Getting to Work

My husband and sons have been working hard in the yard lately to increase our area of food production. We've been starting seeds, buying plants and waiting (im)patiently for the last frost date to pass so we can get started.

Preparing good beds for planting takes a lot of work. We started by clearing the side of our house, which previously was a haven for trash cans, gravel, runaway grass and so forth. As Lennard dug out the area for the beds, he screened the dirt and separated out the small stones. You can see the piles here: one is the really sandy dirt, one is the stones and one is a pile of manure Lennard got from a local horse farm.



Once my husband had the area level, he built boxes out of cedar and placed them where he wanted them to go. He then filled them with a mixture of topsoil, compost and manure. One box was for potatoes and carrots. For that one he created a more sandy mix of soil.

He planted some beans and peas already, but we're going to wait until next week for the rest; we can get some last frosts around here.

Here's a picture of the boxes: