First Post of 2016!

I'm back!

First let me say that when I went to check out my blog from last year, I was bummed to find that I somehow stopped blogging in June! 

This year I plan on blogging through the whole gardening season. For reals. I mean it.

On to the garden!

Before actually getting out there and digging in the dirt, I drew myself a little garden plan. 

My vision. Messy - but I think it gets the point across!

And here's the actual garden as it stands today:

So far I've planted carrot seeds  in the little circular bed in the upper left, beets in the front middle section of the big bed on the left,  and cabbages and onions in the back middle section of that bed.
There's also asparagus coming up in the front right bed.

Asparagus!

Onions weren't in my original plan but I went to the nursery to pick up cabbage seedlings and... you how those things go!.

The variety is Alisa Craig, which I've never planted before. According to the tag they're "huge mild onions, yellow skinned." Hoping they actually grow huge for me!  I planted them down the center of my cabbage bed, and  continued them down the center of the area where I planted beets (not pictured yet). Also tucked some into my strawberry bed, just to see what happens.

Alternating green and purple cabbages with onions down the middle.

It's been raining for the past five days, so I haven't finished my spring planting. I still have to plant peas, and have one more pot of onions that need a home. Tomorrow's supposed to be sunny (before it rains again for a few more days!) so I hope to get that all done. *knock on particle board*

When I was looking over some of my old posts I noticed that a big theme was rabbits.

Rabbit in my garden in early April, pre-gardening season

Two years ago they decimated my peas and cabbage. Last year though - not a nibble. I'm convinced it was because I used this:

This stuff works!

Liquid Fence Deer and Rabbit Repellent (next to a super cute watering can I found at Target!).  It's all natural, made mostly from rotten eggs and garlic. It's stinky, but it works. I spray it around the perimeter of my beds and also around the big bush that you can see in the rear of the first pic in this post, where the rabbits seem to emerge. For some reason I've been against the idea of getting a physical fence - so this has been the perfect solution for me. Target carries it. I ordered it online and picked it up in store (which is when I grabbed the watering can!). But if you can't find it there Amazon also has it.

Another theme from previous years failed beet crops. I *think* this may have been because beets don't like too much nitrogen and I was adding cow manure compost to all of my beds every year. TI haven't added composed manure to my beds for a couple seasons.  Instead I just fertilize them with Tomato-Tone or Garden-Tone.

 I swear by that stuff - especially the Tomato-Tone for tomatoes.

Anyhoo... even with the fertilizer the beets fizzled out. So this year I decided to add *this* to the beet bed:

Gurney's Potato Food

It's Gurney's Potato Food, especially formulated for root crops, including beets!

I'm also planning on keeping that bed very watered. Beets need constant steady moisture for good development. Maybe that's been the problem?

 I will win the beet wars this year, mark my words!

No more dead beets allowed!