[Stefan]

This is about the 4th year I have done a vegetable garden. About 700 sq ft. I have corn, beets, kholrabi, potatoes, carrots, beans, tomatoes, cucumbers, radishes, lettuce, strawberries, raspberries, and I grow everything from seeds. I have trouble with kholrabi, beans, corn, beets, and radishes. I will get a plant--but I do not get much "fruit" or "meat" for these 5 items. I don't know what I am doing wrong. I have a raised bed of soil (that came from the Kent valley) becuase I live on the west valley hill that is glacial rock. The vegetables get a lot of sun. Every year I put lime in the soil. I use compost from the fall leaves and mowed grass. How much should I water the vegetables them? What about steer manure? One recommendation from marylou was spacing of vegetables? Any other recommendations?

[catwoman]

I don't know anything about lime - is that a natural thing? I like to use Alaskan Fish Fertilizer. If you've got lots of veggies in a relatively small space (as I do), I use this organic fertilizer more often than it recommends. I would water daily. And probably quite heavily in the heat waves like now.

[jenjen]

What kind of fertilizer are you using? And on what schedule? Compost is great stuff, I go through yards of the stuff, but the crops you're mentioning are heavy feeders. Corn is especially known for sucking up all the resources in the soil and still being hungry. I use Whitney Farms organic fertilizers at my home and for my clients. You specifically want the flower and vegetable food. I fertilize the vegetables once a month until September, when the garden is dying down anyway. Corn is a special case -- it's a grass and really wants lawn food (the kind without pesticides!). Fertilize this once a month also. Also, what kind of crop rotation are you doing? the beans are great for fixing nitrogen into the soil and the corn would really like that next year. My garden seems to do fine with water every 3 days, I wait until the leaves look ever so slightly wilted in the afternoon, then water them good after the sun goes down. PS The soil may be overlimed, radishes tend to be sensitive to this. Have you ever checked the soil ph? It should be ever so slightly acidic for vegetables to be happy.

[Stefan]

I do not use any kind of fertilizers. Never thought of it. I am still learning. Where do you get this fish fertilizer? Where is this Whitney Farms Organic Fertilizer sold? How do I check the soil ph? I do rotate the location of the beans with the corn from year to year, but I have not noticed a significant difference with the "outlying" corn becuase I do a thorough job of rototilling.

[kiliki]

A good resource is "Growing Vegetables West of the Cascades," if you don't already have it.

[Stefan]

[kiliki]

http://www.elliottbaybook.com/product/info.jsp?isbn=1570612404

[catwoman]

The alaskan fish fertilizer (yes, it's organic) can be bought at I think any of the hardware stores. I've seen it at McLendon's and at Home Depot. It comes in a bunch of different varieties - I have the dried vegetable and tomato fertilizer version. You may want to check with a knowledgable salesperson to find out if you need anything different. In years past, I used the liquid version. I don't know which, if any, is better than the other, but I find the dry is much easier and less mess and hassle than the liquid.

[jenjen]

Whitney Farms organic fertilizers are sold at most plant nurseries. If they don't cary The Whitney Farms brand, they will have another organic brand that will work as well. Again, except for the corn, vegetables like flower food. Corn likes lawn food. Soil ph tests can also be found at most plant nurseries. The soil should read acidic (around 6.5-6.8 on the meter, specifically). Let me ask you this, when you taste the radishes, are they kind of soapy? If yes, the soil is too alkaline and you need to add some peat moss. If no, the soil acidity is probably fine.

[Stefan]

Thanks people for the help. Any more is greatly appreciated! I think I will pick up the book and see what I can do better for next year. As far as the soapy taste of the radishes...I can't remember if they tasted soapy. There are no more, and I did not plant any more becuase I was disappointed at the results. I do remember they were NOT really that spicy this year.

[rubberlegs]

I'll second that excellent book. And add that the seeds or starts you use make a difference. Some of the plants sold in the stores are marketed for the whole country. We live in a maritime climate, similar to England and The Netherlands. "Growing Vegetables West of the Cascades" specifically recommends varieties that work -- and the author started his own seed company. He is no longer the owner, but the company lives on. Buy all your seeds from Territorial Seed Co. By the way, they even have a catalog specializing in winter gardening. Our region is well suited to quite a selection of yummy stuff. If not a winter gardening fan, at least plant a cover crop ("green manure") in the fall, like crimson clover or fava beans, to choke out weeds, add biomass, improve the tilth, add nitrogen, etc. They are easy to grow, easy to dig back into the soild 3 weeks before spring planting, and look kinda cool compared to black plastic or weeds.

[rubberlegs]

Forgot to mention fertilizer. The book recommends some do-it-yourself organic fertilizer that's fun to make. Get 50 lb bags of lime, blood meal, cotton meal, kelp meal, rock phosphate or bone meal, etc. Then mix up before planting according to the recipe. Takes only a minute to toss it into a container and stir with a stick. I recommend stirring with an ice axe because it's twice as much fun. I've seen people stir with a tent stake which also works well. One guy I know stirs with a titanium ice screw. Anyway with the climbing gear stirring and the do-it-yourself part it's at least 4, and possibly 8 times as much fun. But that might be 2 much fun, so subtract 2 -- still 6 times as much fun.

[weedpuller]

One thing you might want to check out about the fertilizer if it's of the manure variety is whether it's sterilized. Otherwise you might be introducing a whole bunch of weeds into the garden . Trust me. This is not fun. For example, some people call purslane a treasure. Others consider it a hideous weed.

[Brian Curtis]

I've been doing battle with purslane all spring. it spreads like wildfire. Thanks for the link. I learned a lot.

[Marmot]

Stefan, Seattle Tilth puts out a good book too. It's called Maritime Northwest Garden Guide. Tilth also offers lots of classes and seminars that may give you some information. You can find them at http://www.seattletilth.org. You can find Whitney Farms at (among other places) Fred Meyer. a list of retaillers is at http://www.whitneyfarms.com/buy/. Teritorial has some good seeds. If you want heirloom seeds, check out seed savers (http://www.seedsavers.org). The Cook's Garden (http://www.cooksgarden.com) is also a good source. Otter and I use these three pretty extensively.