Ever hear of late winter gardening? It involves seeds, seeds and more seeds and then a lot of planning. That’s what’s happening at Terra Basics right now.
Our seeds are organized, inventoried and now it’s time to sit down and plan for all those seeds in a garden plan. We will order any last minute seeds for our new garden areas also.
We have plans for the mint garden which didn’t get finished last year. We are expanding the hillside garden which got partially completed last year. The part that didn’t get finished will become a shade garden for the medicinal woodland herbs and flowers. This will be a great garden for items that need the shelter of the trees from the hot afternoon sun. We will also be reclaiming some of our east slope garden. The wild raspberries have become competition with the elderberry and blackberries. The wild raspberries haven’t tamed well, so we are giving that space to the elderberries and blackberries. This will work out well as we want to expand our elderberries to allow for harvesting of the flowers and still get elderberries.
There is a small east facing garden that has been neglected for some time. It is tucked around the back of the house and not looked at very often. Now that my new office faces that garden, it is in for some grand plans this year.
We’re going to be putting in a new small vegetable garden into a spot that was cleared a few years ago when we took down the 80 ft pine trees.This will be a garden area that will slowly come along over a period of years and be expanded as needed.
After a hike around the property, Tom and I found a small meadow area in the Northeast corner of the property. This will become a small woodland garden for the understory shrubs and shade herbs. It was exciting to find. It is a bit far away, I just hope I don’t have to lug too much water over there!
Our main gardens will get some revitalizing this year also. Every few years we need to dig out the perennials, split them up and add some ‘black gold’ to the soil. The nice part about that is that we get to expand our inventory. Some of the perennials we will pot up and sell as organic potted perennials in the spring. These beds are like a whole new garden bed and plants take off growing since they have more room and nutrients. All of our garden beds have perennials in them. We plant our annuals around the perennials. This allows for the perennials to expand without the need of so much transplanting. When we do have to dig and transplant, we have the opportunity to totally remake the garden bed. We are so looking forward to when the snow is gone and watching everything come back to life in our gardens.
Will be starting some of our early early crops as well as a few longer season crops like tomatoes, peppers and eggplants in March. Now is a great time to let us know what you are looking for this year. Terra Basics is happy to grow to order.
