NEXT Year's Garden Planning

[tortoise]

Garden planning is typically a late winter project, but I think this is a great time to plan, as you are harvesting this year's crop and kicking yourself for something you did or didn't do.

Next year:

Increase the garden by 50%, not including additional space if I put in berries, asparagus, etc. This will add on about 10x15 ft.

NO LETTUCE. That was a huge failure and big waste of space.

NO RADISHES We don't like them. I mixed them in with carrots, but the carrots did so poorly, I'm not repeating that next year.

NO CARROTS! See above!

I'm going to plant onion sets twice as deep as what is on the package. Our sandy soil doesn't hold together well and the onions are 1/2 out of the ground! I put in 200 onion sets this year - might do more next year. I use A LOT of onion in my cooking!

Trellises for the cucumbers, and go to at least 4 mounds instead of 1. Enough for pickles!

20 potato plants - should give enough potatoes for a year.

6 ROWS of peas. SO and DS LOVE peas like you can't imagine. With 1 row, no peas ever made it to the table. Most of them were eaten right in the garden. And this is the first thing I am going to try with heirloom seeds! so excited about that!

3 rows of green beans. 1 to eat fresh and 2 to preserve.

More sunflowers. I would like to dry and put up 24 sunflower heads to be able to put one out every week for the birds.

More tomatoes! I have 2 tomatoes this year. I think 8 or 10 would be about right. I love a good marinara sauce! Yum!

Next year I guess I will learn how to can and preserve food! What would you change for your garden next year?

 

[chicken stalker]

My garden next year...less snap beans. I have waaaayyyy to many.
Peas
beans to dry
more carrots....kids really liked pulling them out and eating them.
Overall more heirloom veggies.

 

[Wifezilla]

I love radishes, but they are a waste of space :sigh:
Mine either bolted or got nibbled to death by flea beetles.

My lettuce was fantastic this year. I tried Vivian Romaine for the first time. Great flavor and you can either let it get big or keep trimming it for baby greens.

My other failures include...
Bloomsdale spinach (I might try another strain, but this type, that isn't supposed to bolt, bolted)

Alaska peas (weather went from freezing to hot so fast they couldn't take the shock)

Chinese red noodle beans (apparently the plants are delicious. The bugs attacked these but didn't touch my bush beans at all. Might try again but take more precautions)

 

[DrakeMaiden]

Bloomsdale spinach (I might try another strain, but this type, that isn't supposed to bolt, bolted)

I had the same problem when I tried to grow it one year. Maybe the name says it all -- it just wants to bloom no matter where you grow it.

I think next year I will just stick to the basics (potatoes, tomatoes, salad greens, basil, pumpkins, sunflowers, beans for drying, etc.). This year I thought I would get all fancy pants and try a few extra things, like cucumbers and sweet potatoes, but apparently that was just my insurance policy that we would have a cool summer. Honestly, I'm not complaining. I like cool summers.

 

[emilosevich]

Start earlier. We didn't get most of our veggies in until mid june and finally finished up with the corn 2 wks ago. DH said he wants to move the greenhouse closer to the garden and I think I'm going to try to grow lettuce and a tomato plant in there over the winter.

 

[Wifezilla]

Start earlier.

I have to start LATER I went crazy and started stuff at the end of January indoors. It really wasn't bad, but I tried to rush stuff outside and lost some good plants due to frost. I think I might be able to hold off until Valentines day next year.

 

[me&thegals]

My other failures include...
Bloomsdale spinach (I might try another strain, but this type, that isn't supposed to bolt, bolted)

Don't give up on it yet Mine bolted quite early this year, too, but it never has before. I plant mine late summer (Aug/Sept), water it religiously, and it overwinters every single year. Doesn't matter how many times it freezes, thaws, snows, ices, it always pulls through and delivers huge plants by March-June. I LOVE that stuff!

Stay on top of the weeds better. That is always my failure and goal.

We trellised cukes this year, and it's working awesomely. Do that again.
We put the tomatoes and squash on black plastic. Also doing incredibly well. Do that again.

I should have babied my transplants better. I didn't, and the early brassicas got choked out by weeds

 

[noobiechickenlady]

Well, I finally convinced DH that adding organic matter is way better than tilling. The spots that were tilled are just about as hard as before. I did mulch them, so that helped a bit. But, the places that I just dumped a big pile of leaves, clippings & poop look way better without any tilling. So yeah, that's one barrier down

1. Better fencing around my entire raised bed area. What the chickens avoided, the goats devoured.

2. No more containers, except for those few plants that have liked it thus far, peppers, basil.

3. Plant many more sweet potato plants. They've done very well in Modern Pioneer's potato baskets and no one is selling them locally.

4. Just buy my mother a few heirloom tomato plants and let her have at. Her hybrid sweet 100s grew up the 5' fencing, over the top, rooted on the other side and are almost back to the ground on the first side. We're picking about 2 gallons a day from 12 plants. Good thing we all (including the chickens and goats) love them

5. Plant more flowers in and around my garden beds.

6. Try the triangle of sand method for carrots in my hard clay soil.

7. Plant way more beans than I think we will eat, because I might then have some to put up.

 

[Wifezilla]

me&thegals, I think I may just try a late planting since I still have seeds left. Spring is so weird here and summer is brutal hot. Fall and winter are usually pretty calm and we don't often freeze that bad. Maybe I will do the same with the rest of the radish seeds. Hummmmmm

Thanks!

 

[me&thegals]

me&thegals, I think I may just try a late planting since I still have seeds left. Spring is so weird here and summer is brutal hot. Fall and winter are usually pretty calm and we don't often freeze that bad. Maybe I will do the same with the rest of the radish seeds. Hummmmmm

Thanks!

Hey wife--It doesn't matter at all what kind of weather you have in winter. Mine has been totally exposed and frozen solid, rained on, covered in snow or whatever. It is most awesome for overwintering, the huge advantage being that you have enormous spinach from March on, at least here. Good luck!