This is the time that you are really glad you started preparing some veggie beds last fall! Springtime at 3000 feet is slow. The soil is chilly and often wet. Raised beds prepared in fall are excellent: they dry out and warm up much quicker. All the better to put in little transplants like this spinach! Full confession is I bought these spinach starts at the store.
Having to start from the beginning on nearly everything at the farmstead means everything goes slowly. I do have some little starts on the light table, but I got them in late, so they’ll go in late. Unlike so many things under the command of nature’s schedule, that’s ok in this case. The slow arrival of spring gives a longer window to grow cool weather crops. Some years it’s cool and rainy enough to grow them all summer. Last year before we arrived it was a wet chilly El Niño year and the area got a whole year’s average rainfall by the first of August. That’s terrible for tomatoes but the upside is there was kale at the market the whole summer.
Last fall I did manage to get some garlic in the ground and it looks great so far. Some was from seed garlic I brought from the former Larrapin Garden, which I’ll call Larrapin West now. Could only plant a tiny bit as the garden space is very small so far. It’s quite an adjustment from a 2100 square foot fenced and ready-to-plant garden!
Some sedum I acquired from a division last fall is poking up and looking cheery. One sweet thing about coming back home is that friends I gave plants to years ago are offering to give divisions from those plants back to me to start at the new garden. That is a lovely full circle feeling.
I’ve got plenty of room to expand, but ‘breaking ground’ is challenging even when there is pretty decent soil underneath. Grass does not relinquish it’s dominion easily. Even when it’s not bermuda. (But oh thank goodness it is NOT bermuda. That grass will humble you fast…) The little deck off the kitchen is done. Now we just need a door! It’s in the works.
Since I didn’t have time to get cover crops established last fall, I covered everything in straw. The worms have loved this and it’s actually challenging to dig much without a worm massacre. So I’m down with hand tools as much as possible. Every one of those worms is valuable! Oh the joy of soft soil that in most (but not all!) areas of the garden just needs a dollop of compost to be dark and fluffy. In that regard, I feel very lucky!
