#vegetablegarden

Early morning at the community garden plot. Spinach growing! Lettuce sprouted. Planted potatoes and sowed carrots.

I try to keep good notes on what I do and how it turns out. I can then review and see what to do different next year, or next time.

An in-ground garden row - dark brown, wet earth is lightly covered with straw. Thin, green spinach seedlings poke their way up out of the earth.

A view of a community garden plot, with areas marked by small flags. In the center left are two rows freshly planted with carrots (leftmost) and potatoes (left center). In the foreground is a row of lettuce covered in protective cheese-cloth and two rows of spinach. In the back are several rows not yet tilled with a few weeds and the remains of the fall cover crop in them.

A journal of hand-written notes on planting and gardening.

**Michael / Chgowiz** @chgowiz@dice.camp · Apr 23

Apr 23

Less than a month and a good many of these will be outside. Next week starts the hardening off of most of these. The bell peppers get a couple of more weeks in the nursery.

They grow up so fast!

An indoor greenhouse, with all four of its shelves holding trays or pots of plants. From top to bottom: Shelf one contains tomatoes (Roma, Heirloom, Cherry). Shelf two contains marigolds. Shelf three contains alyssum, lavender, thyme and bell peppers. Shelf four contains nasturtiums. There are two LED grow lights hanging above each shelf, close to the plants.

**Michael / Chgowiz** @chgowiz@dice.camp · Apr 19

Apr 19

#Gardening #VegetableGarden

Started moving the tomatoes into larger pots. I think the term used outside the States is "pricking out". Whatever it's called, I got a lot of the tomatoes moved. Some need a bit more growth, more true leaves before I move them.

A bit nerve-wracking for this first timer!

Small pots with tomato seedlings sit on a shelf in an indoor greenhouse, with an LED grow light suspended over them. The view is through the transparent plastic material of the greenhouse.

**Weeze** @weeze@mas.to · Apr 16

Apr 16

Weeze @weeze@mas.to

What’s blooming today is the squash flower! I have never grown zucchini before. I presumed they were vines like cucumbers but I am pretty sure one I planted is just a bush? They attacked me yesterday while I was trying to tidy them up. They have spiky things all over them that I couldn’t see. #bloomscrolling #bloom #vegetablegarden #yard #gardening

Large, palm sized yellow flower. Each petal is bright yellow with central lines running towards the center.

**Michael / Chgowiz** @chgowiz@dice.camp · Apr 15

Apr 15

#Gardening #VegetableGarden

The seedlings are doing very well and some of my tomatoes are about ready to make the move to the larger pots! The marigolds (2nd shelf) are trucking along and my bell peppers are sprouted.

Feeling good so far, as this is my first time doing the seedling thing, versus going to local big box and buying plants there.

Now to try out some secret fertilizer on these... we don't talk about secret fertilizer club.

An indoor greenhouse with trays of seedlings. Top shelf has various tomatoes and alyssums. Second shelf down has marigolds and thyme. Third shelf down has bell peppers and lavender (not yet germinated). The fourth shelf tray is still covered and was sown with nasturtiums.

**Michael / Chgowiz** @chgowiz@dice.camp · Apr 14 *

Apr 14 *

Today's gardening - preparing/fertilizing the other half of the greens bed (covered in white cloth, half has spinach already sown), and preparing/fertilizing the potato bed. Tomorrow is planting day for lettuce and potato planting day!

A community garden plot with two prepared beds, one has a white protective cloth. The remainder of the garden is not fully prepared, but white and red flags show bed areas.

**Michael / Chgowiz** @chgowiz@dice.camp · Apr 13

Apr 13

Got the spinach covered up w/protective cloth. The lettuce goes on the other half of that row later in the week. The west side of the plot has been all hand-tilled and marked out. The east side has been marked, but I don't need to till that for another couple of weeks.

At home, I thinned my tomato and marigold seedlings. My bell peppers sprouted! All I'm waiting for are the lavender (which are slow sprouters) and the nasturtiums which I just sowed into trays today.

A community garden plot, with one bed sown and covered with a white protective cloth. The other plots have been marked with white and red flags. Half of the plots have been hand tilled.

Seedlings sit on shelves in an indoor greenhouse. The picture was taken with the greenhouse closed up. Through the plastic, tall tomato seedlings are stretching towards the grow light, with tiny alyssums beside them. On the shelf beneath, marygold and thyme seedlings are growing. Beneath them, barely visible, is a shelf with bell peppers and lavender still under a plastic cover, and the bottom shelf has nasturtiums just sown into trays.

**Michael / Chgowiz** @chgowiz@dice.camp · Apr 12 *

Apr 12 *

Sowed spinach and started tilling the rows in. This picture was taken before I started hand-tilling in more beds with a broadfork. I got about 3/4 of the way done with this side.

The autumn cover crop did its job. The ground is very loose and workable. No double digging needed!

A community garden plot with a small section dug up and seeded with spinach. The rest is waiting to be tilled and prepared. In the foreground is a small sign that reads "Shorten's Shire".

