Vegetable garden year 4
Our backyard is quite small in relative terms, but it does have a side where it gets good sunlight throughout the day, without being obstructed by our magnolia tree. Which by the way, is the most beautiful tree ever this time of year!
We’ve tried for a number of years to grow the easiest kinds of veggies, but our neighbourhood squirrels devoured every fruit and vegetable in sight once it started ripening. I remember banging on our picture frame window overlooking the backyard one time, staring wildly at a squirrel noshing on our only tomato that season, with red tomato juice dripping off it’s tiny paws. Lol. It’s funny to think of how defeated and upset I was in that moment, months spent tending to and caring for a tomato plant. The squirrel did nothing wrong, and was completely being itself. Enjoying a morsel wherever they can find one.
My husband finally built us a raised garden bed with a fenced and covered enclosure . We’ve had so much fun as a family tending to our veggie garden and enjoying the harvest. My kids have grown used to watering it once a day, and checking the plants for flowers and budding fruit. What a joy it’s been, and it does give a certain kind of fulfilment to be able to grow something and eat something off your own land. You gotta try it if you have some outdoor sunlight space!
This is our year 4 of veggie gardening, and I forgot to start the seedlings indoors this year. Thankfully, some things are perennials and biennials. Rhubarb is a perennial plant and is the first thing to grow after winter. I’ve newly discovered that our celery and kale plants from last year have also returned as they are biennials.
I was trying to pull out some ‘weeds’ the other day, of what looked like lettuce leaves, when I yanked out the entire plant and root, I realized it was a carrot! Wait, I don’t have carrot seeds or nor have planted carrots before in our garden. Where the heck did carrots come from? I then realized that our compost from last year, is now the fertilizer for our garden bed. I buy and cook carrots regularly, and so carrot seeds must have come from the compost. As luck would have it, my compost has come through for me this year, and I will get to discover what new plants will come about and gift us with. Happy gardening!
