Well, it’s that time of year again. Actually, it’s well past that time of year: the time to get out there and commune with the soil.
While we’ve had plenty of rain so far this year, there haven’t been too many wam days, so my gardening efforts have fallen a bit behind schedule.
A few weeks ago, I managed to get our backyard garden planted; we have a few tomato and pepper plants along with some bush beans. New to the yard this year are two zucchini plants and some basil. Once the temps heat up we should be in good shape, and not nearly as overcrowded as last year.
The reason for the less-crowded garden this year is the fact that we have a 25′ x 25′ plot at Cypress Gardens just across Arlington Heights Road.

You may recall from this blog that I had a plot at Cypress in 2003 and 2004, with varying degrees of success. I was a condo-dweller in those days, and only a fraction of a mile further from the garden in the other direction. For some reason, though, it was difficult to keep it going. Now that we live closer and have a place to store all the appropriate tools, it seems to be going much better.

In addition to the chicken-wire fence I put up, I also set the plot up into quadrants. One area has about 20 tomato plants, another has beans, peppers, and cucumbers, and a third has four “Three Sisters” plantings underway. So far, things are moving along, albeit slowly.
The fourth quadrant, it turns out, is problematic. When we first checked out the plot before planting, one of our “neighbors” came over to say that we would have a water problem. He explained in a heavy Russian accent that the water spigot we were near always leaks, and that his friend who had the plot last year had to abandon it because of flooding. Well, he was right. We thought we’d be smart and plant something that needed a lot of water in that spot, so we stuck a watermelon plant in the ground. The poor thing is practically drowned at this point. Fortunately, the water problem seems to be limited to that one section of the garden, so when the weather finally heats up maybe things will dry out.
The other clever thing I’ve done this year is to bring my grass clippings from the house and put them in the pathways I formed between the garden quadrants. This helps keep the weeds down and sucks up the extra moisture from the leaky water spigot. If I get enough clippings I’ll put them down among the plants.
I also have a couple rows of sunflowers going at both Cypress and in the backyard.
Now all we need is some real sunshine.