Easter break
Posted: Thursday 5 April, 2007
I'm on holiday for two weeks - I only work when the schools are in session. In addition to my springcleaning, I'm getting on in the garden. The weather has been brilliant - warm, sunny, bit of a breeze (just right for drying the washing!).
I've sowed cucumber, marrow and courgette in the greenhouse. I'm hoping to do a "three sisters" bed a la Carol Klein - using sweetcorn, beans and squashes together in one bed.
I also sowed some lupins, marigolds and alyssum - I never grow flowers and always regret it. Actually, I think I'll go and do some more now!
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Comments
tutleymutley
NOt even sweetpeas or nasturtiums?
Interesting info about the three sisters planting scheme from Judy. I love visiting your blog.
Rosemary
Carol Klein did explain that the "three sisters" bed was a Native American growing method. Wonder how they kept their chooks outof the bed!!
I have sown sweet peas - but direct into a large pot, which will take the willow wigwam thing I made. We'll have nasturtiums anyway - I planted them once and they just keep coming back. Like the borage. And the marjoram. And the mallow.
Woolworths had nice bedding plants today - I might go and blow a tenner on some tomorrow.
Judy
Don't believe they had domesticated animals Rosemary. Maybe dogs, but no cows, sheep, goats, pigs, chickens, etc.
There's so much the New World had to offer European settlers - corn (maize), tomatoes, potatoes, sunflowers, vanilla, chocolate, maple syrup, turkeys.
Clover and honey bees were purposeful introductions in the reverse direction. And others arrived on our shores as "accidental travelers" - Queen Anne's lace, yarrow, and ox-eye daisies for example.
Rosemary
Yes, and we had so much to offer the New World - smallpox, measles, guns. No wonder they sent us McDonalds and Coke!
Comments are now closed for this post.
Judy
Friday 6 April, 2007 at 12:55am
Three Sisters is perhaps older than you think. It is a method developed by Iroquois Indians, and predates European settlement. Raised areas are made about 3 feet apart in all directions (within rows and between rows.) Several corn seeds are planted in small holes. As they sprout, the soil in hilled (mounded) around the young corn plants. Beans and squash are planted when the corn plants are 4 to 6 inches tall - beans in each hill and squash in every seventh hill. Beans provide nitrogen (corn is a very "hungry" crop) while squash shades the ground and smothers weeds. A very practical method developed by the indigenous people.