The May Garden

The May garden is exciting but demanding, especially this year. We had a very cold, very wet spring; the seeds we planted simply did not come up. And now the soil is finally warm enough to plant, and we have so many seedlings to put in the ground! Some of my plants expired with the wait, but some are going to make it.

And the joy of this spring is that the work we did last year (to re-design and re-build the vegetable garden in the back yard, and build a new raised garden and patio in the front yard) is paying dividends now. We spend sunny mornings sitting on the patio looking at tulips, and use minimal effort to prepare beds for planting.

Agenda:

1. May permaculture plan

2. May planting tips

1. May permaculture plan:
I got some good advice from the Reid Homestead site. Here's my plan for May-

• 
  Continue to harvest beets, spinach, kale, parsley, and other herbs. "Though you might have seedlings to plant, seeds to sow, and weeds to pick, your most important task is to harvest and use what you’ve already grown."
• Slug and snail proaction: Here in my valley you have to have a plan or you will loose everything. In our back veggie garden, the ducks have been on patrol all winter, and we are free and clear of slugs and snails. In the front, they are wreaking havoc. (I made the mistake of setting my lettuce seedlings out front to harden and the snails ate them all.) I'll have to get out the Sluggo or I'll loose all my tulips and strawberries too.
• Buy starts: It's too late now to start anything else indoors, so I've ordered some corn, squash, and cucumber starts, and I'm going shopping for peppers and lettuce (to replace the ones the snails ate).
• Improve soil fertility: Continue to prepare my beds by weeding and adding soil amendments. I've got one bed left to prepare, for the three sisters (beans, squash, corn).
• And start to prepare for the fall seeding I will do in June!

2. May planting tips:

This week I'm going to plant as much as I can, specifically:

Lettuce is in the Compositae (Aster) Family. It has grown wild since antiquity, and the ancient Egyptians were probably the first to cultivate it. Lettuces can suffer from aphid attacks, so plant them near to chives, garlic, marigolds, dill, cilantro, and fennel, so as to invite the predatory insects and spiders that eat aphids. (Garlic and chives actually repel the aphids themselves.) Modern lettuce has five classifications: Crisphead, butterhead, loose-leaf, cos or romaine, and celtuce or stem.

I had my favorite butterhead starts (that were a treat for the snails), but replaced them with what I found downtown: a variety 6-pack of leaf lettuce. I'm going to plant it all near garlic and dill.

Bok choy (Brassica rapa), is a member of the mustard family, and is native to China, specifically the Yangtze River Delta area, where it was likely bred from native wild brassica species growing in the area around 3,500 years ago. It's a cool-weather crop that you can plant in the early spring and again in the fall. Bok choy is vulnerable lots of pests: aphids, cabbage worms and root maggots, flea beetles, slugs and whiteflies. Planting near onions can help deter cabbage maggots, and rosemary, sage, thyme, coriander or nasturtiums will help keep flea beetles and aphids away. Definitely do not plant them near other Brassicas because they are all susceptible to the same harmful insects. In fact, if you scatter your bok choy here and there in the garden, it will be less likely to attract insects and worms. 

I have a bunch of very tiny seedlings that I hope to harden off and get into the garden this week. I think I'll put some behind the onions, and some in the front garden near the sage and rosemary, and see which ones do best.

Sunflowers are called Helianthus annuus; in Greek, helios means sun and anthos means flower. They are native to North America, and were grown as a crop by indigenous tribes over 4,500 years ago.

They are a great asset for vegetable gardens, for a variety of reasons: First, they double as natural trellises for climbing vegetables such as beans, and even though sunflowers need a lot of water, they improve soil aggregation, which helps the soil retain moisture through the winter. Also, they can act as a pest trap because they are so attractive to pests; rather than attacking your vegetables, pests such as the leaf-footed bugs will be drawn to the sunflower where they are easy to pick off. Sunflowers are packed with pollen, so they are a real feast for pollinators, and the birds love the seeds!

Have about 10 small plants that I grew from seed, and I've finally got a safe place to plant them, where the ducks can't reach them.