One of the best things about this area is that you can practically garden all year long! With the exception of a cold front or two….

This was my garden over the weekend. We had two nights of lows in the mid 30′s and I figured that several of my new sprouts wouldn’t like those temperatures too much. I also covered my peppers with pillow cases. I find that they are typically pretty cold tolerant, however, they do not handle wind well at all, and this cold front brought with it some strong winds. I’m happy to report that all of my plants survived just fine. The cold front passed through and gave way to great whether today…highs around seventy. After checking the 10 day forecast I decided that it would probably be okay to take advantage of my President’s Day off of work and get a start on my spring garden, as temperatures will only continue to rise over the next week and a half.

The first thing that I did was remove the last of my collard greens from the garden. They were getting pretty scraggly  and unhealthy. So much so, that I was noticing quite a few aphids on the bottom of their leaves. They contributed to many great morning smoothies though! I replaced them with baby tomato sprouts that I picked up today. For some reason the tomatoes that I planted at the beginning of January did not fare well at all. I think that I planted them too early. I am hoping that this second round will do better. I have quite a few tomato plants now, so if they all grow up I should have lots:)

I also planted a bunch of pole beens under this bean tower. I hope that when they sprout they will trellis up this tower:) I also bought some nitrogen fixing soil additive to add to the soil around the beans (wow, total bio 101 flashback!). They are legumes, one of those plants with nitrogen fixing rhizomes around their roots, so I guess it makes sense that  the additive would help. Has anyone tried this before? Does it work?

I also planted a new medium sized tomato and another banana pepper in the place where I recently harvested some cabbage. I love peppers and tomatoes and use them in so much of my cooking, so I wanted to plant plenty in this spring’s garden!

Little Beets sprouting up.

The cucumbers that I planted a few weeks ago have started to flower. They started flowering just as they cold front came in, so I definitely covered them up this past weekend.

New purple flower!

Ryan got me this pretty azalea for Valentine’s Day, along with some beautiful yellow roses and an awesome framed piece of art for our wall:) The azalea looks great on our front porch!

Well, that’s the premise for my spring garden:) Stick around to see how it grows!

Sea Ya Later! 

Kerry Anita