The Backyard

The Backyard

Monday, May 25, 2009

The Pile of Horse Manure and What Did I Plant?


My vacation week this past week was filled with planting, weeding, seeding, mulching and riding bike and kayaking. I never seem to sit still for a moment. But the one thing I realized I spend the MOST time on when I'm in the garden, is the compost pile. I like to call it, "playing in shit" (sorry to you folks who think of sh as a dirty word). The main reason for the pile is, of course, for composting. And composting requires constant turning; thus, I'm digging in it all the time. My pile is a good mixture of well-rotted manure, and some not-so-rotted or little soiled straw. The straw was separated this week and used for mulch on the entire garden. As I planted seeds, I followed-up with a nice layer of straw mulch on each side of the planted rows. Then there's the in-between-stuff -- kinda rotted, but definitely not straw. That was separated into yet another pile, called the "waiting" section. Waiting to go on the next compost pile - or waiting to use as fertilizer somewhere - maybe as mulch around a perennial or two (currants? raspberries?). It WILL be used, just not sure where yet. And the most rotted goes straight to the compost pile. All in all, there was a bunch of time spend on the manure pile this week.
And what did I plant this week?
Butternut squash
Eggplant
Amish Paste and Early Girl tomatoes
Revolution and Nardello Peppers
Cayenne and Jalapeno Peppers
Sweet Potatoes
Sweet Corn!
Yellow Wax Beans
Green Beans
Tiger-eye dry beans
Black Beans
Cannelli Beans
Quinoa
Fennel Bulb
Rosemary
Thyme
Pineapple Sage
Golden Sage
Annual Flowers for color - celosia, scarlet sage for the hummingbirds, snapdragons, and some sunflowers. Pictures coming.
I need a cherry tomato plant yet, then I think I'm done planting for a couple weeks. Cheerio!

3 comments:

DailySAHM said...

My Father told me to use grass clippings for mulch. I put some fresh clippings around a few tomatoes and pepper plants. What's your thought on using the clippings for mulch? I plan to use straw, just haven't made it to the feed supply store yet.

A Joyful Chaos said...

Sounds like an interesting garden! Hope it does really well for you.

Chili said...

grass clippings make a great mulch. I've seen many organic gardens using clippings for mulch. Nice!