This is our journal of what we pray is our sojourn of life (Hebrews 11:8-10) along the narrow way (Matthew 7:14), even the old paths (Jeremiah 6:16), submitting to the Bible as a light unto both (Psalms 119:105). It is our prayer that these documented moments in our earthly time benefit whom God might choose to edify, but ultimately that God glorifies Himself through them.

Garden – Spring 2015 – Update II

The Lord has graciously granted our 2015 Spring garden to continue. The mulch bed gardening allows us to set hoses from the cistern and only have to move them every 10 minutes, which keeps from having to constantly monitor the watering for 2 or more hours.

Here is how everything looked a couple of weeks ago, end of July…

Okra:

Okra Plants

Beans, butternut squash and zucchini:

Bean, Butternut Squash, Zucchini Plants

Here are carrots growing out of the hugelkultur bed. If you look closely, you can see the remnants of one of the bed’s “tenants”:

Carrots & Snakeskin on Hugelkultur Bed

More okra:

More Okra Plants

And our one pumpkin plant, and the okra again:

Pumpkin & Okra Plants

The pumpkin plant really took off, up the fence, which actually had a pumpkin hanging on it:

Pumpkin Plant Growing Up Fence

And up the tree:

Pumpkin Plant Growing Up Tree

And here are the tomato plants:

Tomato Plants

As for the produce, turnips planted a couple of years ago continue to show up!

Turnips

And here is butternut squash down in the root cellar we’ve been granted:

Butternut Squash in Baskets

Butternut Squash on Root Cellar Shelf

And a couple of good-sized pumpkins!

Pumpkins

Here are the few carrots we got from the hugelkultur bed, along with some okra and zucchini. The carrots were something of an experiment as I did nothing to improve the bed ahead of time, and it was just nice to see a few come out. The Lord has also granted several, but not a lot, of zucchini, and the okra keep coming in almost daily. We’ve been able to tuck quite a bit away by lacto-fermenting the vegetables in jars:

Carrots, Okra & Zucchini

And here are some tomatoes. We have pretty much just been eating these as we go:

Tomatoes

And here is where things are now, after about 5-6 weeks of straight upper-90 to 100-degree weather with no rains.

This is Garden 2. The okra is still going, nearly 6 foot tall; some of the green beans are still there; the butternut squash are still producing; and only 1 zucchini plant remains:

Garden 2 Mid August 2015

And this is Garden 1. The okra here is even taller, and the pumpkin plant is basically done. Sadly, a couple of the pumpkins didn’t make it:

Garden 1 Mid August 2015

And the tomatoes. I had to dust them with an insect dust because it appeared blister beetles were making their way over there, and they do damage very quickly:

More Garden 1 Mid August 2015

Finally, because it appears that only soil that’s covered will work well without requiring hoards of water, I decided to start mulching the rest of Garden 1, over the raised bed area, hopefully in time to plant a Winter garden!

Garden Raised Beds

Mulching Over Raised Beds Area

This week is about the last week we can do full watering because the cistern is getting to a point we want to make sure we have enough for ourselves and the animals; so if it doesn’t rain, watering is going to have to be reduced.

We do have rain percentages this weekend though. But God knows best, and we are very grateful for the provisions He has granted from the garden this year thus far!

— David

2 Comments

  1. bayougirl

    I am happy for you – it looks like the garden is improving every year. The pumpkins look especially robust 🙂

  2. David and Susan Sifford

    Hi bayougirl,

    Thank you much! Slowly but surely we try improve things with God's help. 🙂

    Thanks for saying hello!

    — David

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

20 − twelve =