Your 2014 garden - what are you doing new or differently from last year?

[NRaleighLiberal]

One of the garden talks I like to give each fall, and repeat in early spring, is on evaluating how things went, why they may have gone that way, and planning for more success the next time around.

Last year (my 33rd garden) was one of my worst, when I needed it to be one of my best (photos for my upcoming book). It was a cornucopia of all things damaging - the weather pattern, the density of my plantings, critters and disease. Never have I achieved so little with so much effort.

Some of my changes for this year: simplify (grow less plants, less varieties), spread them out (more room for air circulation), stagger plant (so that there are plants reaching maturity at different times during the season), and carry out more thorough disinfection (I typically bleach my pots and grow bags, but end up sticking the same poles/stakes/cages around the plant).

More details to follow - but here's a thread to share anything new that we are going to try this year, as far as a technique (we can start a thread on new varieties or crops separate from this).

I've got lettuce, greens, herbs and beets germinating, and just planted eggplant, peppers, and tomatoes (in progress)!.

[enough]

1. What I'm doing differently from last year is the same thing I do differently every year.

That is: Simplify. Be more realistic. Don't plant too much. Don't plant too many different things. Leave plenty of space for air circulation and ease of maintenance.

Etc. Etc.

And then spring rolls around, and I can't stop myself. I end up doing what I do every year. Planting too much, planting too many varieties, filling up every possible square foot. And loving it, till around August, when the sensible resolutions for the NEXT year begin.

[intheflow]

5. That's what happens to me!

I'm so starved to dig/plant/grow I really go overboard all through early spring and summer. Then by August, I'm looking rather disinterestedly at the raised beds thinking, "Wow, that's a large weed. I wonder if it's edible?"

[NRaleighLiberal]

6. I've managed to start only about 1/3 of what I usually do - so that's progress!

Still...it is an awful lot!

[canoeist52]

2. I think Wendell Berry had it right.

"We learn from our gardens to deal with the most urgent question of the time: How much is enough?"
-Wendell Berry (1934 -)

Definitely need fewer plants this year. Way too much tomato and basil.

[Sentath]

3. New and different

Coming up on the end of our first 12 months in AZ.

First time trying aquaponics.







And I think we're running very late for planting season in AZ.

[Major Nikon]

22. How goes the aquaponics?

Looks like a pretty nice setup. Appears to be pretty simple with bell siphons and perhaps 2 pumps.

I've been updating my hydroponics thread. So far it's been a very educational experience. I could very easily convert my flood and drain setup to aquaponics and I may do that next year, but I wanted to get the hang of hydroponics first.

[intheflow]

4. Planting only one yellow & zucchini squash each!

Last edited Wed Feb 26, 2014, 02:40 PM - Edit history (1)

Good lord, I'm sick to death of being overrun with that squash. Finally convinced my SO of the same.

Started my seedlings way earlier this year. Maybe ridiculously early, but we shall see.

Wish I could get my SO to give up on melons. We can never tell when they're ripe, inevitably pick them too early, and they take up sooooooo much space that could be used for other plants.

Transplanting fruit trees to reasonable distances from each other, transplanting raspberries to where won't get a harsh western wind, transplanting strawberries everywhere since they're spilling over their current bed. They may end up replacing my lawn, which would be just fine with me.

[Curmudgeoness]

7. Duh.

I also use the same stakes and cages without disinfecting them. How could that not occur to me???? I suppose that it is because I grab them when it is becoming a real necessity.

I am going back to containers for my tomatoes and peppers. I tried using cardboard boxes set in the beds and filled with soil mix, and they were supposed to just disintegrate on their own, but it was just a mess.

[WCLinolVir]

8. Bought a new house, new yard, no garden established yet. UGH.

I am going to plant raspberries, blackberries, etc.. for the first time. Three year old plants that come in a 2 gallon pot. I am not sure what to expect. Has anyone ordered from Virginia Berry Farm before??n
I had a garden at old address and it was a lot of work. But since I can, I make use of my excess. Just hope I can pull off a new garden in a month!! No room for starting seeds so it will all be direct seeding. Which I prefer actually. I may buy some plants as well. Definitely need to grow more basil. Pesto in winter is delicious and I had to ration it this year. When is winter ending?
Rich Va., 7a

[Erich Bloodaxe BSN]

12. I love my raspberries

but I've not had a lot of luck establishing plants I bought commercially. The wild black raspberries took off like gangbusters, while the commercially purchased reds and goldens are struggling to even stay half-alive. If you haven't dealt with raspberries before, you'll want to do a bit of reading before you make the mistakes I made a couple of years ago. Some varieties are on a single year cycle, others a two year cycle. My blacks, for instance, run a two year cycle. During the summer, new canes will start shooting out and straight up. They're thicker, greener, have heavier leaves, and won't bear fruit that year. As fall and winter advance, they'll end up falling over to the side in long arcs. In the second year, they'll actually flower out along the length, and bear fruit that ripens up during about a two week window in july. After that fruit is harvested, those canes are done, kaput. I can cut them off down to a few inches above the soil, because they'll never fruit again, they'll just dry out and turn woody, and eventually break off on their own. But leaving them in to do that naturally makes the patch miserable to harvest from, as you're dodging all the extra thorns for no good reason.

My mistake a few years back was in not realizing that the 'non-fruit bearing' canes would bear fruit the next year, and cutting a bunch of them down while 'thinning' the patch for the first time ever. So the harvest the next year was pretty feeble, which is how I wound up reading up on the raspberry cane lifecycle, and got my harvests to come roaring back in the last couple of years.

