Denver urban gardens – Page 9

Friday garden digest 8/19

August 19, 2022August 19, 2022Posted in GardenTagged beans, bees, community garden, denver, Denver urban gardens, Garden, squash, tomatoes, vegetables, weekly garden digest 2022, yard, zucchini4 Comments

I was sick all week but my garden did not care.

Harvest

For some reason I’ve started weighing my fruit.

Developments

What’s in my bucket?

August 14, 2022August 19, 2022Posted in GardenTagged community garden, denver, Denver urban gardens, Garden, organization, packing, tools2 Comments

One lovely bonus of planting in a community garden is the need to haul stuff back and forth to the garden. Unlike a home garden, you can’t just keep your tools in the garage and pull them out as you need them.

Community garden tools

Granted, the garden does have a well-stocked tool shed with basically anything you might need. I use the community tools that don’t fit in my bucket like spades, rakes, etc. But for the smaller items, I bring my own either because of preference, availability, or (initially) because I didn’t want to walk to the other end of the garden, unlock the shed, re-lock it etc. for a trowel.

The garden bucket

I started with bags, backpacks, bins etc. but eventually got frustrated that I could never find the smaller things, and didn’t have any space for bigger things. Enter: the bucket organizer.

I got a small bucket at Home Depot, and an organizer on Amazon. I slipped the organizer on and here it is:

I really like it because it’s a good balance of little pockets to keep thing organized, and a nice larger internal space to dump other stuff that might need carrying (a water bottle, harvest, special tools, etc.)

What’s inside

Plant tags and markers. Always helpful if I want to flag something that’s just popping up, a seed I planted, a mysterious volunteer plant, etc. I’ve grown to prefer plastic because the wooden ones, although more durable, tend to rot and/or mold.

Ties. Zip ties for attaching trellises to poles/ supports etc., green rubber coated wire for tying plants up to trellises.

Tools. Trowel, clippers, little curved snippers for smaller plants, a utility knife, gloves, and a headlamp. Sometimes I go to the garden in twilight to avoid the heat of full sun and it comes in handy.

Lotions and potions. Bar antibacterial soap to wash my hands after a gardening session, other soaps to make bug drowning buckets etc.

Power bank. I’m regularly going to the garden with a nearly dead phone or speaker. This is a power bank that works with the batteries for my power tools and it’s really nice to be able to take instead of waiting for things to charge.

Other stuff sometimes sneaks into the bucket, but these are my go-to tools. Occasionally I bring it into the house to clean the tools or reorganize / clean out any trash that snuck in. For the most part, it just lives in my car so I’m ready to garden at a moment’s notice.

Saturday garden digest 8/13

August 13, 2022August 19, 2022Posted in GardenTagged community garden, denver, Denver urban gardens, Garden, squash, tomatoes, vegetables, weekly garden digest 2022, zucchiniLeave a comment

Developments

Harvest

Retirements

None that I can think of.

Did my garden miss me?

August 6, 2022August 6, 2022Posted in GardenTagged colorado, community garden, cucumbers, denver, Denver urban gardens, squash, tomatoes, vacation, vegetables, yard, zucchini2 Comments

I went out of town for two weeks, which is a long time in the life of a garden in the middle of summer! I returned to a few surprises.

Yard garden

I left my yard garden un-tended as many plants were going to seed or seemed to be struggling. I left the few plants I believed in within range of my automatic sprinklers (controlled by the building), and said a prayer. I returned to find some things ready (ish) to harvest despite my absence!

In general the yard is really greening up. I’m letting it go wild a bit this year to discover what it naturally wants to do before I make any modifications.

Harvest? Zuchini appears rotten at the end but the slugs enjoyed it.

Garden plots

A small village of people looked after my plots’ watering needs while I was gone, and I was pleasantly surprised to find all of my flowers doing better than when I left, squash development, healthy Swiss chard, and some baby peppers!