WE HAVE AN ADDITION TO THE GARDEN!
I repeat: We have a big, beautiful, homemade addition to the garden!
No, it’s not finished yet, but it’s a symbol of big things to come.
It’s been raining a whole lot around here, and hard, too! I was concerned about the well being of our new baby plants, not confident they could hold up in the heavy, relentless rain.
That morning at breakfast I said to Donald and Tim, “I want a hoop house.” Well, we had the PVC on hand and Donald is a building expert. So we got excited. I pulled up some free hoop house plans I’ve been holding on to and we got to building with what we had.
I’m not in favor of pointing fingers, but I will just mention that Donald was in charge of measuring our area. I’m just saying.
Well, our base was too small. There is no way anyone could have walked around and planted the boxes inside our first attempt.
Good thing we have lots of piping!
Donald also just so happens to be 7 times faster at measuring and cutting PVC than myself.
The plan we used called for 1 inch piping, but we have 3/4 inch pipes. We basically looked at the plan for motivation, and we altered it heavily based on our materials and space size.
The width of the base frame is 14 feet, cut into two 7 feet pipes with a joint in the middle for stability.
With this plan, there is enough space to walk around the beds, albeit a funny squeeze.
The spine is one long piece until this end, just 2 feet short. The dimensions of our hoop house are 14′ x 20′.
Ah, at long last we have the beginning of a home for plant starts. We will order some good-looking, heavy duty plastic to cover it. We will build two doors into the walls and it will fit into a smooth flow of the garden path.
If you’ve ever had/have a garden, you understand the excitement of such a structure!
Also exciting is the sprouting of little basil plants! It’s such a different experience to see the germination, the beginning of a plant that I’ve only ever seen mature.
I have 10 of these babies, and Tess is even growing some in her yard. Hopefully together we can supply the kitchen adequately!
And my tomato seeds have emerged! Empty spaces, no more. This is so wonderful.
Here’s a picture of my big, luscious tomato plants. They have a whole lot of leaves going on. I want my fruit to be as big and juicy as they can be, so I read that you can cut off the sucker leaves.
Now, I’m pretty sure this was advice for when you plant tomatoes into the ground outside, and you bury a lot of the stem and eliminate the sucker branches. I cut the extra branches but did not plant them outside. So far they still look healthy, so I’m not concerned yet. I AM concerned, however, about the tiny pots they are living in. They must be close to becoming root bound, which will NOT produce the most beautiful fruit possible. This hoop house is important! I could move them out there!
And no, I don’t have permission from the neighbor to post pictures of his property. Just don’t look too closely. 😉
There are no new developments on the avocado seed yet, as expected. It seems to slowly be soaking the seed. Patience will ensue.
So what’s new in your garden?
What! You haven’t started one yet??? Get digging!
