Spring Garden...50º

23rd of May, potatoes are planted...A different kind of planting, where we layer straw, leaves, alfalfa pellets, peat moss, compost, shredded newspaper and well aged manure...On top of all these layers ending in straw, we place the potatoes in rows, cover them with more straw and a thin layer of manure...Now all we have to do is keep them watered and add more straw as the sprouts start showing...Come late September we pull the dying potato vines and uncover nest after nest of lovely, clean potatoes...The yield is not as good as if you planted them in the ground but they are scab free and so easy to "dig."

Potato Bed

After the potatoes are harvested, we rake the straw to one side and uncover a 6 to 8 inch layer of loamy soil, perfect to plant the next years garlic crop...The photo below is this year garlic that we planted last fall, the same day that we harvested the potatoes...It has reached a height of 36 inches and will stay in the ground until mid July...It won't get much taller but will soon start to put up scapes (seeds) that we will cut off (give to friends and neighbors for stir fry or garlic pesto) and the plant will then put all of its energy into growing big healthy heads of garlic...I love this crop as it never disappoints...I still have, what I now call "Grammas Garlic," the variety my Mom always grew...Also we have a newer variety called "Music," she would have loved this because it grows huge heads made up of BIG cloves!

Music & next to it the 

shorter ones are Grammas.

Temperature was perfect yesterday and I was on a roll so the tomato plants (I bought in LaGrande) needed to get planted...I covered tomato cages with garbage bags to protect them from frost and give them a greenhouse effect...Our season is very short here, so they always need help and I only grow "cherry tomatoes" because they have a better chance of ripening.

Tomatoes inside cages.

I got so involved with planting that I almost missed the end of water therapy BBQ, but managed to catch the last two hours, ate yummy salads and visited with old and new friends...Hugs to All...OWAV:)