Urban Garden: Part 1

 

Great plans lead to great disappointment. Back in the spring when we finally made the decision to begin to transfer our farm garden up to our urban property, we weren't in the worst drought in over a decade. Our tiller was tied up at the farm garden and by the time I finally got it moved to town, the ground behind our house was harder than concrete. My plan was/is to seed it down this fall in daikon radish so that the roots puncture down deep into the soil adding organic material and providing a path for rainwater. For that, I need to plant them six weeks before the first hard frost which could be within six weeks already.

I waited on the rain until I couldn't anymore and decided to run the tiller over it anyway. It was so hard that essentially all it could do was skin off the sod and chop it up. After two passes, I would say I got down to about 1/4" deep, i.e. jus scratched the surface. As you might see, I put a sprinkler out in the middle and have it hooked up to our water. I'm hoping to get enough moisture worked into the soil that it will soften it up enough for me to turn the earth a bit deeper and work the organics down into the soil a bit. Then hopefully I can plant the radish and hopefully get it to grow.

Next year, my focus is going to be to work even more organics into the soil so that perhaps the year after that, we can start using this garden. That could be subject to change next spring if the soil looks decent enough but I'm not pinning my hopes on that just yet. But at least things are finally underway. Progress will hopefully be made and eventually I can look back at this picture and shudder at how dry and hard it was in our back yard.