This is my goal! I am going to post a couple photo updates related to the allotment garden at this page every month this year, so that it is easy to follow the progress month by month.
January
Behind the garden shed, the bushes at the bottom of this photo are the raspberry bushes at the top of my sketch. All my garden beds are covered in a thick layer of snow.
In front of the shed, sitting at the stairs looking at the compost bin, and the raspberry& black currant bushes…..and we have about 30 inches of snow.
Gardening related happenings in January 2024:
February
Behind the shed, the main gardening area.
In front of the shed. The snow is starting to melt.
Cold sowing some spinach and carrots, to get a head start of the growing season. I prepared the beds in the fall (cleaned them up, and added mature compost) before everything froze, and now in February I shovel the snow away, sow the seeds I want to plant and sprinkle some new soil on top. I also made sure to shovel some of the snow back on top of the beds I planted in. The cold weather stratifies the seeds and prompts germination when the time is right. The snow keeps the seeds moist when they start to germinate, and it provide an extra nitrogen fertilizer to the plant.
Gardening related happenings in February 2024:
March
By the end of March, Easter weekend, all the snow on the back side of the garden is gone.
On the front side there’s a tiny bit of snow left.
All the berry bushes are budding.
Gardening related happenings in March 2024:
April
An opportunity arised when I saw an ad on Blocket (a classified advertisement website like Craigslist in the US,) for raised garden beds at 1/3 of the usual price. I contacted the seller and had 20 beds delivered. I organized them with two beds on top of each other, and I now have ten additional garden beds. I’ve started to fill them with organic planting material (branches/compost/soil.)
There is still a lot of work left, but there’s still time. (Unfortunately we are looking forward to some cooler nights this coming week. ) I’ve also purchased fencing material to protect my garden from all the deer in the area. It’s been very windy and rainy this weekend therefor I have not put it up yet.
On April 20th I finally got around to fence the garden. The fence is almost invisible to the human eye, unless you are very close, but distinctive to the deer.
The fence is UV resistant and supposed to last for many years. I could easily bring it with me if I would garden at a different location at some point. I think that I’ll probably take it down every winter. We’ll see. Now I’m finally ready to do some gardening! I have the beds in place and the fencing! Let the fun begin!
Gardening related happenings in April 2024:
May
Purchasing and planting a Victoria plum tree at the allotment.
Gardening related happenings in May 2024:
June
summer solstice celebration.
Gardening related happenings in June 2024:
GreenDreams 