I am going to tackle a garden of my own this upcoming spring. The house I bought last May has a dedicated 5 x 10 raised, enclosed garden on the south side of the house in back.

Last summer I pulled all the weeds growing in it and then sprayed it. In the fall, I churned it up to loosen the soil, leveled it, and then dumped some leaves in it for compost.

I really have no idea what to plant though. I’m open to suggestions on this, given that I am a rookie to the home gardening scene.

Well what kind of stuff do you like to eat from a garden. That’s what I plant!

I’ve let mine go for a couple years and I promised the Belle that this year she will be eating MN tomato’s. She say’s we can’t grow them here, I need to prove her incorrect, but I gotta lotta weeds to pull.

I’m pledging to get back into the garden game as well. Critters are the main thing (beyond time) holding me back.

I’m redoing my garden this year. I let the woman plant a bunch of random things last year and I feel alot of it went to waste. I ate all the peppers and need to re do it. My tomatoes did awesome last year and we had a hell fire of hot peppers.

We do a bucket garden every year up at the lake. Just a salsa garden thing my daughter started. Anyone try tomatillo’s in a bucket I thought about trying some next spring.

Had spaghetti for dinner tonight, used my sauce made from veggies from our garden. I really like reaching into the freezer and pulling a little bit of last summer out. Good stuff.

Next year more carrots, more tomatoes, less of some other stuff. Looking forward to watching it grow.

SR

We’ll be doing one again this year as well. Mainly tomatoes/peppers/herbs.

Just got my seed order yesterday.

Now that we are getting closer to legalization of Marijuana, has me rethinking about what I might plant.

gimruis wrote:

I am going to tackle a garden of my own this upcoming spring. The house I bought last May has a dedicated 5 x 10 raised, enclosed garden on the south side of the house in back.

Last summer I pulled all the weeds growing in it and then sprayed it. In the fall, I churned it up to loosen the soil, leveled it, and then dumped some leaves in it for compost.

I really have no idea what to plant though. I’m open to suggestions on this, given that I am a rookie to the home gardening scene.

With a smaller garden you are probably best off planting a salsa garden. Tomatoes of a bunch of varieties, a few peppers and maybe some cucumbers or squash if you lattice them. Problem with cukes and other similar veggies is they can take over the garden pretty quick. There’s an awesome greenhouse by my cabin that sells started veggies for very reasonable prices, so I don’t bother with seeds/starters anymore, just load up on Memorial Day weekend and plant the following week. We have about a quart and a half left of last years salsa, and will be bummed when it’s gone!

I’ve been a part (more reading than contributing) of this thread the past few years and to those getting into or back into gardening, I think you’ll like this thread!

Follow up to last year’s business-I hit it good with my potatoes and had hundreds of pounds of them, more than I could eat during the harvesting period. I knew I had to find some way to keep some preserved so I tried cutting up and freezing them as french fries and also freezing mashed potatoes.

For the fries I read online to let them sit in water, then boil for 3 minutes, then 3 minutes in ice water, then lay flat on parchment paper and freeze. Then I take what I’ve got in a freezer bag and they go right into frying oil.
What I’ve gotten is some that are kind of mushy and the insides coming out, so next year I’m probably not going to bother with boiling them, maybe just sit in water a little for the starch.

The mashed potatoes turned out real well. I read online that freezing mashed potatoes works just fine if you put enough diary (milk and butter) in them. So I pretty much made them like I would and then just put them in a freezer bag, flattened it for easy storage, and thre them in the freezer. I let them thaw in a bowl as they do get just a little watery, but I’m very happy with how that went and I’ll be doing that every year.

My wife came across this idea on the internet so had to build it last year. Live in the north woods so deer are the main problems with a garden so had to fence it in. Nice design that you can work all the different areas. Had to do raised garden since the soil is so crappy here with rocks and clay. If I remember correctly it is 16×20.

Forgot to attach the photo. Sucks getting old and forgetting things.

BigWerm wrote:

With a smaller garden you are probably best off planting a salsa garden. Tomatoes of a bunch of varieties, a few peppers and maybe some cucumbers or squash if you lattice them. Problem with cukes and other similar veggies is they can take over the garden pretty quick. There’s an awesome greenhouse by my cabin that sells started veggies for very reasonable prices, so I don’t bother with seeds/starters anymore, just load up on Memorial Day weekend and plant the following week. We have about a quart and a half left of last years salsa, and will be bummed when it’s gone!

Thanks much

We plan to also join the home garden crowd this spring. We had a couple raised beds at our old place and will be making a few for our new place (well have been here 3 years now..)

