Graduation Day
As you can see from the picture at right, my cole crop seedlings are just about ready to go out into the garden. I've been keeping them out on the shaded patio for a steadily increasing number of hours each day, getting them ready for life outdoors. This is an important step in the development of a young plant and is often referred to as "hardening off".
Problem is, I'm not sure the veggie bed is ready yet. Several weeks ago I yanked up and removed the existing landscape cloth from the area -- a long, narrow strip measuring about 25' by 1.5' -- and dumped a big trash bag full of chopped leaves onto the soil, but that's about it.
Ready for Bed?
I had a very nice young man come to the house to do some serious clean-up-and-rip-out in my new yard this past weekend. Brian worked hard and really did a great job. He tackled another long, narrow bed in the yard that needed clearing of the six or seven very old, twisted, worn out roses occupying it. Now, I love Tea Rose perfume, and I love when my sweet husband gives me roses, but I am not way into growing them. Besides, here in Dallas, it seems to be a constant struggle to keep them from being overcome with black spot fungus.
Long story short, I've decided to fill this bed with dahlias and am expecting about 50 tubers in the mail soon. The problem is, the soil in this bed is heavy, black clay, a situation dahlias do not care for.
Well, you don't need a crystal ball to see where I'm going with this and what activity is in my immediate future. Yup. Heavy duty bed prep.
Soil Snack Time
It is very helpful -- necessary, in fact -- to plan out what is going to go where in your garden, not only for aesthetic reasons, but so you can build the soil according to the needs of the type(s) of plants you'll be putting in each area. It's also important to get a somewhat early start, so the organic matter can begin breaking down. Late winter/early spring is the ideal time for bed prep.
Vegetables in general love about as much compost as you can throw at them. Broccoli and cauliflower, for example, thrive in soil amended with lots of compost and other nutrient-rich additives. Therefore, the chopped leaves already on top of my veggie bed can be lightly worked into the soil and the veggie transplants tucked in without much other preparation at all. As the leaves continue to break down, they'll not only improve the texture of the soil and encourage earthworm visitation, they'll also provide a continuous yummy snack for the veggies, as well as a nice mulch if we experience a few of our typical Texas mid-80s early spring days...not that I'll be complaining much about hitting 80 degrees in March.
