WHEN I FIRST STARTED MY GARDEN - WATCH DOG

I was listening to a marine who was in Iraq during the war, and he said he saw people fighting over his food scraps because the country's infrastructure completely broke down.  It struck me that I'm completely dependent upon a food delivery system over which I have no control.  After being out of control of everything when the world ended for me in 2009, I know how awful it feels to be tossed around by circumstance.  Growing my own vegetables is one piece of taking back control of my life and one way I can be an invaluable resource for my children and family.

I've never been able to keep houseplants healthy because I forget to water them.  That pretty much sums up my growing experience.  At the same time, I realize how important vegetables are in my diet, and I see how expensive they are getting at the grocery store.  It's time to learn how to grow things.  It has never really interested me, but being vulnerable to external forces feels much worse than taking time to learn to grow vegetables.

My home has a very small backyard.  It's one of those gated-community homes with basically a cement patio in back that wraps around to the trash area and a 10x10 grassy area giving the illusion of a yard.  Up against the side of the house is a small 4x6 brick planter that has been crusting over in the hot sun for years as the previous owner abandoned the house to foreclosure.

I started thinking about my garden in August 2011.  I've read a few articles in magazines, but haven't even picked up a book yet.  I probably should do that :)  My preparation was basically talking to a friend of mine who has a landscaping company and knows a little something about dirt.  For a winter garden, he told me to first cover the dirt with a black trash bag for a couple of weeks and let the August sun heat up and naturally sterilize the dirt.  He said the plastic would cause the temperature of the dirt to rise and kill off fungus and weeds before I started planting.  Well, I didn't do that, but I should have.

In early October, I went to Lowe's and bought some organic soil mix for vegetables and an inexpensive tool kit for about $16 all together.  For the plant selection, I just went to the seedling area and picked out the vegetables I liked to eat.  I figured those vegetables were "winter crops" because the store had them out to sell. (I discovered later than this is not really true because they had tomato plants out in December when everyone knows tomatoes are an April plant.) Anyway, I bought 1 each of red and orange bell pepper plants because I love them and they cost up to $1.50 each during the winter -- very very expensive considering on sale, when they are wilting, you can get them for .50 each.  I also bought some red leafy lettuce, cucumber, basil, parsley and cilantro.

I spent some considerable sweat equity in shoveling the hard crusty soil and did my best to break it up.  I crushed as many clods as I could and tossed out the rocks.  Eventually, I mixed in the soil mix, dug the holes twice the depth and width of the root system, planted and watered.

I babied the plants for a couple of weeks, checking on them everyday and watering them every 2 days or when the soil looked a little dry on top.  Everything was looking pretty good into week three so I added some Miracle Grow.  I was very proud of myself!

Then the dog got into the garden.

She killed about half of the plants.

Boooooo!

I tried to salvage them, but after another week it became obvious that they were dead.  What I learned was that you have to think ahead about protecting your garden.  I was thinking about pests, but because the dog didn't show any interest in the garden while I was planting it, nor did I see the dog trying to get up into the bed, ever, I assumed there was no problem.

I basically had to start my garden over, so I'll talk about what I did next in following posts.