Wednesday, May 21, 2008

SUBURBAN FARMERS

My husband and I are both suburbanites. Our agricultural/ horticultural experience is limited to keeping our lawn green. So, now that we are actually trying to plant a garden, we are constantly amazed with how much we don't know about gardening, dirt (I mean, soil), and all those pesky critters that are out to destroy all of our hard work.

In a way, the lack of gardening experience is a good thing, because it's so amazing to us when we go outside and see, for instance, big ol' bean sprouts where there was nothing the day before. We love checking out each row for any new growth, and we feel like kids at Christmas.





But, the lack of know-how definitely has its downside. We spend a lot of time on the internet trying to figure out how to grow things, how much to water things, where to plant things so they don't cross-pollinate and taste like something else (did anyone else from the suburbs even know that could happen?!), etc. Today, we had Mr. David (remember him from My Little Doctor?) over to do up some contracts, and he helped us water our garden. Big Daddy ("If a little bit's good, a whole lot more's better") was concerned that I wasn't putting enough water on the plants. I replied, "Well, the internet said that I should water it until it until it takes three seconds for the water to absorb into the ground." This caused David to shake his head and mutter, "Yankee internet farmers ..."

Yeah, maybe, but our plants are growing!

4 comments:

Holly said...

We don't have a garden yet (hopefully next year)but no, I didn't know cross-pollination was possible. I'll have to make sure I research that a bit more before I just willy nilly throw seeds in the ground!

Tanya said...

Oh, yeah, cross-pollination can be a HUGE problem. Have you read "SuperMom has Left the Building"? It's a great book by Judith Edwards. Anyway, she tells about planting cantelope (that's musk-mellon for you Southerners!) too close to cucumbers. They had an entire crop of cukelopes that NO ONE wanted to eat! :)

Life in the Crazy Lane said...

Yeah, a Southern friend here intervened before we ended up with cantemelons (canteloupe and watermelon) hybrids.

natasha said...

yeah, i even kill house plants and live in the desert so i can't help you. i would try and hybrid fruit though.