NEW KITCHEN GARDEN – October 2009

Our primary purpose with this garden is to demonstrate how easy it is to grow vegetables in Virginia Beach home gardens, whether the gardens are in the ground around your house or in pots on your condominium deck.  We will grow vegetables year-round.  Our garden will always be “NEW” because each season we will have different plants and we will try to include new and exciting plants as they emerge on the market.  Our intention is to maintain our garden with minimal pesticide usage.  Our secondary purpose of the garden is to donate the vegetables we raise to the Food Bank of Tidewater.  They will be picking up our vegetables twice a week. 

Our garden “complex” includes the vegetable garden with 8 beds and 4 containers.  The seeds for our plants were donated by Renee Shepherd of Renee’s Garden, www.reneesgarden.com, Felton, CA..  Local nurseries, Witchduck Feed & Seed and Londonbridge Nursery, gave us discounts on plants purchased for our garden.   

Some seeds were started in our homes; some were planted directly in the garden.  Our garden has a drip line irrigation system, which uses 40% less water than other systems.  The second part of our project is a compost station, located behind the garden.  This will show how easy it is to compost.  We have several farmers here at the market who will be sharing their compost materials with us.  The third part of our garden is a fantastic greenhouse, donated by Barbara Morrisette of SEASONS BEST, located at the Farmer’s Market.  The greenhouse will be used year-round for seed propagation and plant growing.

We are maintaining a weekly journal, indicating anything that is happening in the garden, successes / failures, techniques we are using, bugs / animals, what is being harvested, weather, anything affecting the garden, and our weekly donation amounts given to the Food Bank of Tidewater.  This information, along with pictures and a map will be displayed at Farmer’s Market. 

We will also send our garden journal to the Virginia Beach Master Gardeners Help Line so they can answer questions from residents that call in on 385-8156.  Our garden information can be found on several web sites, including the Virginia Beach Master Gardeners web site; Farmer’s Market web site; Sybil Mays’ web site:  www.usefulgardens.com; and Reneee Shepherd’s website.  We will also send our weekly updates to Mary Reid Barrow of the Virginian Pilot.

We are now into the fall planting.  These are the plants are in our fall/early winter garden.  There may still be some seeds coming up in early October, so if the plant isn’t there….we hope it is still coming.

Beets

Broccoli – Waltham, Packman

Broccoli Raab - Rapini

Brussel Sprouts

Bulb Fennel – Triest

Cabbage – Red Acre, Early Jersey Wakefield, Ball All-season

Cauliflower – Cheddar (orange), Graffiti (purple)

Chard - Silver Rib, Bright Lights

Collard - Morris Heading, Vates, Georgia

Kale – Blue Curled Scotch

Kohlrabi – Purple

Leeks

Lettuce – Buttercrunch, Iceburg, Romaine, Red Sail, Salad Bowl Red & White

Okra – Little Bubba okra, African okra

Onion – Red, Yellow

Pak Choi – Gourmet White Stem

Radish - Petit Dejuener

Scallions

Shallots

Spinache – Summer Perfection

Squash - Spaghetti, Acorn, Butternut, Delicata

Herbs -  Mexican Mint marigold, Flat Leaf Parsley, Hilltop Oregano, Bronze Fennel, Cilantro, Hill Hardy Rosemary,Variegated Greek Columnar Basil (container), Marigold flowers.

We have already experienced looper worms on many plants, but we are treating them with Dipel.

Our summer vegetable donations to FoodBank totaled 319 pounds !!