Our Organic Garden: Transferring to the Raised Beds
Our organic garden is coming along. Slow and steady. Waiting for plants to grow is like waiting for water to boil.
You wait and wait and wait.
A few weeks ago we moved our starter plants to the raised beds.
My husband filled the raised bed area with many bags of organic soil.
As you see we made trenches so the water would run off and wet all of the soil.
As I shared before, I used biodegradable starter pods to let the seeds sprout.
Once the plants had good growth we planted them into our raised beds.
We waited longer than most might wait, but we finally did the transfer at 28 days. These photos are from that day.
Some of the seeds never did sprout- the green beans and sugar snap peas are two that come to mind.
The starter pods pulled apart with ease and we planted them right into the soil.
Here are some photos after we planted them and watered.
I kept my popsicle stick labels and used them in the beds as well.
The squash and zucchini plants are very hearty.
Still no sign of actual vegetables, but the plants are growing.
These are the cucumber plants.
It has been incredibly hot here in North Texas. There are many days that by the time evening comes the plants are very, very sad and sometimes even wilted. (We generally water in the morning.)
We have talked about building some sort of shade for them during the heat of the day.Have any of you done that before?
So far we do not seem to have issues with pests or insects. My husband has read that mulch is a great option if insects start to give us problems.
And the waiting game continues.
In the meantime we are getting veggies from our neighbor, the local farmers market and our grocery store.
Read more about our organic garden and how we began with the seed starter pods.
This looks great! I didn’t have the gumption to do my square-foot gardens this year. It’s been hot here in PA, so I can’t even imagine what the heat is like in Texas!
FYI, sugar snap peas are a cool-weather crop, so you might want to try sprouting them again to transplant into the bed near the end of August. Watering in the morning is supposed to be the best; the plants aren’t soggy at night when they can more easily develop diseases. Although you should try for 8 hours of sun, a shade screen might not be a bad idea for the hot, hot part of the day (11-2?). If you do plant anymore things, try putting a “well” around each plant, which will direct and keep the water right at that plant’s roots. This is just some knowledge I’ve acquired over the years. 🙂
Have fun!!!
Kelley- oh, thanks so much for all of the wonderful advise.
My husband too believes it is best to water in the morning opposed to night.
He tells me not to water during the heat of the day or we’ll have steamed veggies. 😉
The sugar snaps showed that our area could plant them as late as mid-June on the package…. clearly, that is not so.
Thanks again for all of your awesome info!