As we approach the Summer Solstice, gardens everywhere are bursting with goodness. Little flowers on long stems are slowly turning to the beans or squash or tomatoes that will soon grace the family table.

This hasn’t been the easiest year to get the garden in, here at Wild Things Farm. I was still enormously pregnant when it was time to start the seeds in late winter. And as the time came to move seedlings into the garden, we had a sweet, fresh baby. None the less, we all worked together to get the garden in. It was a bit late, so some of our plants are a little behind, but even still, I think we will end up with a decent harvest this year.

After a couple years of trial and error, we finally set our garden up as 8×4 boxes with four foot mulched pathways. This is our third year with this set up and it has worked beautifully for us. It truly does keep weeding down to a minimum.

Mulch can be expensive, if you buy it bagged or even by the truck load from a landscaping company. We get it for FREE! by flagging down the county road crews as they are trimming trees. They love it, because they don’t have to drive all the way back to their dump site. We love it, because we use so much mulch in the garden, pig shed, and chicken coops.

A couple years ago, Andrew and a couple  kids made some trellises from our garden boxes. They’ve held up really well and are perfect for beans and peas. We have planted Kentucky Pole Beans every year and just this year we added Asparagus Yard Long Beans. The plant is beautiful, but the beans are yet to be tested.

My squash plants were taking over the pathways, so I knew I needed another trellis. I mentioned it to Andrew and the next thing I knew, I had a hog panel trellis arching over the box of squash! Easy, beautiful!

My one other experimental plant this season is luffa. Have you planted luffa before? I’m excited to see how it does. One plant is huge, but the other is still small and neither have flowered.

What are your growing or experimenting with this season?