At the end of the year it is time time to prepare the garden for winter. The last couple days I have gone out in between the rain and storms and cooler weather, to prepare my raised beds for winter. First thing is to clear out the dying vines, plants and weeds. Then I swept up leaves off the pavers and threw them on top of the dirt. As you can see in the picture below, the dirt is dark and rich great for growing anything. I will continue sweeping up the leaves and piling them up thick enough to completley cover all of the dirt. By next spring the leaves will have decomposed to the point of looking pretty much like the soil under them. We will add compost from the bottom door of our bin and the soil will be ready to start all over again.
I leave the tomato cages in the raised beds all winter to keep our dog from digging in them. She seems to think they are a great place to bury her toys. She watches me and tries to help when I plant in the spring and then watches how everything grows, so maybe she is trying to grow some new toys. You never know with that silly thing.
I had a visiter over the summer who told me I should write about how I do everything for my gardens. She grew up helping out on a farm so I thought she probably new all about gardening. So yes they had an acre garden and farm equipment and several people doing the work, so nothing like I am doing. She said she was fascinated with some of the ways I did things. She also said that she bet a lot of people would love to know the little things I do to care for my gardens and how I use what I grow. So I am sharing what I do and you can try some of the different things I do if you want, or you can share some of your tips with me for next years gardens. Just write them in the comments below.
I love to try new things and there is always more to learn. I started hearing about and reading anything I could find on organic gardening when I was 21. I had my first home that spring and so I got to have my first garden on my own. I did Circle Style organic garden and had so much food from a very small area.
The woman who lived behind me had a huge garden all in rows like you would typically see back then and she thought I was crazy. Kept telling me that she had been gardening all her life and her way was the best way. So me being me as always, being the different one in th bunch, (my sixth grade teacher told me that I was unique and I should embrace that) I ignored her and did it my way. So using a method I had read about in an old Mother Earth Magazine my first sister-in-law had given me a few years earlier, I made my circle garden.
First I used a tomato cage in the center, like the one in the picture. The cage was for compost and we threw all of our food scraps, as well as adding raked up grass and leaves all summer long. I then planted tomatoes all the way around the outside so they could climb up the cage and much closer than a normal garden. I then used three long branches and tied them together at the top. Then pushed the bottom of each branch into the ground teepee style around the cage. At the bottom of the branches I planted viny things like green beans.
Outside of the cage area I divided the circle into four sections and planted something different in each section. I had cucumbers, radishes, carrots, and all the things you normally see in a garden, but in much less space. Every time it rained, it washed the nutrients from the compost in the center down into the ground all around it and fed my little garden. I had an abundance of vegetables and canned tomatoes by myself for the first time.
My neighbor came to the fence one day to brag about all the tomatoes she had canned from her huge garden and I politely told her that I had canned slightly more from my tiny garden, which by the way was still producing more. She never had anything to say to me after that. The reason I am writing about my neighbor is not to make myself out to be so great. It is to show that you can always learn more and continue growing as you get older if you are willing. I still research and try new things all these years later.
So about seven years ago I finally decided to try the raised beds. I started having problems with my knees and legs, not being able to bend and stoop as I had always done. Long story short, it took several years to get diagnosed and spiralling downhill with my mobility I thought it would be a good idea to go with raised beds so I could continue gardening until the day I can no longer move.
That year the boys helped me put down the first row of cinder blocks and each year we added a little more until they were three blocks high. Now I can tend to them without stooping. Two years ago I was falling a lot and having to use a walker, so my husband put down pavers so I could use the walker and still do my gardening. Since then working with my doctor and a rhuematologist, I am finally able to get around with just my cane handy in case I lose my balance. I am determined to find a way to keep on doing what I do no matter how old, or what obsticles I have to overcome.