Square Foot Gardening Update

You may remember that almost 2 months ago, our local Roanoke Valley Master Gardeners Association hosted a Square Foot Gardening Symposium, where participants became certified Square Foot Gardening Instructors.  The timing of the symposium was scheduled so that the new instructors would be ready to build their own gardens and teach others how to do so in time for our usual late April and early May planting time for summer vegetables.  As part of the symposium, we planted our own garden, however the timing of the symposium put us a few weeks late for a normal cool season vegetable garden and several weeks early for a warm season summer garden.  We decided to plant a few cool season crops and see what happened, with an eye towards replanting it as a summer garden once May arrived.  This is how it looked the day we planted it:

Now, seven weeks later, I'd like to give an update.  We've actually lucked out in that the unusually cool weather we've had for the last three weeks or so has essentially extended the expected life of our garden.  Had it been warmer, our broccoli and lettuce may have bolted by now and our peas would have started to burn out.  As it is, both the lettuce and broccoli look great, and while we still may not get much out of the peas, they've done better than I expected.  We also have onions, Swiss chard, and carrots planted, each of which look fair.  The onions seem to have either been planted too deep, or simply settled into the soft planting mix, but should turn out fine.  The carrots are about 2/3 of the way through their 75 day to seed to harvest life cycle, but don't look too promising.  My experience growing carrots in the past has not been encouraging.  The Swiss chard is not quite ready to pick, but shouldn't be far off.  Here's how the garden looks today:

I harvested the lettuce and broccoli after taking this picture.  The lettuce will continue to grow of course, though it will slow once summer kicks in.  The broccoli may produce some side shoots, but it also fairs poorly in the heat.  It looks like we ready to fill some of these squares with summer crops!

We're also getting ready to install a square foot garden at the Roanoke Valley Farmers Market.  On Saturday, May 18th at 9:30 am, Master Gardener Betty Bianconi will present a square foot gardening workshop at the market.  Betty will explain the basics of the square foot gardening method and then show participants how to start a garden, by building and planting one at the market.  There is no charge for attending the workshop.