Hello everyone....

Well I've got a super big garden this year and I'm trying to decide what to grow. Soo I was just wondering what every one's favorite home grown veggie is? Plus any tips for the growing season would be good too!

Our garden should be ready to plant mid to late May. So far I'm for sure planting tomatoes, potatoes, onions and peas. I already have an asparagus patch, garlic and rhubarb! Mmm Yummy!

YAY to spring and the upcoming growing season!

YAY Sass, I wish I lived closer, I would help you and we could can together!!!!!

I have a garden spot that is really small (hopefully 10X20 this year) but we plant, green onions, radish, green pole beans, yellow wax bush beans, sweet corn, tomatoes, zucchini, Patty pans, cucumbers and Jalepenoes. I wish I could plant pumpkins too, but we don't have the room!  Hmm, I'm missing something I think!

Have fun Sassy!!!!!!! 

WWIT.....what the heck are patty pans?

Squash!  They grow so big up here b/c of the non-stop summer sun, I bet they'd do pretty well there too.  Spagetti, acorn, butternut, zuccini, cucumber, etc.

To grow potatoes, just cube an old (sprouting) regular potato of any type and plant the pieces.  Dig them up after a couple weeks for baby (or "new") potatoes.  I had 2 rotten-ish potatoes last spring that I planted and was amazed at how many good little baby potatoes it produced.  It was cool to see how the roots spread out underground to places I didn't even plant them, and how the original potato I planted had dried up into a hard black compost crisp.  I planted them in raised rows, but have heard of people growing them in all sorts of containters.

This season I have started: cilantro, basil, chives, parsley, thyme, mint, dill, oregano, and lemons indoors.  I plan to dwarf the lemon tree and keep it indoors if any of the seedlings actually live.  My littlest one has been collecting seeds from his apples all winter and won't listen to me about them not growing up here, so we'll have a row for that.  I don't have room for an apple tree indoors and I've never heard of dwarfing one of those (?).  I have butternut squash, zuccini, broccoli, cauliflower, sugarsnap peas, green beans, spinach, tomatoes, carrots (orange, purple, & white), garlic, onions, sweet potatoes & yams started.  It dumped about 9" of snow on us earlier this week and temps are still getting down into single digits at night, so it will be at least June 1 or later before I get to move them all outside.  That's just the veggies... the flowers are an entire different story!  I start my own from seed b/c it's cheaper than buying them already grown or started.  I will be attempting some perennials for the 1st time ever (a friend planted iris, tiger lily, cosmos, and delphiniums that she grew from seed when we 1st moved in, but I've never started any).  I don't know much about starting bulb plants from seeds and then if I'm supposed to freeze them 1st or what.  Found some cool gardening sites that I plan to get answers from about it though: gardenweb.com and Suite101 are some.

WOW! Everyone has such great plans!

Our planting season is still a few weeks off! Can you believe that it got down to -5c last night! Brrrrrr!

LOL, I still don't have the final list of food that I plan to grow! But I want it to last like potatoes or be able to can the foods to stretch the summer food into the winter!

With the prices of food going up soo much I feel like this is necessary to live well!

I hope we are not heading for another "depression" recession is bad enough! But if we do....it will be far worse than the 1930's....at least back then many, many people had home gardens!

I would really like to be frugal and treat our resources with the utmost respect! Goodness we need them for the human race to survive! ~sigh~

Anyway I'll get of my  

Keep your gardening plans coming! I enjoy reading them!

Any good or properly made compost will not have an odor

May I describe my homemade super cheap composter?


WE took a
30 gallon rubber garbage can with a lid


we drilled 1 inch diameter holes all around the sides.. ( not the bottom or top)  for airing  and watering


We took a pvc pipe with about a 3 or 4 inch diameter..


about 1/3 down from the top of the garbage can.. we used a hole saw to make a hole on each side so we could put the pvc pipe through .

the pvc pipe is going to allow the composter to spin/turn

we put the can up so it's top is slightly above eye level. We happen to have two trees about the perfect distance apart.. . but a clever person could find many ways to brace it


We used bungee ties to secure the top.


 Every day we save organic and also coffee groundswaste (NO meat products!!)  and then put them in the  garbage can /composter

 we also put dead leaves, grass clippings, an occasional shovel of regular dirt  and sometimes some tops of the lily pads that com loose in the lake


WE water it to keep it damp.. just sprinkling with the hose and the water goes right through those side holes


 We spin turn it regularly.. easy to do since the pvc pipe lets it spin,, but the bungee ties are a MUST

WE never got pests or bears or flies or anything.

We did get beautiful black compost.. only a couple of non smashed egg shells did not decompose.


 

Whoa - you both just gave me great ideas!!  Thanks so much!  I actually have a large dog pen thingy that my dog has never stepped foot in (she prefers to lie between the big roots of a large tree w/ the branches hanging low over her) and it would work perfectly for that!  I'd have to construct something to make a solid cover for the main opening but it'd work just the same as a big garbage can (which I may invest in anyhow b/c that's such an awesome idea).  Man our neighbors will just love us.  The spinning suspended trash cans will go great next to the clothesline!  Hee! 

We always have a garden. My hubby is the gardener. I do annuals and herbs.

We get buried in squash and tomatoes. I put a lot of it up in the freezer and we then have it during the winter.

There is a great wholesale produce store here too. Tomatoes at $.89/lb and other great stuff.

I think most people who don't like veggies have never had them. If all you ever ate were store-bought veggies, then you've never had a tomato, that's for sure. Things taste better when they're home grown.