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unit649 6/9/2013, 10:24 pm

Hello everyone,
I was a member here a few years ago, but downsized our house at retirement, and have not had a garden for 2 years. The good thing is my son has our old house and gardens now, and his wife loves the gardens. I am starting over from scratch with smaller beds, only about 3' x 3'. I have 6 about filled, but am getting a really late start. I am in KY and hope to get the heirloom seeds in tomorrow. Do you think it is too late? I plan to plant green beans, corn, tomatoes, cucumber, cabbage, onions and potatoes.
Madge

Triciasgarden 6/10/2013, 12:40 am

Hi Madge and Welcome Back! I like the idea of 3 x 3s. It is easier to get to the middle! I don't know what Kentucky is like so hopefully someone closer can help you. I did want to welcome you though!

brainchasm 6/10/2013, 2:26 am

unit649 wrote:Hello everyone,
I was a member here a few years ago, but downsized our house at retirement, and have not had a garden for 2 years. The good thing is my son has our old house and gardens now, and his wife loves the gardens. I am starting over from scratch with smaller beds, only about 3' x 3'. I have 6 about filled, but am getting a really late start. I am in KY and hope to get the heirloom seeds in tomorrow. Do you think it is too late? I plan to plant green beans, corn, tomatoes, cucumber, cabbage, onions and potatoes.
Madge

The green beans should maybe be ok; make sure they don't end up nitrogen-deficient.
The corn, I dunno. Knee-high by the fourth of july is the old salt, and you'll be well behind that just planting now.
Tomatoes, you're gonna need to buy plants. I would say it's way too late to try from seed.
Cucumbers, maybe. You can start from seed because they're so fast, but the summer heat might nuke them.
This is not really the season for cabbage anymore; I'd wait until fall.
Definitely not the season to be planting onions!
I can't speak to potatoes...

Good luck! Maybe get some eggplant in the ground if you can find plants (not seeds, they're slow as it is).

And of course, almost anytime is a good time for okra!

ETNRedClay 6/10/2013, 9:43 am

unit649 wrote:I am in KY and hope to get the heirloom seeds in tomorrow. Do you think it is too late? I plan to plant green beans, corn, tomatoes, cucumber, cabbage, onions and potatoes.
Madge

I'm just south of you in Tennessee, so we have pretty similar growing seasons. But this is my first year with veggies and my first SFG, so take this with a bucket of salt.

My plan, after reading, reading, reading, and consulting with my veggie-growing relatives over the age of 80 (of which I have quite a few) is to plant corn/beans/squash again on 6/15 and 7/1. I said, What about knee high by the 4th of July. The old-timers all said, Plant short-time crops in July.

I said, Oh.

There's that logic again.

And our garden centers still have quite a variety of veggies available. Maybe yours will as well. They have been picked over, but still, SOME veggies are better than NO veggies.

Good luck!

unit649 6/10/2013, 10:52 am

Tricia, thanks for the welcome. Yes, I had trouble harvesting from my 4 x 8 beds, so for me smaller is better. My local Lowes happened to have some left over boards in their trash area, so I was able to get enough same length boards already cut for 5 beds, for under $10. I think they are 3' 4". I consider those a gift from God!
Madge

unit649 6/10/2013, 4:44 pm

brainchasm,
Thanks for your good advise. I guess that I better forget about the cabbage for now. I do have some volunteer heirloom Tommy Toe tomato plants that came up as volunteers from last year. Even thought I did not have a garden, I got the volunteer plants from my old house and tried them in pots. They did ok, but not great. But then one fantastic plant came up beside my deck, and grew and grew until it took over the end of my deck. It was the most amazing plant and I counted over 1000 tomatoes that I got from it. So I am thrilled that I have some plants from that vine for this year. I will try to post some pics of it. The 2nd pic is what I picked just before the first frost.
Madge
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unit649 6/10/2013, 7:51 pm

ETNRedClay,
Hi neighbor, I am in central KY, but was born in E KY. Our weather probably is similar to yours. You are right to listen to the old timers, they knew so much about farming. I ordered my heirloom seeds from seedsavers.com. So I guess I will try them, and see how they do. I wanted to plant potatoes, but did not get them. I will check the farmers markets out in my area.
Thank you,
Madge

Triciasgarden 6/10/2013, 9:57 pm

I am so envious of that tomato plant!!! That plant and the tomatoes are beautiful!

**sanderson** 6/10/2013, 10:47 pm

Unit649, Free wood. Way to go.

unit649 6/11/2013, 6:24 pm

My grandaughter and husband helped and we got 5 beds filled and planted. I ran out of peat so will have the finish the other bed later. We did not get the grids on, because I was in a hurry to get them planted today. Trying to watch the Farmers Almanac on good planting days. My 13 year old grandaughter got her own bed and she chose what to put in it. Here are some pics of the garden today and my plan. I really like Theresa's path and want to do that as I can. With some small stones outside the concrete path. The first pic is my concept of what I want to do. The 2nd pic is of the garden today.
Madge

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unit649 6/11/2013, 6:46 pm

And this was my layout plan.
Madge

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