2017 Veggie round up

My veggie planting is complete, so I thought it was time to write about this year's planned crops. I have also doubled the number of raised garden beds again, so now I have 4 beds. I may actually not overcrowd my planters this year. There is laughter in my own head over that. Of course, I am going to overcrowd my planters, it's what I do. I did have some slug problems last year, they seem to be more under control at the moment. I did buy some Sluggo and added that to my anti-slug arsenal to help keep them from being a problem. There was also a problem with the soil I bought for the new planter last year. It was hot, or rather, it seems the organic material in it was still breaking down which made the soil really warm. This cooked a couple of my peppers at the roots although, the eggplant loved it and grew really big. I remedied that this year by making the new planters a month before I planted anything so the soil could finish breaking down before I put anything in it. It seems to have worked.

Things from last year I am not replanting

Bush beans- I really like green beans, I do. They grew great, no big problems other than some slug attacks. The thing is, in the height of grilling season, I don't really want to eat them. Green beans are a veggie I associate more with fall and cooler weather. They just didn't get eaten enough to grow them again.
Seattle's Best Tomato- took forever to get fruit, not very tasty when I did. My search for a slicer tomato I like continues
Viva Italia Tomato- Once again, not super impressed with the flavor and the plant collapsed under it's own weight making the fruit hard to get.
Some of the peppers I tried last year- They cooked in the soil so I never got to try them.
Rosa Bianca Eggplant- Loved it last year, no one was selling it this year, going to try a different variety.
Danver Carrots- They never grew. I have the worst luck with carrots.

Sugar Pie pumpkin- Good pumpkin but I found another more exciting variety for this year

Things I am planting again this year

Collard greens- They love the north side of the house and they are in full bloom right now. I bought some to replace the ones that are flowering right now.
Squashes- Acorn and zucchini had fewer powdery mildew issues last year so they produced more and more steadily.the butternut squash failed miserably but I am going to try them again. We eat a lot of butternut squash and being able to grow our own would be awesome.
Juliet tomato- Still my favorite variety to grow. Once again, it was a total champ
Lettuce- Gotta love being able to pick lettuce as needed in the spring.
Garlic- With 4 planters it will be much easier to keep track of the garlic so I can find it all come harvest time. I am determined to master a system for garlic, we eat a lot of it.
Hot Peppers- most cooked in the soil last year but I am going to plant them again including Satan's kiss, habenero, and jalapeno.

New plants to try this year

Red orach- already a failure, I planted the seeds when I planted the radishes and carrots this year and they never appeared. I can't find much on their germination preferences either so I don't know how to get it to work.
Onions- I wasn't planning on doing onions this year but some one at work had extra sets. I have purple, white, and a yellow.
Fennel- We tried cooking with fennel bulb this winter and ended up liking it quite a bit so I thought it was worth a try to grow it.
Basil- Saw some at the annual plant sale I go to and it isn't the Genovese that is found everywhere. This one has a smaller leaf and I am hoping it attracts less slug attention.
Black beans- Why not? We eat a lot of them and these are a bush type so they should be pretty easy to care for. As long as I figure out what to do with them post harvest they should get eaten.
Snap Peas- Already a win. I've been eating them for the past two weeks and they have been pretty easy to grow.
Radish "Sparkler"- Also already a winner, I bought this as a seed tape and it has worked great.
Kaleidoscope Carrot Collection- Carrots in a seed tape may be my ticket to carrot success. thee have actually germinated pretty well.
Ground Cherry- Looks like a small tomatillo, tastes sweet. It's hard to explain but I got to eat a couple last year and was determined to try growing it this year.
Potatoes- I am taking the plunge and trying to grow potatoes. The extra risky part is that I am growing 2 of the varieties in cardboard boxes. I am hoping the boxes manage to keep their shape long enough for this to work. I am growing Purple Majesty, Yukon Gold, and a fingerling called Makah Ozette.
Naked Bear Pumpkin- A small sugar pie type pumpkin with hull less seeds! I love roasted pumpkin seeds and with this variety I won't even have to deal with the hulls. It's a total win.
Prosperosa Eggplant- Italian variety that I have not tried before and since I couldn't find Rosa Bianca, this one will have to do.

i am also testing out another set of paste and slicing tomatoes, if they do well I will repeat them.

Purple Bed

The S.O really likes the color purple. His enthusiasm for plants begins at things he can eat and ends at things that are purple. His only other sweet spot is purple foliage plants with red flowers. Any other flower color or plant attribute do nothing for him. Last year when I bought my coveted Shagbark Maple, we started a new garden bed. When we started the bed my SO suggested we fill it with purple stuff. I agreed to it, I mean, why not have a garden bed devoted to a single color. It's an interesting design challenge.
Have I stuck to a single color? Almost. I planted a dwarf forsythia so there is a pop of yellow in early spring and a few annuals in other colors as fillers.

Dwarf Forsythia in the background Globularia cordifolia in the foreground awaiting planting

For purple, I have put in some bulbs and perennials that I will be adding to once I see what works and what doesn't. There are crocuses from when that Garden bed was lawn, most of them made the transition, a few couldn't handle the mulch layer. I want some more and they are really inexpensive. I dropped in some irises a while ago that I got from a coworker, one of them is red, and the rest purple and I didn't keep good track of which was which. They also haven't appeared yet this spring.  We'll see what happens with those. there are purple gladiolus I just planted and have already forgotten where. My ability to remember where I plant bulbs is terrible. For some more purple I planted two "Raven" Penstemon, a "Caradonna" Salvia, and a purple delphinium. There will be more pictures as the season progresses.

Just planted. I will be adding to this I'm sure

I think I'm going to go get a perennial verbena, that would be a nice low plant for that bed. Maybe some phlox too.

My maple, just starting to leaf out

 Also since there is a tree, I will need to plant more shade plants over time. Oh tragedy I sigh, as I already have a short list of epimediums and purple foliage shade plants. I am a plant addict, what can I say.