Gardening is a great summertime hobby. You get to spend time in nature, lower your grocery bill, and for those with children, it’s a great learning opportunity. Unfortunately, it’s not a hobby you can pursue whenever you feel like. Like any living thing, a garden requires attention on mother nature’s schedule. A big garden can compete with other summer activities for your attention, particularly with vacations. Here are a few tips to help you keep a garden alive and still take a summer getaway.

Plan and plant accordingly. 

If you know ahead of time you’ll be taking summer vacations you can plan your planting to better fit your needs. There are three key things to think about when planning your vacation tolerant garden.

Drought Tolerance

The first feature to look for is drought tolerance. Crops like flint and dent corn, sweet potatoes, and peppers will all probably tolerate missing a week of watering while you’re away. Many perennials like asparagus and rhubarb can also handle a bit of neglect once they’re established. 

Weed Tolerance

You can also select plants that will outcompete weeds. Most crops need to be kept weed-free in the spring when they’re young but certain crops will keep themselves fairly weed free once they’re established. Vining crops like cucumbers, melons, pumpkins, and squash are ideal for this and can be used under taller crops like sunflowers, corn, or pole beans. Thick plantings of greens like kale can also keep out weeds once they’ve gotten started. 

The Three Sisters Garden Guide

Harvest Dates

Lastly, if you know exactly when your vacation will be you can try to time harvests around that date with certain crops. While there are no guarantees in gardening, many plants provide fairly reliable harvest dates allowing you to plan when you’ll be home to harvest. Try this with crops like sweet corn, dry beans, and onions. Root crops are also ideal because they can be left in the ground for long periods and harvest when you get home.

Use mulch.

Another great way to make any plant more drought and weed tolerant is to use mulch. A layer of cardboard or newspaper covered with grass clippings, straw, hay, wood chips, or old leaves will keep weeds down for a large portion of the gardening season. Also by covering and insulating the soil, it will help keep it cool and moist even when you’re not home to water. 

Install drip irrigation. 

If you’re able, installing drip irrigation can make life a lot easier. Drip irrigation delivers water right to the base of the plant decreasing loss to evaporation so you lose less water. It’s also easy to set your system up on a timer making it perfect for those times when you’re out of town.

Weed, harvest, water.

It won’t be the most fun way to start a vacation but if you have time put in the work to thoroughly weed, harvest, and water your garden before heading out on vacation. You may still have some work to do when you get back but not nearly as much catch-up as you would otherwise. 

Get a Garden Sitter

Many people hire pet sitters when they go away but few think about hiring a garden sitter. If you have a large garden hiring someone to harvest, water, and maybe even pull a few weeds while you’re away might be worth it. You may even be able to trade them some vegetables for their efforts. 

Recommended Varieties

There are many varieties that will tolerate a vacation or two but here are a few we recommend.

• Ashworth Sweet Corn – dependable and early maturing (69 days)
• Floriani Red Flint Corn – needs minimal attention/watering once established
• Black Turtle Bush Dry Bean – good drought tolerance and reliable harvest date
• Suyo Long Asian Cucumber –  hardy, heat-tolerant, variety good for pickling or slicing
• Connecticut Field Pumpkin – low maintenance once established, great for canning, baking, or jack o’ lanterns
• Hopi Dye Sunflower – drought tolerant, great for birds, eating, or just as an ornamental

Summer is a busy time for everyone. Use these tips to maintain a productive garden while still enjoying a few summer getaways. 

Having a shady yard can be wonderful on hot sunny days but it’s tough for those who love to garden. Thankfully there are a number of flowers, vegetables, and herbs you can grow that tolerate at least some shade.

Listed below are a few of the plants that tolerate partial to full shade (less than 3 hours direct sunlight per day) that you can order through us.

Flowers

Many flowers, particularly annuals, love full sun but there are a few that do well in more shady areas. Some flowers like nasturtiums, tolerate shade but may not bloom as much as they would in sunnier spots.

• Balsam
• Violas
• Bee Balm
• Nasturtiums
• Soapwort
• Sweet Alyssum
• Sweet William
• Sweet Wormwood (Sweet Annie)

Vegetables

While you can’t necessarily start a vegetable garden in the middle of the woods there are quite a few plants that will tolerate some shade. In fact, having a bit of shade can help you grow cool season crops later in the south. However, it’s important to remember that many plants will grow slower in the shade than they would in full sun.

