Planning for spring

[jimmyj]

Mmm, spring garden stuff....

I'm with you, getting the fever. We've had a ton of success with everbearing raspberries. As for strawberries, learn to have them grown in "succession" so the baby plants takeover from the mother plants every other year. The harvest will be much better. The dang birds like fruit too though!

Mmmm, berries....

 

[Western]

Western - glad to hear you daughter still loves garden work. I can't even get my daughters to learn how to can tomatoes and other garden produce, but they still know how to "drop by and borrow a few quarts of this and that" Most of the time, I consider myself lucky if I get the jars back!

:laughing: I understand where your coming from, that is the same for most of the other stuff. She still lives at home (the last one yeah!) She will stay until she finishes nursing school:thumbsup: My hopes are that she gets a job and can provide for herself vs depending on some "guy". The boys, shoot, they took off early, oldest is 31 :thumbsup::drink:

I'm really looking at some fruit trees this year, moving the garden so may not be able to get that in, but the trees will need more time in the ground, so want to move on those soon.
BTW is "Gunny" ment at to your work I.E. "GSgt"??

 

[sseelhoff]

I finished fencing off a 40x40 area (picket fence with Arbor entrance. Built two 8x12 raised beds. We have spinach and lettuce in one, and onions in the other. For us, tomatoes can go in in another 6 weeks. Yikes. Better get those seedlings started. Should probably start work on a cold frame soon to harden them off before putting them in permanently.

 

[Reyer Farms]

Remember when planning your garden: you can't pick your family, but your family can pick! Here is a pic of our strawberries. I need more cold weather and hope for little less rain. Getting ready to start plowing for corn. Hoping high tunnel gets here quick!!!



A tomato from last year, I named it Floyd.

 

[Reyer Farms]

So here recently, I've already received 6 seed catalogs. I've been pondering for quite some time on getting some black raspberry canes and this spring I think I'm finally going to do it. I think I'm also going to have room for some strawberries (my personal favorite). I have a small area behind the house that is steeper than I want to mow. I'm in zone 6 and was wondering if anyone has any recommendations/pictures on variety or trellis setup. I would like thornless black raspberries but I haven't seen any listed, and I know I want the everbearing variety of strawberries.

And yes I know it's January but I've got cabin fever something fierce. And the sad pathetic thing is I really enjoy doing this kind of stuff. There is no money in gardening and small farming, but you eat really really well.

I plan to build out trellis for blackberries very soon. I will post when I work on them. I believe they are just called "v" two wire. Ours are semi-erect thornless varaities.

 

[Gunny]

:laughing: I understand where your coming from, that is the same for most of the other stuff. She still lives at home (the last one yeah!) She will stay until she finishes nursing school:thumbsup: My hopes are that she gets a job and can provide for herself vs depending on some "guy". The boys, shoot, they took off early, oldest is 31 :thumbsup::drink:

BTW is "Gunny" ment at to your work I.E. "GSgt"??

We have a few things in common, my wife is a nurse and two of my daughters are also nurses! Those two are the ones I was talking about.

My handle: Actually, I retired from the Army as a First Sergeant, but I was in Field Artillery and I always liked my time spent as a gunnery sergeant on the gun line. In the Marine Corps, all E7's are Gunnery Sergeants as a rank, but in the Army, it's a duty position, even though it's also an E7 slot.

 

[Gunny]

I plan to build out trellis for blackberries very soon. I will post when I work on them. I believe they are just called "v" two wire. Ours are semi-erect thornless varaities.

My blackberries are in rows with two strands of hi-tensile wire running down the rows, lowest one about 2 feet from the ground, highest about 4 1/2 feet. I kinda wrap the canes around the lower wire and tie them to the top. You can't let a first year cane touch the ground or it will start roots for a new plant and you don't get any berries from that cane, so it's pretty important to keep them tied. I also prune the tall canes back some in late spring to encourage more berries. I set the rows far enough apart that I can run a bush hog between them to keep weeds down, then use a gas trimmer to clean up between the plants. I get about a gallon of large berries from each mature (3 year old) plants, right now I've got about 36 mature plants. It's not hard to find people that don't mind picking blackberries from thornless plants, everybody on my side of the family and my wife's side tear them up.
I have started another patch, letting the canes start new plants to be replanted back into the rows so that in a year or so I can sell some. Around here, U pick blackberries on thornless canes go for $8 a gallon! That'd be an easy way to make an extra 300 or 400 dollars during the summer and they don't take a lot of care. Just keeping them tied up, a little pruning, cutting out the old canes and running a bush hog down the sides.
We make a lot of blackberry and strawberry jam and there ain't much better than some biscuits and homemade jam on a wintery day or a good hot blackberry cobbler!

 

[Western]

We have a few things in common, my wife is a nurse and two of my daughters are also nurses! Those two are the ones I was talking about.

My handle: Actually, I retired from the Army as a First Sergeant, but I was in Field Artillery and I always liked my time spent as a gunnery sergeant on the gun line. In the Marine Corps, all E7's are Gunnery Sergeants as a rank, but in the Army, it's a duty position, even though it's also an E7 slot.

Got it! My FIL, retired 82nd Command Sgt major, he currently still lives outside Ft Bragg. When he was down for Thanksgiving, he was telling me about his 1st tours in V Nam as a Sgt. over the artillery, was telling me how deadly the 104mm (??) cannons where. You fellas may have "chewed" the same dirt, so to speak.

 

[forgeblast]

I use baker creek now for all my seeds. I love the company and the product I am getting is top notch.
I use nourse farms for any brambles. The product I recieved from them is amazing. We had picked so many blackberrys, froze and canned them and still could not pick them all.
My trellis is shown here it is part of my garden fence and off some old sign posts I have hung angle iron and then ran wire so that the blackberries hang over the electric fence and dont short it out.

 

[Reyer Farms]

Thanks for the info gunny!