From the Archives

Looking Back on the Gardening Season

It’s that time of year again. The ground is frozen, the holiday decorations are up, and I’ve eaten enough turkey and stuffing to last me until next November. The garden is resting, which means that, inevitably, the gardener is restless. But we get to look back, see what went wrong, what went right, and what we want to change for next year.

2008 Successes

It was an off gardening year in general for me. My daughter was born just as the garden season was ramping up, and, happily, she was the focus of my world for most of the season. There were a few things that went very well:

Swiss Chard. I’ve written before about how happy I was with my chard this year, so I won’t belabor the point. Let’s just say it saved my fall garden.

Yellow Pear tomatoes. I missed growing these last year, so I made sure I sowed seed for them this year. Even though it was a generally crappy tomato year for me, these did very well, and very few days went by when we weren’t popping them into our mouths while we weeded or watered.

The front garden renovation. I am very, very happy to call this project “half done.” Next year, the focus will be on making the shady side of the front garden just as pretty as the sunny side.

The butterfly garden, thanks to lasagna gardening. My first large-scale attempt at lasagna gardening extended a narrow bed along the picket fence surrounding me veggie garden into a nice-sized garden full of nectar plants for monarchs. I’ll be doing more lasagna gardening in the future.

Swallowtail caterpillar! We had a swallowtail caterpillar make himself at home in the pots of parsley we bought for our front porch. It ate its way through one large pot, and we went out and bought two more, just for the caterpillar. It made a chrysalis in a neighboring forsythia, and we were lucky enough to watch it, newly emerged, stretching its wings in the sun. From now on, we’ll have plenty of parsley plants on hand.

The leaf shredder/vac. My husband decided to get a leaf shredder vac for his birthday. Now, instead of shredding all of our leaves the old way (raking into a pile, running over with lawnmower, raking again to place onto beds) we just rake them into a big pile, vac them up, and dump them by the bagful onto our beds. It has saved a ton of time. I only wish I had more leaves!

Making more vegetable gardens. My husband dug up the side yard and we’ve begun amending the soil for next year’s new, large veggie garden. He also built a raised bed for along the back of the house, and will be building another in the spring. We’ve more than doubled our vegetable garden space for next year.

2008 Failures

Tomatoes. My tomatoes were crappy this year. I blame myself. Too little attention was paid to them, both in the seedling phase and beyond.

Morning glories and lemon cucumbers on the fence. I posted about the heartbreak at seeing my plants had been ripped up by my next-door neighbors. It taught me a valuable lesson about not growing anything important on the chain link fence. However, the morning glories had the last laugh, and were back to their twining, blooming selves within a couple of weeks.

Beets. Like the tomatoes, my beets just never took off. Again, I blame myself.

Apples. We had a terrible coddling moth infestation this year, resulting in the loss of over 90% of the Golden Delicious apples from our tree. There is nothing more frustrating than picking a large, perfectly golden apple and seeing that telltale tunneling hole.

There it is, the good and the bad from this past gardening year. All in all, not a terrible year, but it could have been so much better. What were the biggest successes and failures in your garden this year?

4 comments

4 comments to “Looking Back on the Gardening Season”

joey, November 30th, 2008 at 6:18 pm:

I think you’ve had an extremely ‘fruitful’ year, Colleen! Gardeners wait for the dawn of each new spring, ‘hope and glory’, and why we spend, like yesterday, hours in horrid temps, tucking gardens to bed (those of us in Michigan know … bedtime is not always as we plan), planting orphan bulbs, photographing voids, and praying on sore bended knee, that perhaps ‘next year’, yes …

VP, December 2nd, 2008 at 10:24 am:

Hi Colleen – thanks for your visit over at my place, it was good to see you

And now you’ve given me a timely reminder to get cracking with my review of the gardening year. What service!

Mary S., December 2nd, 2008 at 11:38 am:

Good gravy, girl. If you grew anything the year a baby was born, you are amazing. The year my first baby was born (1988!), I only killed plants. Congratulations on the garden and the baby!

Colleen, December 2nd, 2008 at 3:53 pm:

Joey—Bedtime in Michigan surely is not as we plan! I’m still seeing things I meant to do before this cold weather hit.

VP–You’re very welcome. I’ll look forward to your year in review!

Mary–Thank you! It was definitely a busy year

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From the Archives

Looking Back on the Gardening Season

4 comments

4 comments to “Looking Back on the Gardening Season”

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