# Progress on our First Garden



## PreparedRifleman73 (Nov 2, 2012)

This is our first year gardening so far. I thought I'd post some pictures. I'm looking for critiques and helpful advice! We're using the sqaure foot method and I've been keeping a detailed journal. I say "we" because behind every man is a good woman...but this is MY baby! haha BTW, we are in Central Minnesota.








This is how we started our plants. We realized we did way too many tomatoes and too much brocolli; but we need more lettuce and scallions next year. One could almost grow the scallions indoors completely I would think.








This is how my boxes started to look in the backyard. They are cedar, 4' x 4' on the inside. They are level East-West but they do slope a little bit towards the back for water. *Update:* We know have made 4 of these.








Closer view. Again, we have 4 of them.








My helpers got distracted....








Close up. It's 1/3 each of compost, vermiculite and peat moss. It's a few weeks old, but they look much darker and better now that we've gotten plenty of rain.








I didn't think the apple tree (planted last august) was going to survive. But it did. What would you recommend; mulch, rocks?








Look at that delicious cherry tree blooming!

And with that, *any advice?* We have since planted 4 of those 4x4 boxes and made a non-terraced box that's 4'x10' for raspberries. Strawberries are greening up nice and a few veggies are poking through. Tomato plants we started idoors look pretty disappointing. We did a soil test and corrected the low nitrogten and potash with fertilizer. We had a neutral pH and good phosphorous. Pics of plants to follow!


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## Bobbb (Jan 7, 2012)

hawkmiles said:


> We realized we did way too many tomatoes . .


I've never heard of this strange concept. Is this something that comes from Alpha Centauri?


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## UncleJoe (Jan 11, 2009)

I see the apple tree has some suckers growing out at the base. Break or cut them off then mulch it. And that long, straight shoot on top needs to go as well. Wait till fall and trim it back to one of the side shoots. As the tree grows, you'll want to be able to pick the fruit from the ground. Look around at some orchards. You'll notice that the trees are less than 10' tall. They are pruned every couple years to keep them that way. Pruning also stimulates fruit production. When a tree is stressed, which is what pruning does, it produces more of what it takes to reproduce the species. In this case, fruit.


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## *Andi (Nov 8, 2009)

Congrats on the first garden!

Look forward to hearing about it as the season goes on.


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## biobacon (Aug 20, 2012)

We are on our first in ground garden. Your setup looks great. Good Job.


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## JayJay (Nov 23, 2010)

~~~I see the apple tree has some suckers growing out at the base. Break or cut them off.~~~

Heck,, I do this to all my trees--I have some Cleveland Pears, Silver Leaf Maples I still do it to and they are 4 years old.


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## lovetogrow (Jan 25, 2011)

Good on ya hawkmiles, and that's a good lookin crew of helpers you have on hand there too


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## Woody (Nov 11, 2008)

You don’t have to grow the tomatoes in your boxes. Dig a hole a foot deep and 16” or 18” round, add some compost or store bought stuff and mix it in. Depending on your soil you might need a lot or just a little. I like to mound the planting up a bit, higher than ground level. Then make a depression on the top, as round as the hole is. This traps the water when you water and it doesn’t all run off. The sides of the depression only need to be an inch or so tall. Then mulch the whole thing sides included. You can scatter them around the yard to find out where they are the happiest as far as amount of sun.

If you find you really did have more tomatoes than you require, next year you can do squash or another vine sprawling plant in the hole so it doesn’t take over your planter. Vegetable plants around the yard are as pretty as flowers and you can eat them! There is no written rule that you have to grow in rows or even in a ‘formal’ type garden.


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## PreparedRifleman73 (Nov 2, 2012)

We've made quite a bit of progress on the garden! It's all planted, take a look! We had our first food from the garden, Lettuce and Cherry Radishes! Very excited!


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## Roslyn (Feb 20, 2012)

Such happy helpers!! My daughter would help me in the garden when she was young, and by 2nd grade we made her her very own plot to plant as she pleased. She would sit next to me and dig with her own trowel in the dirt and then come over to me and stick a dirty hand in my face and say "Look Mom!"

Her hand would be filled with every little creepy crawly that she could find in the dirt. Used to give me the willies, but she loved it.

She used to pick up slugs and hold them on her hand and talk to them. Yuck. Still makes me do the creepy dance.


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## JayJay (Nov 23, 2010)

~~Vegetable plants around the yard are as pretty as flowers and you can eat them! ~~

I have tomato plants in my pea gravel flower bed across the front of my house.
They are about 2 1/2 and 3 feet tall now.
I didn't want to pay $4  each for those wire cages; so I just got some of those closed S links(&, like this sorta) from TSC.
Gene opened one up for me; I latched it across the shutter tops; tied string in the closed ring/end, then attached string to plant--works nicely and you can't even see the string until close up!!
Yeah, I've already had to re-string the plants, but saved $20.


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## PreparedRifleman73 (Nov 2, 2012)

Roslyn said:


> Such happy helpers!! My daughter would help me in the garden when she was young, and by 2nd grade we made her her very own plot to plant as she pleased. She would sit next to me and dig with her own trowel in the dirt and then come over to me and stick a dirty hand in my face and say "Look Mom!"
> 
> Her hand would be filled with every little creepy crawly that she could find in the dirt. Used to give me the willies, but she loved it.
> 
> She used to pick up slugs and hold them on her hand and talk to them. Yuck. Still makes me do the creepy dance.


The S may never HTF, but we'll have made memories in the process.


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## PreparedRifleman73 (Nov 2, 2012)

We've had great luck in our first garden here in Central Minnesota. Harvested lettuce, radishes, onions, zucchini.


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