The Community Garden

Almost a year ago, I was attacked by something weird and decided to take my and my neighbors' suggestions to an actual active pursuit and lo! shocking amounts of paperwork later, we had  a community garden.

I could go on (and on) about the obstacles. The mind boggling effort it took to make something happen. The endless conversations about it. I won't, because I lived through it once already and can't stand doing so again. Let's just say it was a draining process. As a matter of fact, it was so draining that by the time my planting beds were all ready to go I didn't have the energy to actually plant stuff. It's a rewarding end product, though, so there's that for the situation. Assuming we don't violate the terms of our lease, the garden is good to go until 2017.

We aren't able to plant into the ground. The lot previously held a home that was destroyed by fire. Demolition involved bulldozing much of the building into the basement, then covering with some dirt and grass seed. We've got bricks, rocks, etc. heaving out of the ground all over the place. I personally like planter beds for the 'containment' factor but our depth was an issue forced upon us by the terrible condition of the ground.  I have two 2x12ft planter beds. The beds have about 20inch worth of "planting mixture" in them.  In addition to my two planter beds, there are seven more beds of various sizes. There's still room for more in our lot and we're hoping to expand next year with more participants. But for now, we're just six households with varying degrees of experience trying to muddle through the worst drought our area has seen in recent history.

The garden charter requires that the planter beds be filled with a medium called "Mel's Mix." It's based on Mel Bartholomew's theory "Square Foot Gardening."  It's 1/3 peat moss, 1/3 vermiculite, and 1/3 mix of five different composts. Frankly, using it and his planting guide has been amazing. I've seen more produce than I expected in spite of the weather, late planting, bugs, and inexperience. It's expensive to start up (vermiculite is rather costly) but you don't have to replace it each year. Honestly, I'll be putting some more planting space in next year and I won't use anything else. I recommend his book, too. Everything you need to know as a beginner is in there. I'm not compensated for this endorsement. I just actually believe in the method.

In the spring, I planted six heads of lettuce, 36 radishes, eight snap peas, 12 green beans, and a pumpkin. As time went on I added tomatoes and bell peppers, then zucchini and yellow crookneck squash. We ate our way through the lettuce and radishes. The snap peas were a complete failure. The green beans were great but didn't make it through the intense heat, and that whole planting area was given over to a started plant a friend gave me - turned out to be a vining cantaloupe variety. We're munching on squash every week, zucchini almost as often, tomatoes almost every day, and harvested an eight pound pumpkin. And it's just the beginning of August.

That's all for now. I'll be more specific later about the plants and the garden. I'm content with an overview tonight.

I strongly recommend "Square Foot Gardening"  http://j.mp/SquareFootGardening