Farm and Garden:Spring Garden Pictures

Herb Area: Mint, Wild Violets, and a
giant plantain that nature provided.

Everything is growing well so far this year. As an experiment over the last few years we have been trying to grow our garden in a couple of ways. One I am trying to grow it as more of a companion garden with a mixture of plants as edible ground cover, the larger plants dispersed between and tall vining plants trellised behind.

Many Mini Strawberries

Also, we have been intermingling the plants, herbs, and flowers in an effort to keep pests at bay. So far it seems to be working pretty well. It's not perfect, and it is quite messy looking at times, and difficult to navigate right now, but I am hoping that eventually as time goes by and the garden area matures, we will have things more workable with paths that allow easier access.My hope is to eventually create a landscape that is actually beautiful and functional and edible. The most difficult thing is trying to decide which plants to keep where they are and which to move or get rid of. Tree placement/removal has proven the most difficult task because although the the tree cover is wonderful it affects the kinds of things we can grow and the yields we get from the plants that we have.

Peas

A day in the Strawberry Patch

 We ate our first pea pods in a salad this week. Some of our salad also came from the garden. We were able to pick baby kale, lettuce, endive, the peas, and some strawberries.
The herbs are wonderful this year and we are beginning to actually use some of it this year. The mint has taken over the box it was planted in and the kids and I have been enjoying mint water and just eating the leaves out of the garden as a little snack...although I'm not sure I would actually call it a snack.

Garden Flower

There is also lots of lamb's ears...it was a gift. I'm not exactly sure what you do with it, I guess it will require a little study. It is really pretty and looks like it will flower this year.

Garden Helper

We planted lots of cucumber plants this week and they has a bit of a rough start because of the sudden cold snap we had this past weekend...it's odd for this time of year, but very welcome because it will be sweltering before we are ready.

The tomatoes are coming along well and we are anticipating having lots of lovely tomatoes this year with lots of variety...reds some pinks, some yellows, and this year we are trying a zebra striped yellow/green variety, just because it looked neat.

There are also peppers, squash, watermelon, a little spinach, and eggplants. We will probably squeeze in more as the season goes along.

So how does your garden grow?