Photo evidence

tarragon, rat-tailed radishes, arugula, broccoli raab, radishes, and parsnips

basil, fennel, and amaranth waiting for their turn

a forest of tomatillo, peppers, eggplants, and tomatoes

Mini’Stead Check: The Garden

It’s Spring (in case you hadn’t noticed).

Every spring you want to push your limits.
Sometimes I play it fast and loose, and lose. Sometimes I play it safe, and miss out. This year I decided I would start much earlier but remember, no matter how alluring our early spring weather is, there always a frost out to get you before May. I literally was contemplating how early I could push planting my tomatoes Tuesday afternoon.

Then it froze Tuesday night. Bullet dodged!

Everything that I’ve planted (roots, peas, brassicas and greens) has come up and is looking good. I thwarted some early on ant attacks with a mixture of cornmeal muffin mix and diatomaceous earth.

• Cornmeal: When they eat it, it swells up and kills them.
• Diatomaceous earth: Scratches their body and dehydrates them.

Inside, I have a veritable jungle of tomatoes, tomatillos, peppers and eggplant. It’s getting a little ridiculous (46 peppers, 26 tomatoes, 6 tomatillos and 13 eggplants). May looks promising. All 70’s and 50’s. In the next weeks I’ll harden off these plants off and get them into the ground.