Spring Dinner Salad

A combination of spinach, romaine, mixed greens, and chard. Chive flowers aren't just a garnish... they have a fresh chives taste when you first bite into them with a spicy onion kick at the end. Yum! :)

Spinach Sprouts

This shot is part of my ongoing effort to improve my repository of what various sprouts look like... (so I don't accidentally weed them). =P

What we have here is this seasons 2nd round of spinach.

Spinach looks nearly like grass when it's first coming up (in my view). In this instance I planted it in a row-like fashion, but I think that like most leafy greens, spinach would be well served by planting in a square-foot-garden approach.

The bok choi (backround), and the broccoli (foreground) and doing great.

Likewise, the spinach and mixed greens are coming along nicely. We'll be able to enjoying the first round of the spinach crop quite soon.

The lower rock wall bed

Last year I planted in front of this rock wall, and I (nominally) amended the soil in only half the bed. I wish I would have taken pictures of that entire process... sunflowers that were in the portion of the bed that had received some compost were notably taller and better looking than those that I just planted in the dirt (little more than a sand/clay mix).

This year I've dug down about a foot breaking up the sand/clay dirt, removing the rocks, and amending the soil with cedar grove compost. In my mind there's dirt and there's soil. Dirt occurs naturally. Soil is something you have to create and nurture.

We planted watermelon (Bush Sugar Baby - 80 days), more spinach (Bloomsdale Savoy - 50 days), more broccoli (Green Sprouting Calabrese), and pumpkins (Small Sugar - 110 days). I'm skeptical that the watermelon will work ... but I was told that you can use a dome of plastic or you can prop up a sheet of plastic (southern facing) to amplify the sun and create a warmer micro-climate for the watermelon. I'll probably try that to help the watermelon along. I'd be neat if it works. It could be a viable method for other warm climate crops- peppers in particular!