'Nuurr

Yesterday, the garden received around 40 cubic yards of wonderful fluffy Edaleen Dairy compost manure. This is the stuff that has most of the liquid squeezed out, leaving behind only the solids. Thanks Gerald and Ralph at Edaleen for this pile of ........!

This stuff will breakdown real fast and provide a great foundation for the overall garden.

Shortly after it was delivered, Eldon again came over in his tractor and moved the compost around the plot area and then tilled it in. It looks great! Thanks Eldon!!

Click to enlarge pictures.








Below you'll see what the garden looks like after Eldon's professional touch. Thanks Eldon!!



Also, he turned the pre-existing yard waste (grass clippings and leaves) that was in the eco-block pit [see in background]. Now that stuff will start to accelerate toward good compost.

Joy!

Photos on Display

Melissa took some interesting pictures of the shed after the clean-up work Saturday. I thought we should post several. Very good work Melissa!

Click on image to enlarge.

De Shed Is Empty

Thanks to Larry V. and his trusty ole Dodge and trailer, and a hardy crew of folk from the neighborhood and from Sonlight, our little shed is now free of all that "stuff" that has been gathering in it for decades.

Isn't this beautifully rustic, brings back the good old days of 1929.




A before picture...





Another before picture....











Next is to get a plan to fix this little gem up as our garden Center. I propose that neighbors who will use the garden and members of Sonlight, we jointly work on this building and spruce it up. Between sweet-equity, in-kind donations and just plain purchasing power, perhaps we can make this into a multi-million dollar retirement home for AIG bonused executives...that is for us to charge high-end rent for sure!

Jeff

Alice Waters' Crusade For Better Food

If you haven't seen a recent piece by 60-Minutes on Alice Water's, take joy and see her drive for organic food and community gardens and "slow food"...its wonderful!

[Sorry for the lead-in commercial...]



More videos and a wonderful "sloooww food" breakfast...click here

First Till of the Year!

Thanks to Eldon H. and his farm tractor, we got the river silt tilled in Monday morning. Yeah!

Now comes the other series of compost-organics that will be tilled as well. Soon we'll have a very good start with rich soil for the early spring-crowd of veggies.

Thanks a ton Eldon!

Jeff

Master Gardener Training Coming to Us...

[Below is a note I received from WSU Extension's Jill Cotton. How cool is this! We will figure out a way to find out who wants to sign up for what...soon.]



The WSU master gardener volunteers are available this spring to help home gardeners grow vegetables in their community garden plots. We are working on developing presentations on these subjects:

From the Ground Up team:
* Soils, fertilization, and soil preparation styles
* Compost and Lasagna garden style
* Planning and siting the garden, and useful tools
* Useful structures; raised beds, trellises and supports
* Seeds, selecting and growing starts

Grow Your Own Groceries team:
* Planting: transplanting, furrows, Square-Foot, Bio intensive
* Growing, cultivation and care, weed and insect control
* Harvest and seed saving

If you would like to schedule any or all of these volunteers to help out at your community garden, please contact me with a date and time, and please forward this email to anyone else you know of who could use our help ! I'll look forward to hearing from you!

Jill Cotton
Master Gardener Program Coordinator
WSU Whatcom County

Spread it around

This past Saturday, a wonderful man got on his tractor, worked many hours, spreading around the river silt that was delivered by the county. In the rain and cold, this sweet man faithfully served our north city community by helping us in our efforts to develop the community garden.

Here's the look of "spread-around-river-silt"...click to zoom larger.


Thank you dear one, who wishes to remain anonymous!

Okay next, we start bringing in various composts and organics. If thing dry up enough so we can get a tractor/tiller in on the site, we'll till in this added material into the silt and earth that is there now. Layer by layer, tilling by tilling, we'll gradually get a really good foundation for our garden.

I was out there today, digging some test holes at various locations. A good sign: Lots of earthworms! I think "I felt the earth move under my feet..." sorry Carole King, different context. But there ARE a lot of good guys worming their way around in the Good Earth.

Jeff

What's Happening...

What's in the works or happening ... you may ask? Well here's what.

I have contacted several community citizens who have access to earth moving equipment, asking if they would move the 49 yards of river silt on the garden plot site. That should be done within the next week.

Have arranged the use of a dump truck to get some free compost for the garden, and haul it there once the silt is spread. Then will get more purchased compost from local source. Also some manure from local dairy. With all this on the site, then we'll get a tractor-tiller go over the whole scene and mix up all this good stuff.

For the fun of it, I thought I'd draw up a draft proposal for how the whole 3/4 acre area with the garden might look. See below. [Click on the picture for larger sized viewing]















Of course this will be discussed and other ideas at the upcoming organizing group that will be meeting Saturday, March 21st.

This is fun!

Jeff

Move That Dirt!

I am asking around for some in-kind help with moving the river silt we received last week to the final garden site. What is needed is to get this initial resource spread out over the 4 tenths acre that will be our garden plot area.

Then I am trying to obtain some really good composted cow manure, and put it on this area. Once we have these, we will try to find an tractor roto-tiller and till up the area well. From this we then can begin to lay out individual plots.

So if anyone knows of a business or operation that has front-end loaders and back-hoes, this would be sweet. Let me know and we'll ask if they can help.

Thanks,
Jeff

Grand Design for our Beautiful Garden

If anyone knows of someone who has the ability to produce professional landscape planning blueprints, we sure could use their in-kind (donated) assistance.

Since we are starting from scratch, fresh scratch that is, this is a good time to have an overall well-thought out design, layout and plan developed. From this we will be able to methodically develop our garden and all aspects with it.

So if you know of someone, or if you are this SOMEONE, let me know and we'll explore how to best use this community asset.

Jeff

Work Crew Needed

Saturday, March 21st, at 9 AM we need a work crew to help clean out the old shed on the site of the community garden. It won't take a lot of time, but many hands make light work!

So to those who have or will sign up to be part of the community garden, let me know if you will be there.

We may also have some other activities linked that morning to this. It may be work related, or perhaps some training/learning on gardening or the like.

Anyway mark it in your calendar, RSVP to me, and off we go.

Jeff