Planting Time at Lawrence Manor

One of the things I love the most about living in a small town is that the real estate is dirt cheap. We bought a house on 2 city lots with 6 producing pecan trees and a sweet storm cellar which doubles as a prayer cave complete with icons and candles for less than a down payment on an apartment in the city (seriously, just because you call it a "condo" and pay a bunch of money for it doesn't change the fact that you just bought an apartment). After finding myself under 30 years old and already part of the landed aristocracy (remember the good old days when you had to be a man and own land to vote? and people wonder why the country is going down-hill these days...) I set myself to making my land productive.

Last year I threw together a garden rather quickly in May. At least, I think it was in May. The plants I bought from the green house were on clearance, so it was almost too late to plant. I grew tomatoes and peppers along with oregano. Most of the tomatoes went rotten and the oregano never got harvested, but I did manage to can 30 pints of jalepeno peppers and dry around 6 dozen cayennes.

This year I am going to be much more methodical in planting my garden, and I am going to document it here on my blog (I figure this is a much more productive way to spend my blogging energies than pontificating on things "spiritual" or worse, entering into the raging internet debates between the neo-reformed inquisition and those of us who aren't crazy).

Here's the goal for the year:
75 pints of pickled jalepenos (I need a pint a week just for myself)
52 pints of pickles (normal and hot variety)
30 pints of salsa
and maybe another 30 of pasta sauce

As for exactly what I'm planting this is a rough run down:
Asparagus
Broccoli
Brussels Sprouts
Basil
Garlic
Green Beans
Lettuce
Onion
Peppers - 2 varieties of Jalepeno, Red Habanero, and Ceyenne, and maybe Bells
Snap Peas
Spinach
Tomatillos
Tomatoes

To cram all these plants into such a tight space, I'm going to use a variation of the square foot gardening method which I like to think of as "clump planting." It's not pretty, but it works :) I'm also going to save some space by planting my green beans and snap peas along the fence which I've put up for the dogs. This may not work all that great, but I'm going to need room for 3 dozen pepper plants so space is valuable.

My garden space is roughly 34' x 17'. I'm going to surround it with chicken wire to keep the rabbits out (although I will most likely give a good chunk of my salad harvest to them). I also may run electric fence around it to keep the deer and gypsies out.

The weather was exceedingly beautiful Saturday, so I went ahead and did a first tilling. Here's what things look like as of March 13, 2011: