Exciting Garden Things

There are things, exciting garden things, happening under that dome of plastic. 

They may only be exciting to us gardeners though.  I have some raised beds in the greenhouse!  Brandon helped me use some old lumber to create shallow raised beds in the center of the greenhouse on on each side.  We stood the lumber on it's side, and pounded wooden stakes in the ground to hold the boards in place. 

Then we used a shovel and removed the top two or three inches of soil from the pathways, and filled the shallow beds.  For the past several years I've been amending the soil in the greenhouse with compost, chicken feathers, old hay, manure, and weeds green cover crops.  All that organic input has resulted in beautiful black garden soil loaded with bits of organic matter.  By scraping the good dirt from the paths and adding it to the raised beds, the rich garden soil is even thicker. 

We spread old hay on the pathways.  It won't be long before that breaks down into soil too, and I can make more raised beds. 

I raked the soil surface, and planted lots of greens.  Because of our clay soil, drainage is a challenge in the garden when it rains.  Sometimes water stands on the surface in the greenhouse.  I'm hoping that the shallow raised beds will help with that problem, although I know if will require more watering when it's dry.  All that nice organic matter should soak up the water and hopefully keep it from drying out too fast.  

Look, seedlings!  I planted lettuce, mustard greens, turnips, kohlrabi, radishes, and sugar snap peas. 

The chicks that live in the brooder in the front corner of the greenhouse are doing really well.  They are two weeks old now, and are more than half way through the first bag of chick starter.  I visit the greenhouse twice a day to tend the birds and water the bed of greens.  The wind makes the plastic pop and rustle, but I keep the sides rolled up during the day so there is fresh air.  At night I roll one side down to block the cold wind.