You know it’s the dead of winter when all of the seed catalogs start rolling in. Looking outside at all the gray and brown and dreariness, the colorful glossy pages of the catalogs make me daydream of greener and warmer days. I think the companies know this and take full advantage of gardeners in garden withdrawal who, like me, dream of all the possibilities of spring. With this clever marketing, they receive huge orders for seeds and plants that come spring, have nowhere to go because I order twice as much as I have space for.
This year, I got a little smarter and made my huge lists of seeds and plants and then I took stock of what I already had and started whittling the list down, way down. I have a three berry patches; raspberry, blueberry, and blackberry. This year I decided to expand my blueberry patch and my raspberry patch, since they are fairly small. I have not had much luck with my raspberries. I add plants every year and lose plants every year. I found a good deal on 15 plants of three varieties, one of which has done well already so I’m going to give them a try. I’m also adding 12 blueberry plants of four different varieties. In order to grow blueberries here, I have to do quite a bit of work to acidify the soil and add organic matter. I’ve been trying to do this by piling up dead pine needles over the area I want to plant and when they go in, I’ll add Sulphur, peat moss and compost and keep my fingers crossed.
I love strawberries but hate that they have to travel across country to get here and when they arrive, they are either mushy or unripe. For some reason, I haven’t tried growing strawberries here since I made my strawberry barrel several years ago. That worked fairly well, but the birds got the hanging berries faster than I could. I’m going to try again, but this time in a raised bed with 50 plants of two varieties. With any luck, we’ll be enjoying berry cobbler and strawberry shortcake come summer!
This year, I got a little smarter and made my huge lists of seeds and plants and then I took stock of what I already had and started whittling the list down, way down. I have a three berry patches; raspberry, blueberry, and blackberry. This year I decided to expand my blueberry patch and my raspberry patch, since they are fairly small. I have not had much luck with my raspberries. I add plants every year and lose plants every year. I found a good deal on 15 plants of three varieties, one of which has done well already so I’m going to give them a try. I’m also adding 12 blueberry plants of four different varieties. In order to grow blueberries here, I have to do quite a bit of work to acidify the soil and add organic matter. I’ve been trying to do this by piling up dead pine needles over the area I want to plant and when they go in, I’ll add Sulphur, peat moss and compost and keep my fingers crossed.
I love strawberries but hate that they have to travel across country to get here and when they arrive, they are either mushy or unripe. For some reason, I haven’t tried growing strawberries here since I made my strawberry barrel several years ago. That worked fairly well, but the birds got the hanging berries faster than I could. I’m going to try again, but this time in a raised bed with 50 plants of two varieties. With any luck, we’ll be enjoying berry cobbler and strawberry shortcake come summer!
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