Gardens for 2021 season

S

SONNY

501 Club
Anybody thinking about this years gardens? seed books slow coming this year---only have 4 here so far. We need to order a few seeds this year. We have some "saved seed" and will start testing it to see if it will grow.
Are you going bigger? smaller? same size? Ours will be close to the same size as in past years except for an area not planted so we can stockpile horse manure during the growing season, then spread after harvest and plow under.
 
House garden quite small, just garlic and radish this year. Maybe a cherry tomato plant or two.

Going to plant several more pecan trees on the acreage. Have a nice level location chosen. Problem with the location is that there are several houses buried under the current soil. The soil is packed clay and doesn't seem to have enough nutrition for trees but does grow grass. Will take the backhoe and dig out several good size holes for the pecans, then fill the holes with good soil.

The area is about 3/4 acre. Looks like they scraped off the top soil and used it to burm the adjacent stream. Then dug the hole to bury the houses, covered the houses with clay. For years been building up top soil by adding humus, 2 and 3 year round hay bales from the neighbors.

Edit: Discussion this afternoon with son. Might as well add several fruit trees with our pecan order. 4 or 5 soil samples from the planned planting area and from the location where we plan on obtaining better soil.
 
My garden is expanding this year. I’m getting ready in my greenhouse to start tomato plants about the end of February to have them ready to plant about the middle of April. I’m planning on 400 tomato plants. These will go in a garden near my house in town along with some cucumbers, squash, okra and probably some other things. I also have an acre prepared army farm for sweet corn, peas, and green beans. I plan on selling as much as I can and also give to family and friends. Now if the ground will dry out enough to get my rows bedded and tomato stakes in the ground I’ll be good to go
 
About the same size, with a couple of added things planted for my son, who moved closer last summer. Seeds are ordered, one package inshipped, with arrival date of next Tuesday.

Ed
 
Hopefully this year will be a lot better than last year was. Late frost last year left us with no fruit and ground stayed cold til it was almost too late to plant. Some of the early planted seeds did not come up at all. Carrots and beets here did nothing---could have been seed but I think the cold wet ground did it.
 
Honestly, I'd rather jump into a swimming pool of razor blades and then take a bath in rubbing alcohol than think about gardens right now!

But I did take some soil samples on Saturday.......I missed the "free" window for the NC lab, so I'll have to send a check. $4 a sample now.

Al
 
Eugene":lbjyyj9s said:
Soil samples from the planned planting area and from the location where we plan on obtaining better soil.
Click to expand...
$20- per soil sample.

Picked up 3 soil sample kits from the Univ MO Extension Office. $60-, sounds expensive. We are going to buy and plant 3 to 4 foot tall seedlings, some where around $200- for the trees. Fence the trees to keep out the cattle. May be 20 or 30 man hours to complete the project. Then pump and haul water to the trees as needed.
 
I ordered one big kit a few years ago and a refill for it 2 years ago----they last a long time. I dont do much testing--- just fertilize heavy and concentrate on getting the siol loosened up with compost.
 
We have 3 areas on our farm we plant ,one is 100' x 100', second area is about 250' x 50' and the third area is 100' x 135'
We have a produce stand on the farm so we grow everything from seed in our 12' x24' greenhouse. This coming season I plan on using drip irritation from the pond and cover raised beds with plastic mulch using the cub.
 
New house equals new garden. Look forward to the new, first time garden at the new house. Already have a herb area for the wife. And vegetable garden is currently being developed in an old patio area. (30x20).
I’ll keep you guys updated on what we grow.
 
I have snow 5 feet deep over one of the little gardens, a quarter acre on by the shed --- that will take forever to melt and dry up.
The rest of the gardens have 2 foot drifts scattered over them,wont take long for them to dry up, also sub-soiled 3 feet deep in them so water will go down faster.
Onion plants on order will come the week of the 23'rd of Mar, which is the time we need to plant them ----MOST years we get them right in --- one year it was 2 weeks late!
 
Don McCombs":1rv2myx4 said:
It will be a month before I can even SEE the dirt.
Click to expand...

Go to the store and buy a bag of topsoil! :) You could see some dirt before nightfall!

Who will be starting seeds indoors? (I will be!)

Whatcha starting and when are you starting them?
 
No seed flats til the end of this month or first week of Mar ----that way plants dont get overly wild growth and spindly. then later the outdoor hotbed will be started.
 
The ground is finally starting to dry out here in central NC. Hopefully I can get the garden tilled and rows bedded up next week. I’m starting tomatoes this week sometime. I’ll be starting some seeds about every ten days up until about the end of April. I hope to start setting tomato plants out beginning about the middle of April and will continue planting until about the end of May. I had 500 heirloom tomatoes last year and I’m planning on the same this year. I’ll also be planting cucumbers, peas, beans, and squash once the ground warms up. I sure hope the garden season isn’t as rainy this year as last year was.
 
We put 3 sweet potatoes in jars of water and waiting on ground to settle so we can dig out the area for the second hotbed. still freezing the ground at night making it slimy in the daytime so might have to wait a few days to work on that.
This years weather could be another weird one ----- hope not! Last year we hauled 10,000 gallons of water to keep our gardens alive. the year before that was 15,000 gallons.
We are setting up a couple more rain tanks to catch more water this year early. I have the old one up now to start next time it rains. dont think it will freeze enough to break the tanks. they can take quite a hit and be o.k.
Going to start a couple seed flats in the basement soon, heat pads under seed flats and grow light on top -----usually works. Need a few early cabbage and tomato plants.
Main crop plants will be started outside in the hotbeds!
 
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