End the winter blues – plan your garden

I sit here looking out my window and everywhere I look is buried in nearly a foot of snow, the temperature is lingering around 10 – 20 degrees, and this is March! If the long winter has gotten you down, why not try thinking happy thoughts of spring and plan your garden?

What tastes better than a juicy home grown tomato, or a nice lettuce salad, or some fresh peas, or even a nice crunchy carrot? Well all of these could be right outside your door if you get some seeds or plants and put in a garden. Most people think they have to put in a big garden, and therefore get overwhelmed, but if all you want is a couple tomatoes and a few vegetables, then all you need are a couple planters or larger pots. If you do want a large garden, but don’t have the space for it, try your front yard. Our society has this impression that yards of nothing but grass are more important than gardens, but you can’t eat grass (well you can, but it doesn’t taste that great!). Tear up that grass, and put in a garden. My wife and I did this when we first moved into our house and every year we end up taking up more and more of our grass yard and replacing it with productive garden space.

What should you grow? If you are new to gardening, I would suggest keeping it simple and sticking with the staples and easy to grow items like beans, carrots, onions, lettuce and tomatoes. You will find that most of these don’t take much care and will probably produce well for you. If you have a green thumb, then I would just tell you to experiment with things that you have never tried growing before; every year our garden had a couple new items in (this year it is okra) just to see how it does. You might be surprised at what you can grow. Ever heard of fresh sweet cherries in New England? We are growing a couple trees and got our first cherry last year.

So, pull yourself out of that winter depression, and start thinking spring by planning that garden; you will be surprised what it does for your mood and how happy it makes you come harvest time. Then again this is just life according to Troy.