Fall Garden 2011

I started my first vegetable garden this spring. I was a little worried because my backyard only gets morning light, but I decided to plant anyway and see what happens. I planted a lot of tomato plants, bell peppers, peas, green beans, lettuce, arugula, zucchini, squash, basil, chives, mint, and cilantro.

At first they all did really well, but we had an extremely hot summer here in Arkansas and my most of my vegetables stopped producing. I heard from a lot of other gardeners that they experienced the same problem.  However, my tomatoes and bell peppers did really well and they are still producing.

I also got squash bugs which completely ruined my squash plants. I only harvested 1 zucchini from 7 plants. I was pretty bummed and I probably won't plant any squash next year. Since my squash plants were beyond saving I ripped them up and prepped the soil for a fall garden. I used my shovel to loosen the soil and mixed in fertilizer and peat moss to enrich the soil.

Then on August 20th, I planted carrots, parsnips, and spinach in this part of my garden

John and I had installed soak-er hoses for the spring garden so I planned on re-using them.

Then in another section of my garden I planted butternut squash (hoping that squash bugs won't destroy that too) and pumpkins. I heard that it was too late to plant pumpkins and squash but I decided to try it anyway. Worst case scenario is that I don't get any pumpkins.

I'm hoping to post the progress of my garden through the fall. Hopefully, I'll have some better luck this season.