Last week, I posted about the "no longer so cute" little woodland creatures who are eating my container garden that we brought with us when we moved. At first, I joked with my husband that I hoped it was a deer because with all of the onion tops and parsley it had eaten, my sausage would already be seasoned. We discovered though, that it is probably rabbits. We found a rabbit "village" - lots of rabbit holes and lots of rabbit families - just a few feet from the location of the container garden. My Dad is planning to take the boys rabbit hunting soon, but really, there is no way to keep them completely out of the garden, so I think we are going to have to try to contain the entire garden somehow to protect it.
The plan is to build 4' X 8' raised beds (hoping to have the first one finished by next weekend) with a hinged lid composed of 2 4X4 frames with hardware cloth stretched across the top and sides. The lids will fasten to the raised beds with some sort of clasp so that they cannot be opened without an opposable thumb, lol. Under each raised bed we are going to put hardware cloth to help keep out the diggers. I don't know if we will be able to completely outsmart the critters, but we will start here and add more reinforcements if necessary.
I am also planning to add lids to the container garden, as the onion tops and parsley are growing back. Hopefully we will still be able to harvest and use these at some point. And speaking of harvest - I harvested 8 carrots this week (5 orange and 3 white) and used them in a soup - well, only what the kids didn't eat right away made it into the soup. Very yummy! I hope to plant more as soon as the new beds are ready.
While my parents were here last weekend, my Dad helped me to make a compost bin, and he, Mom and our oldest son helped to fill it with leaves. I'll get a picture of it soon and post it. It is nothing special, just posts and hardware cloth, but we definitely need it for the garden and we have more than enough leaves to get one started.
I also mentioned last week that I wanted to work on getting some salad greens to grow indoors. We have many East facing and many South facing windows that get so much beautiful direct sunlight. A week ago, I planted the first small container (an old bowl) with mesclun seeds and they are up.
We will probably harvest some as micro greens and let some continue to grow to the "baby greens" stage. If they look to be growing well, I'll let one or two plants get bigger. I planted a second container yesterday - in a lettuce container from the grocery (thanks for the idea, Alea!!).
In another week, I should be able to tell if they are going to grow well. If they are, I will plant another container and then a fourth the following week, maybe with spinach.
Do you have a winter garden growing? I love to read about other people's gardens and would love to read an update of yours. Please post a link or update in the comments :)
This post is linked up to Fertilizer Friday.
3 comments:
Do you have an aversion to cats? We boot the cat outside at night when the rabbits come into our yard. They've never bothered my garden and I don't have anything covered, but they are in raised beds, about a foot off the ground. I also have the boys pee around the the garden to help ward off pests like that. I don't know if it works, but I haven't had any problems.
Your flowers are pretty. I love the surprise when you move to a new place a bulbs come up.
Your daffodils are lovely! You should link this to Fertilizer Friday. I have a link on my garden blog: http://www.onedeterminedgardener.com/2010/01/signs-of-life.html
Alea, thanks for recommending Fertilizer Friday. I linked up :)
Paula, we have/ had a cat (I love cats) but we have not seen her in a while. She either got lost or eaten by something. We are getting a dog soon and most likely another cat. Hopefully that will help. Had not thought of having the boys pee around the garden beds. They will love that, lol.
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