• Collards
• Lettuce
• Swiss Chard
• Broccoli
• Cabbage
• Kale
• Peas
• Beans
• Arugula
• Spinach
• Carrots
• Radishes
• Beets
• Green onions

Woodland Medicinals

If you have a wooded area on your property consider growing ginseng or goldenseal. Both plants are highly medicinal and native to North American forests. They do well in the forest understory or other shaded areas. Wild ginseng and goldenseal are frequently overharvested so adding them to your property can help these plants survive. You can pre-order seeds or roots will both ship in the fall.

Mushrooms

Though not actually a plant, mushrooms can help you make the most of your property because they love humid, shady spots. The mushroom spawn, available as plugs, comes from Sharondale Farms and makes cultivating mushrooms easy. The plugs are placed in holes drilled into logs and inoculate the log with mushroom mycelium. These logs will bear mushrooms for several years to come, giving you an edible product from your shaded areas. Great varieties for beginners to try include:

• Oyster
• Shitakes
• Lion’s Mane
• Reishi

If you have a wooded or very shady area on your property you can also check with local nurseries to see if they carry any plants local to your native woodland. Shrubs like holly and plants like Dutchman’s breeches and bleeding hearts are accustomed to growing in the shady understory and make wonderful landscaping plants as well!

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Leeks have a long and cultured history. Some of the earliest records of leeks come from Egypt. There dried leeks were found in archeological digs as well as in carvings and drawings. They were also consumed in ancient Rome and are said to have been a favorite of the emperor Nero.

Later leeks were brought to Wales where they gained impressive notoriety. According to legend, a monk named David suggested to the Welsh that they wear leeks on their helmets to distinguish themselves from the enemy in their famous fight against the Saxons in the battle of Heathfield in 633 AD. Later that monk became St. David. To this day the Welsh still wear leeks on St. David’s Day and the leek is a Welsh national emblem.

Planting

Leeks are surprisingly easy to start from seed and plant. To start from seed you’ll need a tray full of good quality potting soil. You don’t need separate cells for leeks though they’ll do fine in cells if that’s easiest for you. Generously spread seed in the tray, lightly cover it with soil, and water them in.

Once your leeks are 6-12 inches tall, you’re ready to plant them out. To prepare your bed for leeks you’ll want nice loose soil. You can broadfork and then rake it smooth if you practice no-till. Then take a tribble (basically a handle or stick about 1 inch in diameter with a slightly pointed end) and make holes for your leeks. Generally, the farther you plant them apart the larger the leeks will grow. Aim for about 9-12 inches between each plant and row or 2-6 inches between each plant and 18 inches between each row.

Once your bed is ready, gently tease the plants apart. You don’t need to worry about keeping soil with each plant just try to avoid damaging the roots. Then place one leek in each hole, making sure the roots are touching the bottom. Do not fill the holes in. The deep holes create nice blanched, white stems and by filling them in you can get dirt between the leaves.

Once they’re all planted you should carefully water them in. Watering will stir up enough soil to cover the roots at the bottom but you should do so gently as to avoid filling in the entire hole. Once they’re established you can mulch around them with hay, straw, leaves, or grass clippings to cut down on weeds and keep the stems white.

Harvesting

Harvesting leeks is a bit like harvesting carrots. It’s best to loosen the soil with a garden fork before you pull them to avoid breaking them. Try to avoid spearing any, of course.

You should chop off the long roots and outer, tough leaves into a ‘V’ shape. If you’re harvesting quite a few it’s best to place them, base down in a bucket with a bit of water to help them stay fresh.

If you’re harvesting leeks from frozen ground our friend Pam Dawling recommends pouring boiling water on the base of the plants if you’re harvesting a few for immediate use.

Storage & Eating

One of the best ways to store leeks is by just leaving them in the garden. Winter varieties of leeks are very cold tolerant, handling temperatures down to 10°F. In many areas, they can be overwintered in the garden providing fresh produce when little else is coming in.

If you must harvest your leeks you can store them fresh in the refrigerator or in wet sand in a root cellar. Leeks can also be dehydrated or frozen. To dehydrate you want to slice them into thin pieces and dry them in a single layer in a dehydrator. You can freeze leeks the same way on a cookie sheet before transferring them to a container for easy use.

Potato and leek soup is an obvious classic but leeks are incredibly versatile. They’re milder than a regular onion and are excellent for galettes, pasta dishes, or just sauteed with some fresh greens or cabbage.