Shade vegetable gardening?

Growing vegetables in the shade would be a huge triumph for me. I'm cursed/blessed to have half my yard be shaded due to the direction of my house. Cursed for gardening; blessed because my kids have a shaded area to play outdoors!

And as I continue to push the boundaries of my raised beds, the idea of gardening in the shade has greater appeal. Apparently I'm not alone. From what I'm able to see, the general consensus is leafy vegetables like lettuce, seem to be ok.

Root Simple has tried other veggies with some success:

• New Zealand spinach


• cucumbers


• tomatoes (not as much growth as in the sun, but they are fruiting)


• Swiss chard


• dandelion greens


• raspberry (Really! I had just purchased another bush...)

Colleen Vandereim from organicgardening.about.com puts this rule of thumb forward:

Basically, a good rule to remember is that if you grow a plant for the fruit or
the root, it needs full sun. If you grow it for the leaves, stems, or buds, a
little shade will be just fine.

After checking out this list of shade-tolerant vegetables, maybe I need to rethink my planting for this fall, as my flowers begin to die back. I see possibilities ahead!

Fall gardening? It’s not even summer yet.

Yes, I realize the calendar says late July. Tell that to my garden.

While I’ve been pleasantly surprised by our wet, cool summer – I think the warmest it’s been all month is 85 degrees – it’s not done much for my garden, other than the unauthorized additions. The weeds are thriving.

So when my fall gardening class began a deep discussion of plans for not only fall plantings but also plans for the winter, I was floored. Fall planting? It’s not September (when I drop in the garlic). And winter? Isn’t that five months away?

I started reading a book on four-season gardening, which hit the point home. Yes, you can have your seasons of gardening tasks: planting in the spring, weeding all summer, staring sadly at the remains in the fall. Or you can take a more ongoing approach. It’s more “do” and a little less do-or-die as far as planting and maintenance goes. And it means that you could be working – and reaping the rewards – for weeks and months beyond your neighbors.

’ll admit it’s taken a major shift in attitudes for me. After a decade of working in publications and the media, I’m comfortable in thinking seasons ahead for my day job. And I’ll be the first to confess I typically wrap up Christmas shopping by Labor Day. But planning for cool-season crops before the tomatoes turn red? It feels strange.

Still, I am slowly getting into the groove of thinking fall. I’ve flipped through a few Web sites and ordered a few fall garden catalogs, a few of which I’ve already had to steal back from my 4 year old. I’ve started marking up my garden plan, which I’ll post next week when I feel it’s a little more final.

In the meantime, if you have suggestions of things to start in my garden for fall, I’d love to hear them!

Feeling Blue

We're feeling blue this weekend in our home, and not just because we're battling bugs, exams and more than our statistical share of injuries.

We have blueberries!

Despite everything that I've read that says you shouldn't expect blueberries in year-2 plants, we've got them. My daughter, posing last night for a photo in our garden, squealed that "The blueberries are ready!"

Of course I thought no, as most of them were a strange green-blue.

She was right. Three tiny pea-sized berries were purple and ready to pick. A little tart, but then it's just early June. What a treat for her... and I am sure they'll make it no farther than our strawberries, which rarely pass the front door!

Second life for stuff in the garden

Thinking about starting a garden this season? You’re not alone. Seed sales are up about 30 percent this year over last. Even if you planned ahead, or thought you did, like I did, you’re likely still waiting in the queue for your seeds or sets to arrive in the mail.

Frugality is the name of the game these days, and gardening for seed can seem like an attractive option. Unless you have to buy tools. Or soil amendments. Or are more aggressive and want things such as raised beds or vast container gardens.

But you can still be frugal when working on your garden. Recently, In My Kitchen Garden posted ideas on how you can keep your garden “greener” by reusing things you may have already had at home:

• Seedlings can be started in toilet paper and paper towel tubes, then planted in the ground once they're well-started.
• Old metal strainers can serve as compost sifters.
• Old bedsheets and blankets can protect plants in cold weather.
• Cracked plastic buckets that no longer hold water can still carry weeds, rocks and compost.
• Rusted baking sheets make handy trays for seedlings and other things.
• Old metal pots not nice enough to be donated to the thrift store can be used as planters or for carrying soil amendments, compost, etc.
• Yogurt, sour cream and other No. 5 plastic containers can become weatherproof seedling markers when cut into strips – an idea I’m trying soon!
• Containers for fresh mushrooms at the supermarket can be used for seed starting. (You can also use egg containers, and just plant the entire thing in the ground if using paperboard containers.)

Since I have gardening on my mind this week, check out these stories:

• Tiny Choices: DIY Self-Watering Planters
  One Green Generation: How to Keep Rabbits And Other Animals Out Of Your Garden – Humanely, Organically, Frugally, & Sustainably

And, in case people give into panic over this swine flu (yes, I'm on information overload already) and our systems shut down, keep in mind you can always make a pizza with your tomatoes and veggies from your garden. The Green Parent shows you how to build a solar pizza oven.

First Farmers Market of the Season opens (Bloomington)

Spring is here, which means six or so weeks of waiting for farmer's markets to open in the Indianapolis area.

