First Gardening Day of the 2017 Season!!

[Update provided by Iris--Thank you!]

We met at the garden today (April 8th) to get ready for spring planting. The big project was to move the mature compost out of the middle bin, screen it for undecomposed/large pieces (think avocado pits) as well as plastic and other non-organics, and put the finished soil into the garden beds. Elisa Zazzera, who has been keeping our compost going all winter, was there to get us started. MJ stopped by for a while too. (Sorry we didn’t get photos of MJ!)

We’ll be meeting at the garden again next week and, if the water is turned on by then, we’ll be able to start planting!

For more details on the compost pile see the blog post here.

Here’s a pile of beautiful dark soil created from food and garden scraps!

Marcelo and Els began working on creating the area where we plan to move one of our big double-plot raised beds (the one that is currently too shaded).

The middle compost bin, emptied of all the good stuff.

The bin that is in the process of composting with fresh fruit and vegetable scraps, leaves and other garden debris.

Gabriela took over the compost bins after Elisa left.

Iris made a trellis of string for the snap peas she and Linda H. planted this week.

Susan getting started on her plot, checking the layer of ground leaves and looking for overwintering greens.

Mark kept working on the area for the new bed. He and Iris wheelbarrowed loads of dirt from the infamous dirt pile to begin to even out the land. They also put the fence back up (it had been moved to allow for piles of snow to be plowed into the garden area). Hopefully the deer who discovered the garden while the fence was down will be discouraged from making it a regular lunch spot.