You might even want to set up some guide wires to keep your patch from getting too wild. My black raspberries have spread enough that they're starting to grow around one of my black cherry trees, and making it tough to reach my compost heap.

[WCLinolVir]

13. I have a sixty five foot+ fence I need to hide.

I am planting this week due to cold etc.... Kinda late I know.

[WCLinolVir]

17. I found a black raspberry patch last year. Fabulous.

I get my plants this week. Tayberry, Marionberry, Triple Crown, Prime Ark, Heritage, and Anne Lemon Gold.
I will also plant 2 Jostaberries and a couple of semi-dwarf fruit trees.

[Erich Bloodaxe BSN]

18. Sounds like your backyard is going to be a lot like mine

4 fruit trees, a bush cherry, 2 raspberry patches take up about a third of the back yard, leaving the rest for the dogs to run around and me to garden in. I really think I need some sort of permanent water feature to get even more wildlife to visit.

[WCLinolVir]

19. Just need a birdbath, and a compost pile.

I get squirrels, raccoons, opossums, stray cats (do they count?). Butterflies just love old fruit in a compost pile! Especially melons. This year I am putting in a butterfly garden with milkweed and parsley. The blue monarch lays eggs on parsley.

[lululu]

20. caution about birdbaths

Don't get the kind of birdbath that has a separate concrete dish on top. They can fall off when an animal reaches up to drink out of it.

[sadoldgirl]

9. My second bedroom serves as seed growing area

with lights and at 70 degrees (F). Foe many years I planted dahlia tubers in pots there as well. Last year all my dahlias were infested with a virus or fungus. It attacked only my dahlias, not the tomatoes, cucs,etc. This year I will dig the tubers directly into the ground at the end of April about 4 inches deep in the hope that late frost will not go down that deeply. I will have to watch for slugs though. So, wish me luck! BTW, I live in a #5 area.

[WCLinolVir]

14. Ugh, slugs are a pain. They are the biggest pest I have.

[Erich Bloodaxe BSN]

15. Yup. Most of the strawberries I lose, I lose to slugs.

Birds attack a few, but it's the slugs that cost me up to a third of each year's crop.

[WCLinolVir]

16. That's awful. I battle them on my pepper plants. Come fall it's the brassicas.

[Viva_La_Revolution]

10. Biggest change... I get to have one!

Last year sucked, I was in Colorado and missed out on the whole season.

this year I've got 9 varieties of toms sprouted, bulbs of several types planted to fill in bare spots, and peas and greens to seed soon.

[Erich Bloodaxe BSN]

11. What's new this year?

Well, first, the 'deluxe cucumber frame, from Gardener's Supply just arrived, and is already causing me to curse. The first cursing came with the 'made in China' sticker, because somehow I'd gotten it into my head that Gardener's Supply was a made in America sort of company, which is one reason I'd ordered from them. Went back to the catalog, though, and they don't tell you where anything is made, so now I can't figure out why I thought they were a 'made in America' company. Second, while the two side panels join together simply enough, the way it's designed to join at the 'hinge' between the two sets of panels are 4 thick springs that you're supposed to 'wind' around the edges of the panels, like a spiral-edged notebook. I was able to get each spring about halfway wound before I simply couldn't get the leverage to continue. I'll try again in a day or two when A) my fingers stop hurting, and B) I dig out a wrench to try and get better leverage, I guess. Whoever came up with that design must have fingers of steel, since they didn't mention using any tools when putting the thing together.

I'm also supposed to be getting a 'tall pea trellis', but that hasn't arrived yet, even though the two were ordered at the same time, and supposedly shipped at the same time. I went back and looked closely at the photos in the catalog, and I can't see any similar spring joins for those, so I'm hoping they have simple hinges.

As to the plants, snow peas and 'big max' pumpkins are the things going in this year that didn't go in last. I'm glad I didn't already put the peas in yet, since it froze overnight, and we've got at least one more overnight freezing temp in the 7 day forecast.

[giasroom]

21. Changes 2014

Having had to give up my house with the big yard for awhile, this year I will be planting much less. I started lots of tomato seeds that I had purchased from an Italian seed company and egg plant the I purchased from another site, and none of them grew. I have been gardening since I turned 8 years old, and starting my own plants since I was in my 20s; I have never had seeds not do well. I have never been one to follow the Old Farmer’s Almanac for planting by the moon, but I looked, just for the heck of it. Wouldn’t you know it, the day I planted my seeds it said was a very bad day for planting, barren days. The seeds came up, but the plants didn’t grow at all, they were the same size forever and I threw them out. I will start them again for the second planting of the year. I also started a garden spreadsheet so next year I will make improvements I have suggested this year. I moved from the north to the south and I have never been able to get the hang of southern planting seasons. I will also be planting different kinds of herb seeds just to get an idea of what plants to start next year to sell at the farmers market. I am also now involved in the permaculture movement here where I live.

[glinda]

23. Weather was funky so started late. This year I am ignoring my garden basically.

Not going out to check it as often because I get chewed by bugs. Just water it every now and then and dash back into the house out of the heat and mosquitos. So sad. I didn't even plant as much this year. It will be survival of the fittest as far as I am concerned.

[danhowitt1]

24. Dan Howitt here a newbie thanking everyone

so much good info and advice here! THKS everyone! My bests to all, Dan Howitt.

[glinda]

25. Welcome to DU !!!!!!!