Feeling Our Way Along

I'm just about ready to dump the whole contents of the worm bin into the garden.  The worms are surviving, but they seem more than content with tunneling through their bedding.  All the kitchen scraps I leave (and I've tried all sorts of them) go moldy before they attract any worm-ish attention.

Clearly I'm not doing the worm thing right.  Still a garden can always use a few hundred more worms, so it'll probably be a good thing to put those guys out there.

Speaking of the garden, we're getting some produce.  Last night we had a very tasty salad from the thinning of one of the south rows.  Overall, however, I think that the garden lacks some key nutrients.  Our plants are not developing as quickly as one would hope and expect given the good conditions of sun and water.  This is not too surprising -- and not at all discouraging -- for one's first attempt at creating a thriving garden from notoriously bad soil.

There is a WSU extension nearby and I'm going to call them and see if they can recommend a soil testing service.  There are probably some good things we can do this fall to insure that next year's harvest is greater.

Angel and I have been very busy on the ornamental landscape front.  We've added a retaining wall (nearly 40' long!) along the west side of the driveway.  Yesterday, I worked the soil of about half of it.  Angel did a major weed removal and added a few more plants.  This area will eventually feature blueberry and blackberry fines, but they are merely twigs so far... albeit twigs that have green growing from them!

We are also developing a plan for a large, secondary garden just to the east of the main garden area.  This will require more fencing, but it's another great spot with southern exposure.  And this spot can be fed by rainwater captured from our roof!

Last night I realized that I have years' of projects available to me.