It’s been five weeks now since we planted the first things in the garden.  Sometimes radishes would be ready that quickly, but we did have some pretty cool stretches.  They shouldn’t be far off, though.  I thinned things somewhat the other day and fed what I pulled to the chickens, but I need to do some more.  Time for some updated photos; as always, click to make them bigger.

First, on the left are the Little Marvel peas.  My original chicken wire over the center of the plot was mostly intended to keep the dog from digging, but one day I noticed something was nibbling the peas that were exposed on either side of it.  Probably rabbits.  So I put a short fence of chicken wire around it instead.  Those peas were stunted, but they’re recovering and catching up.  The un-nibbled ones are starting to develop the little tendrils they use to climb each other, so they actually look like peas now.  To the right of the peas are radishes and lettuce, but the radishes are bigger so you can’t really see the lettuce.  The radishes should all be pulled within a couple weeks, and then the lettuce will take off.

Little Marvel Peas and Radishes

After two rows of radishes and lettuce come two rows of radishes and carrots.  The carrots are really tiny, but you might be able to see them if you put your nose on the screen.  They still just look like grass.  They’ll come on after the radishes, like the lettuce.  To their right is one row of cabbage, which still needs to be thinned, since there are enough plants there to transplant the entire yard full.

Radishes, Carrots, and Cabbage

Next are two rows of Swiss chard.  I thinned these, but will need to go through them again, as you really only need about one plant per foot, which means 3-4 per row.  More seedlings for the chickens.

Swiss Chard

And lastly, on the east end of the bed, the edible-podded peas (snap peas).  These also took some rabbit damage, but they seem to be coming out of it.  They took about a week longer than the Little Marvels to come up, so they’re not as big yet.

Snap Peas

In the other garden bed, the garlic is still growing and the herbs are all greening up.  I guess they all survived after all.

Garlic and Herbs

And here’s a closeup of the turnips and radishes that are in that bed, next to the herbs, between the two birds on sticks.  The other radishes are ordinary ones, but these are German Giants, which get much bigger than usual.  I’ve never gotten any the size of a baseball like they say in the seed catalogs, but they’ve come close.  It’s nice when you only have to clean a couple radishes to make a snack instead of a dozen.

Radishes & Turnips

And here’s a picture of Pepper, doing her best to ignore the chickens while they graze in the grass.  She’s actually been really good around them, not acting aggressive at all.  She does get excited and want to help when it’s time to herd them, though.

Chicken Herder

And here’s a perfect picture Angel caught of her, when we were fighting over the smallest stick in the yard:

I HAZ A STICK