Brussels Kitchen Garden @BRKitchenGarden@mastodon.social

**Brussels Kitchen Garden** @BRKitchenGarden@mastodon.social · Apr 11

Apr 11

Salad season

Over the next few weeks is the perfect salad season, just after the winter chill has passed and before the summer heat arrives...

https://kitchen-garden.be/diary/salad-season

Two hanging balcony pots contain lettuce plants

#Garden #Gardening #GrowYourOwn

**Dining & Cooking** @dnc@vive.im · Apr 10

Apr 10

Dining & Cooking @dnc@vive.im

Vegetable Gardening Live Monthly Questions & Answers E-56 (Cool Crop Tips) https://www.diningandcooking.com/2009442/vegetable-gardening-live-monthly-questions-answers-e-56-cool-crop-tips/ #composting #Gardening #GrowFood #GrowingFood #homestead #homesteading #organic #SelfSufficient #SelfSufficiency #sustainable #VegetableGarden #VegetableGardenVideos #VegetableGardening #VegetableGardeningVideos

**Hrafn van Es (Ravi) they/he** @Ravimakes@pixelfed.social · Apr 9

Apr 9

Hrafn van Es (Ravi) they/he @Ravimakes@pixelfed.social

Tomato plants are growing well, sweet pepper plants have only just come up.

#garden #gardening #vegetables #vegetablegarden #growyourownfood #growyourownveggies #tuin #tuinieren #moestuin #moestuinieren #groente #groentetuin

#groentetuin

**Brussels Kitchen Garden** @BRKitchenGarden@mastodon.social · Apr 9

Apr 9

Brussels Kitchen Garden @BRKitchenGarden@mastodon.social

Container Gardening

Even with limited growing space, certain cultivars of beans, cucumbers, squash and tomatoes can be grown in large containers with plants producing the same amount as garden planted varieties.

https://kitchen-garden.be/gardening-why-garden/container-gardening

A view of a balcony with a multitude of different sized pots containing various types of salad overlooking a garden below

#Garden #Gardening #GrowYourOwn

**Brussels Kitchen Garden** @BRKitchenGarden@mastodon.social · Apr 7

Apr 7

Brussels Kitchen Garden @BRKitchenGarden@mastodon.social

The humble radish

The humble radish is one of the fastest and most reliable cropping vegetables with seedlings appearing after 5 days and the crop ready after 6 weeks.

https://kitchen-garden.be/diary/the-humble-radish

A large green plastic container holds several radish plants sitting on a wooden bench

#Garden #Gardening #GrowYourOwn

**Michael / Chgowiz** @chgowiz@dice.camp · Apr 5

Apr 5

#gardening #VegetableGarden #composting

Today's gardening tasks: getting light onto my tomatoes, now that they've fully sprouted;
seeding my bell peppers, alyssum, lavender and thyme;
getting the remaining pallets I needed from the very generous local business and finishing my 3-bin compost area.

*whew*

A 3-bin compost area made out of recycled pallets donated by my local Tractor Supply store.

Tomato sprouts in a seed tray lean towards the LED grow light above them. They look like they're stretching oh-so-hard towards the light! So cute!

A tray of seedling flats with a clear plastic cover sit in an indoor greenhouse shelf with an LED grow light turned on above them.

**Michael / Chgowiz** @chgowiz@dice.camp · Apr 5

Apr 5

Finally, the tomatoes have sprouted! The Romas, to the top/left edge, are still getting there.

I should've looked at Johnny Seeds website when I started, I wouldn't have been as worried when it took 5 days to germinate. They were right on time.

Here's hoping I have better tomatoes this year!

Tall tomato seedlings have sprouted from the seedling soil in the cells of small plastic trays, within an indoor greenhouse.

**Michael / Chgowiz** @chgowiz@dice.camp · Apr 2

Apr 2

#Gardening #VegetableGarden #Zone5

After 32 hours, the marigolds are busy sprouting away, while my tomatoes underneath are still figuring it all out. Yay for sprouts!

Seedling trays with sprouting marigolds sit in a small indoor greenhouse, with an LED grow light above them.

**Michael / Chgowiz** @chgowiz@dice.camp · Mar 31

Mar 31

So it begins! Double-digging my first row for the 2025 veggie garden, getting it ready to sow spinach after this next freeze snap is over.

This is my same plot from last year, and my efforts/work with double-digging last year, plus compost, plus fall cover crop seem to have paid off! The soil is much more workable this time around. Still hard work, but not as tough and clumpy of soil.

A rectangular row has been dug up in a community garden plot in early spring. The sparse grass and tan-brown remains of a fall cover crop are still there. There are marker flags and poles marking out the various corners.

**Michael / Chgowiz** @chgowiz@dice.camp · Mar 31

Mar 31

Up here in Zone 5a, planting most vegetables happens around Mother's Day, more or less. I can plant the cold weather stuff (spinach, lettuce, potatoes) in early to mid-April, but the majority go in Mother's Day or after.

So... the seeds are finally getting started and I've been to my plot to see how it fared over the winter. The cover crop remains kept the weeds away! Now to start ground prep...

Two trays of seed starters, fully of soil and freshly sown, sit on indoor greenhouse seedling racks.

A view of a brown and (mostly) asleep garden plot at my local community garden.