What does everyone like to use for building their raised beds? At our old place I used treated 2x10s, but have heard that using treated isn’t the best idea – which may explain why the first couple of years our boxed were great, but the last few things didn’t grow all that well.

I’ve been leaning towards using corrugated steel as the boss wants them to look nice. But it’s not cheap and it’s difficult to find any used. Anyone build some with something they really like?

Tlazer – those boxes look very nice – how did you build those?

drewbop wrote:

I’ve been leaning towards using corrugated steel as the boss wants them to look nice. But it’s not cheap and it’s difficult to find any used. Anyone build some with something they really like?

My neighbor did this last year, and I do not care for it.

glenn57 wrote:

Don’t think a thread has been started??

Never to early

Hey Glen. Are those Kohlrabi the variety that grows real fast and gets big without tasting woody or bitter???? The last few years I’ve been buying them at the local Farmers market. I can’t believe how big some of them are and still taste great. When I was younger the ones we grew had to be eaten when they were still rather small or else they would not taste good at all. Last year I started making lots of Pickled ones. The refrigerator kind that doesn’t need canning. They are yummy pickeled.

I used left over composite decking from when I built my deck. Now the deck and garden box match. I like the way tlazer did his and may go this route for a bigger box.

drewbop wrote:

What does everyone like to use for building their raised beds?

There’s a bunch of pics and discussion in last years thread that might help. I used cedar as I had a bunch in the garage. TBD on how it holds up or lasts, as it’s only a year old but so far so good.

http://www.in-depthoutdoors.com/community/forums/topic/2022-gardens/page/2/

Super Sauce, Big Daddy, and Honeycomb tomatoes. Park Whopper jalapeno. Full size and thumbelina zinnias. Inca marigolds. Peppers and tomatoes getting started in next couple of weeks, here in Arkansas.

fishthumper…….no there the early vienna whites. i did pick up a package of the purple ones just to try them.

i thought of finding the seeds for the big ones, but i also had bought a couple of them monsters at the farmers market, but when you eat a piece of the big one and then the vienna whites, the vienna whites tasted way better in my mind. i’ve had the vienna whites get as big as a baseball..yea some get woody but if you can pick and eat them as they grow there ok!!!!!

as far as wondering what a newbie to gardening wants to know about what to plant, i still say it depends largely on what you like to eat out of a garden.

i make salsa different kinds of things from cukes and my own soup starter so thats what i mainly grow. i like kalarabi, so i plant them. i also grow my own dill!!!!!!!1

Tlazer that looks awesome! I’m on the edge of the wilderness so I have the same problem. Between garden and newly planted trees I’ve probably got $200-$300 invested in fencing the last few years*

*Minus Menards 11% rebate of course.

I just finished the last project of our 2022 garden, shelled 96 ears of popcorn into just shy of 2 gallons of kernels. Couldn’t believe how well it grew, nearly every plant had at least 2 ears, several had 4. Pretty sure I’ll be safe switching to sweet corn this summer and won’t run out of popcorn. Taste tested it twice just to make sure it tasted good.

Transplanted some rhubarb last spring so should be able to get some this coming spring, haven’t had rhubarb pie in years.

Hoping to add a Northstar cherry to the orchard this year and need to add a better pollinating partner for our honeycrisp too (hoping for sweet 16 but will see what local nursery has come spring). Originally had thought the crabapples in yard would work but they are all a little too early (but perfect for the zestar).

I used the plastic boards from Menard’s. Same dimension as regular lumber. Cheaper than cedar but more expensive than treated. We also didn’t want to use treated for a vegetable garden. Hope it holds up, reinforced the corners with sections of the 4×4 support posts for the fence. Worry a little about what the cold weather could do to the plastic. We all know about shrinkage in cold weather. So far from what I can tell it is ok so far, but we haven’t had any extreme cold weather either. Used two 2×8’s stacked for the base so it is 15” deep and 4×4 for the posts. The fence panels came from L&M and I think they were called cattle panels? They were 16’ long and heavy gauge wire but I can’t remember the width but I think they were about 50”. They were not expensive though around $40 a panel.

Here’s a little gardening porn to get you excited about spring. Went into a Lowes in Florida today. After 5 years, still gets me seeing a fully stocked garden and flower racks in January.

2nd try on pic

one more

Stevenoak. That is just cruel showing those photos. I could send a photo of my garden, but I would have to shovel it out from under 3 feet of snow. I better shovel quick since they are calling for another 4-8” of snow tomorrow. Sick of winter and it’s only mid January.