Sunday, January 17, 2010

Happy Birthday To Me!

So what else do you do when you turn 40 and are looking at a new path for your life?

Plan your gardens for the year- Duh!

I couldn't sleep last night because I found this great site that helps you plan your gardens. It includes freeze dates (for your area, by zip code) and when to plant indoors and out. It even tells you when to harvest! What could be better!!


Here is what I have created with it so far:
East Side of Garden- Where the chickens are in their Coop. I currently have 3 8'x4' beds on this side and a corner 5'x5' bed where we put our potatoes. We will be expanding our garden again this year by adding an additional 8'x4' & 4'x4' bed on this side of the garden. As you can see nothing is planted on this side as this is where the chicken coop started its rotation. The chicken Coop sits on a raised bed for one month and then that space lays fallow for 2 months while the chickens move on to the next bed.
West Side of Garden- This is where all the action is! Right now it has row covers over 2 of the beds. Currently all that is in them are onions, but that will change in the next few days when I will plant broccoli, carrots, beets, spinach and lettuce. As you can see we will also expand this garden with an 8'x4' & 4'x4' bed.


I would love to add another 2-4 beds but have not figured out how to accomplish this yet. If we had 12 8'x4' beds the chickens could rotate to a different bed every month thereby leaving all beds in a usable condition 9 months out of the year.
Here in Georgia, we have a pretty long growing season, and I think I can possibly grow all year long with the addition of the row covers on 2-3 beds.
I have yet to finalize my plans on seeds to plant, but today is my Birthday and I can play with seed catalogs if I want to! Do you hear the music playing?

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