​Greetings fellow gardeners, If you wondered if spring was here,  last week and this week was classic spring weather. Hot one day only to have a freeze the next day, with a little rain thrown in there too.  So far most of our plants have made through the changes. Most not all. A few have passed on but that is gardening. Last Saturday we planted 50 lbs. of Yukon Gold seed potatoes and 50 lbs. of Norland Red seed potatoes. We found room for 1,300 onion plants. These were planted in plastic that we laid down by hand. 120 lettuce plants and 2 more flats of cabbage. The cabbage was what I started in my basement.  These did not fare so well this past week. This Saturday we will plant another 30 lbs. of seed potatoes. This brand is Lehigh, developed by the University of Lehigh right here in PA.  They are 110 to 120 days to harvest. The other 2 types are 90 and 100 days to harvest.  We will cover our red beets with netting. I am hoping this will discourage the deer. The deer really like our red beets, we shall see if this works. Our resident bluebird house has a nest with 3 eggs so far. The female Bluebird will lay 1 egg a day from 3 to 5 total before she sits down and starts to incubate them. Then it is 12 to 14 days before they hatch. Really nice to see them around the garden.  Thank you to everyone who helped out this past week. Steve, [email protected] 215-872-6616

Greetings fellow gardeners, last Saturday was the official first planting of the season. 4 flats of green cabbage, 3 flats of broccoli, 1 flat of red cabbage, 7 beds of red beets and 3 beds of carrots made their way into the garden. A hardy bunch of volunteers braved the cold breeze and finished in record time. This week we plant 100 lbs. of seed potatoes, 1,300 onion plants and 2 flats of lettuce. I also have 2 more flats of green cabbage that I started in my basement, ready to join the party.  This second planting will be time consuming because we have to lay a row of plastic and drip line down for the onions. This is done by hand and takes a little time to do. The onions also get covered with insect netting. The potatoes will be planted in10 raised bed boxes and a full 230-foot rototilled row. This past week my bird watching was put to use as I spied an Eastern Phoebe and a pair of Rough Winged Swallows flying around the garden. Both birds are early migrants that nest in Pennsylvania.  I have to be careful. I find myself staring off at the top of a tree or off into the sky and forget what I am doing. Not good especially if you're working a rototiller!  
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Thank you to everyone who helps out with the garden. We've only just begun.....so song goes! Steve, [email protected] 215-872-6616

Greetings fellow gardeners, last week I was enjoying the nice spring weather, while setting up the gardens raised beds for this Saturday. Thank you Dean Shollenberger for the help this week. All the raised beds have had a mixture of soil/compost added to them and I was able to run my small rototiller through them. This Saturday we will plant cabbage, broccoli, red beets and carrots. Next week we will plant onions and potatoes. The last week in April we will plant whatever is left over from the first two weeks. The water has been turned on and the hoses set up. The only thing I haven't done is test the water lines in the raised beds. Last Sunday we received 2 pickup truck loads of cardboard from the youth fellowship at Advent. They had built a BOX city over the weekend and slept outside to give attention to the homeless. The cardboard will be used in the garden for weed control and to cover our walking paths when we set up the lower end for summer planting. Working in the garden each week I get to see firsthand the changes that occur all around us that sometimes go unnoticed. I watched a female eastern toad emerge from my compost pile this week. She was sleeping deep inside the pile all winter waiting to come out to start laying her eggs for the next generation of toads. Eastern toads are extremely sensitive to chemicals and other irritants. When I see them in our garden, I know we are doing a good job of keeping the garden a safe place to grow food as well as a safe place for the toads. 
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Thank you to everyone who supports this mission. We've only just begun. 2024 will be a great year! Steve, [email protected] 215-872-6616

​Greetings fellow gardeners I hope you like rain. We got a real soaking this week. I can only pray the last weeks in April are dryer then the first weeks. Last Saturday a small crew topped off most of our raised box beds with a combination of mushroom soil and homemade compost. We wheeled about 50 wheelbarrow loads into the garden. We also planted 3 beds of red onion plants. These were planted in the beds at the very lower end of the garden and covered with netting.  I call these my experimental beds. Where I try out new plants and ways to plant then. We may be putting more boxes in the upper end next year. I wanted to see how we can plant onions in raised bed boxes. This week I am taking Saturday morning off and going fishing. I am on Vacation next week so I will be finishing up prepping the upper end for Saturday the 13th and our first big planting day for 2024. WOOHOO here we go! Thank you to everyone who helps out with this mission. We are slowly gearing up for the spring and summer growing season. We will be praying for nice weather and a heavy harvest this year. Steve, [email protected] 215-872-6616