Invasion of the Unknown

So, I had some Japanese raddishes growing (by request of my husband) and lettuce growing.  Oh and some red bells.  The red bell pepper plant was (foreshadowing here...notice the word "was") beautiful.  It was healthy and strong and growing tons of nicely shaped, store quality red bells that hadn't turned color yet. 

Until the day of the invasion. 

I checked on the garden beds and noticed there was a suspiciously empty patch in one of the areas.  I looked a bit closer and yep--all my lettuce was gone.  Completely full on gone.  The Japanese raddishes were gone too.  Totally gone.  I immediately thought maybe snails, but they usually just nibble and stuff.  And I couldn't find any tracks or evidence of them.

I then started thinking maybe a bird.  After all, I did have some entire strawberries go missing.

I found a tiny slug nesting in my bell plant.  Again, I didn't think anything of it.  I simply picked it out (with gloves and a shovel) and got rid of it. 

After another frustrating day of things mysteriously disappearing, I decided to try one more thing.  I've already used crushed egg shells to no avail.  It could be a bird, it could be slugs.  I didn't know.  So in a last ditch attempt to keep things organic, I filled pie tins with cheap beer and put them in different locations.

The next morning, my husband excitedly called me outside before work. 

7 slugs.  7 little damn slugs terrorizing my garden. 

Oh yeah.  We mean business around here. 

Growing Better Sweet Corn

We planted our corn something in late April.  The year before we planted it too late and learned our lesson the hard way when our corn never got higher than our knees and didn't produce any corn to eat. 

So this year we got our timing right.  Great.

Other things I did right:

*watering was appropriate.

*picked them just at the right time...and the ones that were big and full were so good and sweet.

*planted them in a block, which helped with fertilization.


But....I made some mistakes.  Here it is in a nutshell:

* Overcrowding.  I grew them from seeds and grew too many.  Then, I didn't have the heart to get rid of any, so I planted too many next to each other.

* Didn't fertilize or mulch or add anything else.  I'm wondering if that would have produced bigger corn to eat. 

So I did a little research.  Next year I want to do better.  I want to be able to eat nice juicy corn from every plant.  Here it goes:

* work the soil before planting.  Help the soil get it as humus as possible.  Work in some multi-purpose compost before planting seedlings.

*plant legumes in the area where I want to plant corn next year.  Legumes (like beans and peas) help enrich the soil by contributing nitrogen.  Sweet corn needs plenty of nitrogen. 

*crop rotation--so plant my corn in a different area next year. 

Gardening Vocab Lesson: Building Rich Soil

I’m learning as I’m doing, so I wanted to document things I’ve learned in the world of gardening.

First, some vocabulary.

My gardening books keep talking about “humus.”  Humus?  Like hummus the food?  I was thoroughly confused, so thanks to the good ‘ole Internet, I looked it up.

Humus:  organic matter.  It apparently is super excellent natural stuff in your soil that helps things grow out of control (in a good way.)  You apparently can help your soil be more “humus” by composting, building lasagna gardens, and mulching.  That brings me to more gardening jargon to look up.

Composting: decomposed recycled gunk you throw in your garden for nutrients the soil needs to stay rich and healthy. 

Now, we’ve tried to make our own compost.  We’ve put in the right scraps and used milk cartons.  It just never happens for us.  So, recently we bought some organic mulch from Lowe’s.

Lasagna Garden: a method of organic gardening that involves layering (just like you would make lasagna, hence the name).  Here is an easy to follow tutorial of how to make one. 

Mulch: sprinkled on top of your soil.  It retains moisture in the soil, suppresses weeds, and makes the soil more attractive.  Organic mulch improves soil fertility too. 

So hopefully you see (as I have learned) that maintaining healthy soil is a work in progress.  It's a continuous process.  Serious gardeners are mindful of their soil quality, so this is an area you'll be seeing me post about frequently in the posts to come. 

The Start of My CA Garden

When we had a new fence installed, we found out it had to be done at an angle because of some stupid rule due to the proximity of my neighbor's garage (stupid beach community--houses built on top of each other!).  So, that left us with a piece of land that was rightfully ours that I wanted to do something with.  I thought it was a good opportunity for me to do what I've been wanting to do--a "California Garden."

What is that, for all of you non-Californians?

It's a garden that utilizes plants native to California, which are considered more environmentally sound since they use less water, generally speaking.  Here's a nice list of plants. 

I plan to extend this California Garden to the side of my house too, once I find the right inspiration for such pursuits. 

Introduction to Green Urban Gardener

Hello all! 

I wanted to pick the blog name "Gardnerella," and luckily thought to Google it first.  This popped up:

Gardnerella vaginalis.

Now, I don't know about you but I just don't think any readers would enjoy a blog name that reminded them of a bacterial infection of the vagina.  Ouch.

I'm a Green Gardner, and a mean that in a couple different ways.  I'm "green," as in a new gardener.  But I'm also trying to be a "green," gardener, using organic methods. 

The most important thing is that I'm a new gardener and I'm hoping to share my experiences and the things I learn with other newbie gardeners.

This was my second year attempting a garden.  My whole life I watched my dad garden and longed for one of my own.  Well, the day finally came where I bought a home of my very own.  The first summer was a wash from moving and also suffering morning sickness with my first pregnancy.  Year #2 in the house involved a sad attempt at growing corn and a bell pepper plant.  The bell produced one bell which unfortunately succumbed to a fate at the paws of my dog.  The corn was planted too late and never got higher than my knees.

That brings us to year #3 in the house.  A little remodeling of the backyard gave us more space.  We built planters.  We planted at the right time.  Lo and behold, we successfully grew corn, pumpkins, strawberries, beans, yellow squash, basil, thyme, lavendar, rosemary, oregano, cucumbers, sunflowers, zinnias, marigolds, tomatoes, parsley, mint, and it just keeps comin'. 

Young corn plants:

Grew to be mature corn plants:

We even managed to get a fall/winter crop in the ground this week.

I should also add that we live in the city.  A beach community.  Hence the name "Green URBAN Gardener."  Did you catch that?  Beach community= tiny backyard (although to us it seems huge).  I want to blog about how you can totally grow a garden even in small space.  My dad shook his head so many times and told me I didn't have the space...I sure showed him! 

Take a look:

We even squeeze in our drying rack for hanging clothes.  Pictured here are the cloth diapers we use for our son. 

More to discuss later! 

Happy gardening!