I put the tomatoes and peppers in this week. And I did something radical, crazy and new....I went to my local garden store and bought a bag of compost manure! I mixed this into the mounds where I planted the tomatoes and peppers. Now that I know that I can buy it, and how easy it is (go figure) I think I'll make mixing in compost/manure a regular part of my garden routine. I probably should have bought more, but I had enough to put one good full shovel-full in each mound. I already have a beautiful Carmen pepper about 1.5 inches long.
While I was at the garden store I got a few nasturtiums, which are supposed to be good companion plants for the tomatoes and melons and put them into that side of the garden. I ended up kind of changing my plan a little bit, so that one half of the garden has the tomatoes, marigolds, nasturtiums and the melon patch (I decided to plant all the melons together to try to help control the sprawl, rather than interplanting them in the grid as I had previously considered). I saw a lone pot of white spanish onions, and thinking of Karen's blog (Mid-Northeast) about planting onions, I figured, what the heck. So I got them, and put them in too. I'm kind of excited about that.
What else...I went ahead and shoved a few touchstone gold beet seeds in the ground and we'll see what happens with those. Muskmelon and Old Melon seeds too - the lady at the garden store told me it was okay to put these in.
It must have given you some comfort that the first set of zucchini would be o.k. when you found your little survivor sitting in the water. Can't wait to see what happens. I like your mounding system, it looks very orderly! I love compost and think that is why I had survivors where I thought I wouldn't. Good luck!
ReplyDeleteBlack Cow is cheap! (relatively) and truly the best stuff that the big box stores have for adding into your garden. Add it in twice a year, up to 2" on top of the soil.
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