Why Garden In the First Place?

So, pull up a chair and sit down and mentally munch on a piece of mental homemade jalapeño pepper cornbread made from peppers from the garden.  I grew the peppers last year and made that cornbread from scratch myself, cornbread never tasted better!  We've already touched on getting into gardening out of necessity, because the government just doesn't pay the disabled enough to live on and eat quality food.  And for those of us on it growing a vegetable garden, even one consisting of a few carefully chosen vegetables in containers, can go a long way to supplement one's diet with some healthy vegetables.  And the beauty of it is that the cost of doing that compared to buying it in the store is unbelievable.

Last year I was at the hardware store late in the planting season with an unexpected windfall in the form of a gift which I was putting on some needed things for the garden when on an impulse I spent a couple of dollars on a set of Beauregard Sweet Potato plants marked down for sale.  On the way home I picked up a $3 bag of really cheap potting soil and a $2 bag of mulch/manure.  Again, the cheap stuff.  I took a $5 tote I'd bought on sale for another purpose and mixed the mulch with the potting soil and planted some of the sweet potato plants.  I ended up giving the rest away.  But come the Fall this is what I got out of that tote:

Now remember, that was from a late planting and it was in a container, albeit, one which wasn't that small.  Try adding up what you would pay that many sweet potatoes in the store and compare and you'll see what I mean.  Those plants didn't require much in the way of care, I just kept them watered, that's all.  Since nobody else in the house will even touch what I grow, i'm still eating off of that November harvest.  Added to that some of the potatoes grew slips for me this and years planting hasn't cost me a dime.  I just reused the container with its soil and planted some in some grow bags I used for tomatoes last year.  So, the only reason they will cost me anything this year is because I've added some fertilizer to help replace what was lost from last year's growth.  That cost is minimal.  I'll have more this year from the look of things and since I know how folks are going to be about them I have a better idea of how to make use of them and make sure I'll have slips for the next year as well.  With God's help they'll be a gift that just keeps on giving.

That is one of the reasons folks who aren't in our position and can afford the grocery store get into growing vegetable gardens anyway.  It is a good way to be frugal, to make one's money stretch even further and bring other things one wants within reach.  In my local store the sweet potatoes are sold individually and plastic wrapped.  I know because I bought one as an experiment in growing from the tuber.  Last year I got one tuber out of that experiment.  This year I discovered I'd missed a couple of tubers when I harvested and had some volunteer plants from that planting, in the soil in the back yard.  The long run frugality is also a good reason to switch to heirloom varieties when one has the hang of growing the plants.  Saving the seeds reduces that cost tremendously.

Since soil is generally free, all one has to do if they choose to garden organically is to take care the soil gets built up, bur then that will be the subject of a future post somewhere down the line.If one has to buy it for containers, that cost will be spread across the years since the soil, and generally the containers as well, will be reusable.  So economically speak it makes sense to set up some kind of a vegetable garden, one which fits what ever situation or lifestyle one has.

We've already used this picture before, but it gives us another reason to garden, the beauty with which the garden rewards us.  People think a vegetable garden has to be some sort of an eyesore.That isn't really the case.  The Seminole Pumpkin, the subject of the picture, is a beautiful plant on it's own which provides ground cover over a large area and, well, you see this male flower.  All one really needs to do with it is to prune it to make sure it stays within whatever boundaries on sets and keep it watered.  Those large variegated leaves will add to any landscaping scheme.

Scarlet Runner Beans have beautiful red flowers and seem to put them out all through the growing season.

Not all of the flowers are as large as the pumpkin above, but others, such as the watermelon to the right are still quite beautiful in their own right and pleasing to the eye as well.  If one wants to add herbs as well as vegetables and fruits the possibilities for an all edible garden really grow.  There are other plants which aren't edible but are useful for warding off certain insects.  Certain marigolds will discourage harmful insects and are beautiful as well.

Pride of accomplishment is something that cannot be overlooked.  After the work, and there will be work no matter how we do a garden, we can rightfully take some pride in a successful result.

Not to be overlooked, though, is the sense of peace one will feel by sitting in a beautiful garden.  I’ve mentioned before that I’m a Christian.  Well, according to the sacred text I follow, the Bible in its Protestant form, the first habitation of mankind was a garden which had everything in the way of fruits Adam needed to thrive.  Is it any wonder, then, that we find peace in nature or in a nice garden?  As little as it is, I often find that I can go to my garden the part in the back, and sit down at the chair there at the worktable and find it easy to calm down and find a sense of peace when things are so tense in the house there.  I also find that sometimes now I’m drawn to it when nothing is out of order, just to sit and enjoy the peace of my garden

So there are plenty of reasons to plant a garden, even if it is just a few containers on a balcony.  In the beginning there is much to learn and we want to help with that end of things.  However, as one progresses and learns enough to be able to paint a canvas, so to speak, with plants like and artist does with paints the benefits will be many instead of just few and more than worth it.

A Look Around The Garden

Before going onto more areas it might be a good idea to take a look around the garden to see where I'm at right now.  To start the ball rolling, this is what I have to work with:

So what I have is the raised bed out front and next to it then some of the beds on the side of the duplex we see on the right.  thanks to the generosity of those next door I also have all of the back yard next to the back fence.  So let's start there:

So, you get to see one of the reasons I can garden.  I use an old chair from the short time I was confined to bed by my back.  but what we also see is the work table I share with the housemate who prefers to grow flowers.  The biggest feature in the garden here is the Seminole Pumpkin plant, which grows all the way across the back space from the left to the right and climbs right up out fence.  The size of the leaves which mostly get partial light are awesome!  And that's just the one plant.  On the left we see one of the trellises I put together this year for my tomatoes.  The Pumpkin Plant is in the grow bag the vertical part of the frame on the left is.

This is a closer view of the same trellis taken not long ago showing the growth of some of my tomatoes at that time.  were going to take a look at a couple of closeup photos of them next.

This is the same trellis now:

 

 And close in to see some of the tomatoes on one of the plants.

And this is one of the cluster of flowers on another of the plants.

This is at the center of the back garden and these are Tiny Tim Tomatoes I have in a five gallon container along with some Genovese Basil.  these are the tomatoes I'm currently enjoying.

This is a potted set of Rainbow Coleus plants I am keeping on the worktable as an ornament at the moment.  They're a little something I put together because my wife loves Coleus.  A little later I'll save the seeds and plant again next year to keep them going for her.

Moving along to the next area, the one at the back of the side of the building:

These are some Aloe plants a neighbor gave me when i happened upon them dividing a ton of them for his sister.  So he asked me if i would like some and gave them to me.  Next to them on the left is a container of lettuce I'm growing for cut and come again harvesting.  And to the right we see some leaves from a Scarlet Sage plant.  Behind that we find:

This is the other trellis I made and it has both pole beans and tomatoes running up it.  For some reason the beans gave me plenty of flowers, but no beans.  I don't know if it was already too hot or what went I planted them.  I'm hoping to do better another time.  In front of those we find:

Bunching onions!  These were originally planted in that green container several years before I got started and then left alone until I started gardening and the ladies spread them out in the container.  I've enjoyed them for several years now and decided to divide them up and planted some in the other container and some along the front of my other bed.  Planted behind them are Morning Glories and we can see some French Marigolds to the right.  Those are part of my efforts.

This is the bed at the front of the side.  It is planted along the lines Dr. Lind Scott-Walker of the University of Seattle, WA, recommended to me when I first planted this bed.  The near part is oriental vegetables with Chinese Cabbage and Bok Choi planted, the Cabbage in front.  My lettuce and carrots are n the distance there and some of the lettuce is bolting.  As you can see I do have some weeds i plant to do what is called a chop and drop on. But the real problem children are the grass rooting its way in and Dollar weeds doing the same from the other side.

 Now we're around front and see the 3x5 raised bed which is a little underutilized right now.  It does have peppers, the ones in the back are Habenro Peppers and in front of them are some California Wonder peppers I think.  In the front corner is a small patch of Spicy Oregano.

Another view of the of some of the peppers and the sweet potatoes planted beside them.  The Habanero in the pot is in its second year of production and popping with fruit.

And those are containers of Beauregard Sweet Potatoes and the red one in the back has my Moon and Stars Watermelon plant.

 I failed to mention when we were around back that I have another kind of Sweet potatoes growing behind the Pumpkin plant.  They are volunteers from some I grew last year I'd grown from one Sweet Potato I bought in the store.  I also have Bee Balm, three kinds of Basil and a Tiny Tim Tomato plant in the same bed.  The Tiny Tim was a volunteer which sprang up in the front bed and which I transplanted to the back.

 The flower at the left is a Seminole Pumpkin flower.  The Seminole Pumpkin is the variety the Indians grew right here in South Georgia and took South with them as they fled the forced deportation to the West.  After they became the Seminole and started profiting from gambling the pumpkin became a wild plant which grows in the Everglades.  I got the seeds for these from a gardener on E-bay who is growing them and selling the seeds to those interested in keeping this old variety going in gardens.

And the red flowers are an attempted close up of the Scarlet Sage Flowers.

Well, that's it.  That is my small garden I am working with and how I'm doing with it right now.  So I wish all of you the best and as always:

Smile!