This morning, I was able to finish prepping the new garden plot!

Woo hoo! It’s done!

Well… okay. Maybe not. But it’s almost there.

At this point, there are two things that need to be done to the area. One is a thorough watering before planting. The other is to adjust the acidity. Hopefully. According to the meter, the soil has a pH of 7.5. This plot will have beets and carrots in it, and the packages say they should be in soil with a pH of 6.5

From what I’ve been reading, I could increase the acidity several ways. One it to add compost or wood chip mulch. Which is interesting, because the whole reason the soil here is so soft is because it basically is compost. This area had firewood on wooden pallets, with whatever organic material (leaves, needles and grass, I would figure) was under the pallets. Which means it should be more acidic than alkaline.

Another thing that can be done is to add sphagnum peat moss. We would have to buy that, because there isn’t much left of the bale we got last year.

Other suggestions are for additives we would have to hunt down and buy, and that’s just not going to happen right now.

There was even a suggestion to water the area with highly diluted vinegar, but that tends to be a short term solution.

I might just have to go with what we’ve got.

The seeds we have that are supposed to be planted as soon as the ground can be worked are parsley and carrots. They should already be in the ground right now. 😦 The parsley was to be planted in a different area. As for the carrots and beets, I have 3 varieties of each, and I’ve plotted out 6 rows. They are cross marked, making a grid of 6 x 5 squares, as I was thinking of working in square foot (ish) plots rather than single rows. For the carrots, and any other really small seeds, I plan to use this method of planting.

Then I have to find a way to cover them, to protect them until they sprout. I could lay a board over them, but if I can find some, I think I would prefer to cover them with semi-transparent plastic row covers.

We shall see when the times comes.

For now, I think it’s time to go soak some carrot seeds!

The Re-Farmer