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In Our Maine Garden: Week 3 … Or, Look at Those Rows!

Things are growing! When we planted our gardens a few weeks back mostly from seed, I was worried they wouldn’t but our community garden plot is showing good progress. That’s what I am sharing in this, the third installment of In Our Maine Garden.

A funny thing happened in the garden this week.

Okay, maybe not ha-ha funny. Perhaps curious, interesting or delightful would be a better word for it.

Anyway, things grew. Quite a bit. I mean, do you see those lovely rows of growing plants?

When we planted these tomatoes, for instance, the plants didn’t come close to clearing that first bar of the tomato cage. Now they are several inches taller.

Our green beans have gone from little sprouts bursting from the seeds to these little seedling plants with actual, sizable leaves. Something — some pest — has been nibbling on them and the stems though. That has me a little concerned. Any suggestions on dealing with it?

My prized shishito pepper plant has several buds on it. I suspect this will be the first plant to have a harvest for us. I can’t wait to make some Blistered Shishito Peppers with Lemon and Sea Salt.

The carrots and beets are coming along nicely. We’re planning to plant a second row of each this week so we can have two harvests of them this season.

And the onions are coming up too. I’ve been surprised to see that they are dense in some areas, but not growing in others. I wonder why?

Meanwhile, the lettuce is also growing — though quite slowly. Next year, I think we’ll plant that much earlier. And the baby bok choy is still too tiny to really tell how it’s doing. We haven’t seen much growth from that yet.

The hardest part, so far, has been developing a regular schedule for visiting and caring for the garden. I’ve popped by a few times on my own to weed, and am trying to get the kids there several times a week to water. Early season is so exciting to watch since things change and develop so quickly, so I want them to see that as much as possible.

Unfortunately, we won’t be getting a second plot though. The renters of the untended ones planted this past week and there are none left. C’est la vie. Next year, I will just sign up for two. Or maybe three.

How’s your garden growing?

Kate Dwyer

Wednesday 13th of June 2018

We've got growth! I'm going to need to pull some cucumber plants soon because all our seeds seem to have taken! Flowers on the tomatoes and the carrots are showing too!

Sarah Walker Caron

Wednesday 13th of June 2018

That's AWESOME! I *think* our cucumbers are growing ... but I am honestly not 100 percent sure. Hopefully this week I will :)