SPRING IS SOON!
Nature is taking back its rights and soon the first buds will come out.
The ideal time to prepare your vegetable garden: follow the guide!
During winter, it is as if the vegetable garden fell asleep to live in slow-motion. Pamper it as early as March: as a thank you, it will give you lovely vegetables until autumn.
1. Clean
During spring, weeds start to grow, and the garden is full of rubble, leaves, branches and other waste which landed here during winter weather. It is the time to clean it all up! Do not forget to compost these wastes which will let you fix the soil week after week. If you protected it with cardboard or straws, you can remove them. Thanks to this spring cleaning, your vegetable garden is more than ready to welcome seeds and plants. Additional piece of advice: check your tools and – if necessary – clean them, repair them and sharpen them... In other words, get them ready!
2. Pampering the soil
The practice of in-depth digging tends to disappear, but it is still important to air the soil by using a broad fork or another ecologically-friendly gardening spade. Proceed with care to decompress the soil without altering the underground’s ecosystem. You can bring complements to this breathing soil for instance sand if the terrain is clayey, or even natural fertilizers such as compost and/or manure. If you planted green fertilizers after summer (alfalfa, vetch, sainfoin, mustard, phacelia...), it is now time to pound them with a mower then burry them superficially with the broad fork. You will need to wait about a month before planting or seedling.
3. Planning
You want to get into the heart of the matter? Quietly think about organising your vegetable garden. Ask yourself what you want to grow this year, then think about crop rotations and placements: some spring and fleeting vegetables will quickly give way while other will add colour all season long. Do not forget that some vegetables grow high (such as tomatoes), which will throw shade on its neighbours: some like it and other prefer getting a nice tan. Finally, you can make your own seeds using germs seedling ground and buckets. Put them inside or outside depending on your region’s climate: beware of spring freezes!