An Introduction

So I used to be the Zone 5 Gardener , but first I was rezoned, and then we moved.  I started this blog (and the previous blog) to share ideas, successes, and failures in gardening, especially with those other people that look online and only find gardeners in warm places like California and Florida.

My gardening style is different.  I strive for low maintenance, exotic looking landscaping, and large tomatoes.  My garden is usually a salsa garden, taking up most of the space with tomatoes, peppers, and onions.

I'm not a pure organic gardener, but I don't like to waste what I have, and I don't like to buy things I don't need, so many of my methods overlap with organic gardening.

Here are my top ten gardening tips of all time:

1.  Put your garden in full sun and raised slightly.  Sun = energy = good growth.  Raised garden beds, even if only raised a couple of inches, don't pick up as much debris, become workable earlier in spring, and usually have less problems with drainage.

2.  Good gardeners grow vegetables; great gardeners grow soil.  Feed your soil.  Add organic matter to your soil every chance you get.  I like to use composted leaves (which I compost right on the garden from fall to spring and then till in), bagged composted manure, peat moss, and composted garden and household scraps.

3.  Buy your tomatoes tall and plan them deep.  Buy the tall seedlings, strip all of the leaves off except the top 2 to 4, and bury the seedlings up to the leaves.  Everything you bury will become root.

4.  Feed the tomato plants from top to bottom.  All of the plant can absorb fertilizer, so I usually spray my tomatoes down with a water soluble fertilizer.

5.  Use blood meal to boost nitrogen in your garden soil in spring.  It is as good if not better than most high nitrogen fertilizers.

6.  If you are gardening near concrete, sulfur can be your friend.  Sulfur makes the soil more acidic which counters the effects of concrete and other man-made alkaline materials.  This is especially useful for azaleas, blueberries, river birch, and other plants that dislike alkaline soil.  Coffee grounds can also help.  Sulfur is also an important nutrient for peppers.

7.  Build your tomato cages horizontally.

8.  Seek a balance with nature.  My neighbors had tons of trouble with rabbits eating their garden.  I went easy on the lawn treatment so clover would grow between the back fence and the garden.  When the bowling-ball sized bunnies appeared in the yard, they would spend hours chewing on the clover and never touch my garden.

9.  Mow your grass high.  It will stay greener and require less water, fertilizer, and weed control.

10.  Use your leaves.  Sticking leaves out on the curb to be picked up, burning them, or throwing them away is a waste of a wonderful resource.  Mulch them into your lawn as a naturally composting fertilizer or compost them somewhere for use in garden and flower beds.

Planning the New Garden

So we're all settled in at the new house, and as March has evolved, the snow has disappeared and it is time to start thinking about the new garden.  The new house is half an acre in the woods, with a pool taking up the best sunny spot in the backyard.  To make things evens more interesting, we have a whole herd (14 counted) deer living in the back woods.  The property also sits on a large hill sloping down from the front yard all the way to the back of the backyard.

So the first thing to do is to figure out where the sunny summertime spots are.  Sun is the most important ingredient for a successful garden.  I went to the solar site and used their solar panel inclination calculator to determine where the sun angle will be in the summer.  I need to be at least 60 degrees off of shadow from the neighbor's foliage from their trees.  Hopefully this falls outside of the pool fence, so I have enough room for an 8 x 12 garden spot.

Deer and other wildlife are going to be a fact of life.  I am planning to outfit the garden with a motion activated sprinkler to keep big things away.  Some fencing and a gate will hopefully keep the rest of things out.

I also get to build a new version of my horizontal tomato cages.

Some pictures of the new property will be coming soon.  As bulbs and plants awaken this spring, I'll be taking 'before' pictures and trying to catalog what we're starting with, since at least those plants can survive the deer and climate here.

Eventually, a fully fenced backyard may be in the works.