If you're up for a quiet drive down SR 37, though, I thoroughly recommend a Saturday-morning drive to the Bloomington Farmers Market.

I've learned to settle for staring at starts and a few lone packages of lettuce in the May months, so I was surprised to find in Bloomington three rows of stands - in April, no less! - and little room to roam despite the wide berths between the vendors's rows. It was a visual feast of colors - rows of plants in bloom, a huge variety of produce, and locally produced foods from eggs to granola.

My 3 year old was thrilled to buy blueberry bushes to add to her strawberries at home. We were able to score semi-dwarf blueberry plants (which have just beautiful leaves and flowers!) from Backyard Berry Plants, a local producer of organically grown blueberry, raspberry and blackberry plants. The couple was extremely friendly and extremely knowlegable, and we were thrilled that they held back the last two of the particular variety for us, since we'd called ahead to let them know we'd be at the market. It's great to be able to have a resource that really understands what it's like to cope with this crazy Indiana weather!

I'm sure we'll make the occasional commute to Bloomington this summer, and I can't wait to see what's in store. The Bloomington market's hours are 8 a.m. to 1 p.m. Saturdays through October. You can get directions here.

As one market opens, another sets to close. The Indy Winter's Market's last weekend is this Saturday. Hours are 9 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. Stop by and show your support!

A gift for gardening

A dear friend of mine is blessed with a fabulous gift for gardening, one that she doesn't give herself enough credit for. Last Labor Day weekend, she surprised me - on her vacation, no less - by planting a small garden of native flowers beneath my living room window. It looks fabulous this summer.

Yesterday, I asked her for suggestions about my edible landscaping dilemna, and at the end of her day, she had plans in place for me!



She writes:

You can do both. (He) can have his raised beds, and you can have your more
traditional landscaping. It is not as hard to mix formal and informal as you might think. The key is to plan your hardscaping so that you will never have to move it. It is because your yard is small that going vertical will not only create added space, but will also help you delineate certain areas, e.g., the patio is a good place for the formal raised beds because you will need easy access to the herbs and vegetables. Raised beds also provide the opportunity for built-in seating. Who doesn’t like to brush their hand over mint or oregano just to sit there and breathe in the scent, or snip a few mint leaves to crush in their lemonade while dining al fresco? Creating a lawn of edible ground cover between inset flagstones is another formal touch. Crushable thyme thrives the more you step on it so a small play lawn of the stuff is perfect for little people who are constantly on the move.

Orient all structures and plantings toward the south which is the direction of the sun. Trees like cherry, apple, peach and plum should be planted at the back of the garden. Their shade will fall to the north away from the garden in the summer, and they will act as a windbreak for the garden during winter. Leave room around the house for your deck, but build your raised beds into it. Two levels with the tallest on the
northern edge and the shortest at bench seat height. That way, every 4 feet you can put down two feet of boards for a seat. Your deck will have built in seating on the planters, and you will have a raised work surface when you are gardening.

So there. Edible landscaping designs for the lot-limited in less than a day! Now, I just need to get to work...

Planning edible landscaping no easy task

RIP the tree. It finally blew into two during the latest windstorm. Which means I'm forced to seriously start planning an edible garden.

The problems?

• We're starting from scratch.
• We live on a small plot of land to boot.
• We're at the mercy of the home association, which says such things as gardens need to have goofy 1' fences around them or other ways to show you just don't have dirt and weeds growing there.

So we're trying to figure this edible landscaping out. I've started the hunt, online at least, for fruit trees, and found that the Arbor Day Foundation will ship them in late fall. It's a start; however, I need a tree now for my landscaping requirements. So I'm on the prowl.

My husband and I are suffering from a serious difference of opinion on how to carry out edible landscaping.

My husband prefers the more traditional rectangular gardens, housed within a raised bed.

My feeling it should actually look like, you know, landscaping. Our yards are small enough without the sense that you're being boxed in with more raised beds. (Of course, I also realize how long it took to pull off the raised beds the last time we built them!)

I saw these examples and thought they would be fabulous starting points (can't remember the source, unfortunately.)

What would you do? If you had a postage-stamp lot and small children, how would you make the best of all worlds?

Edible landscaping, here I come...

Edible landscaping has been an idea that's intrigued me. Living in a community with small lots has left me with little room to meet the requirements for landscaping, the desire for a traditional garden and the need for space to play.

Exploring the idea of edible landscaping was on my agenda this year, with the idea to create an actual plan (a first for me) to start implementing in 2009.

Then my lowly tree was struck by lightning.

Either yesterday or the day before, the little maple was split up the middle, with a black charred hole about the size of a quarter about a foot from the ground. We'll have to replace it to meet said landscaping requirements for the homeowners association. I'm thinking a cherry tree as a possibility. I remember as a child having a cherry tree, and enjoying cherry dessert made by my mother (and getting seriously bored with pitting bowls upon bowls of cherries destined for the freezer.) Given my oldest child's love of food, I think a cherry tree might make for a great match, though I'm unsure whether it's too late for the year.

This weekend's project, given the 90+ degree forecast, is to swing by the library and check out the few books they have on edible landscaping.

Can anyone recommend other resources to learn more?