Homestead Delivery!! PBR slugs, and Tomatoes are taking over

It may not seem like much, but last Thursday I went out into the garden and picked a few things to deliver to Power Puppy and Chef. Each of them received a bag of freshly picked mesclun, lettuces, swiss chard, nasturtium flowers, peas, yellow neck squash, and a mix of herbs.

Of course, I clipped a few sprigs of fresh Lavendar for their bedside stands, and some freshly picked Salal Berries.

It felt so good to be giving them this little bit of food fresh from the garden, even if it was hardly more than a salads worth per person.

The garden is growing along smoothly, and I am super happy to see the difference each day.  Right now I am battling two problems though; space, and slugs. I did the right thing at planting and planned out how much space each thing would take, and there are now crowding issues. My space issue however, is that I want more!  I want more space to grow more things!  Already in the works for next year is a plant to extend the garden another ten feet or so, add boxes to the raised garden portion, and soil improvements.  Ideally I wanted to do them this year, but, time and money got in the way.  Next year, during the winter I am going to build up the boxes around the beds, mix the soil, layer with compost and manure, and have it ready for next years planting in Spring.

But, that is only the first problem, and it hardly is a problem, it is more of an addiction.  As to the other problem, slugs, it is a never ending battle.  In an effort to stay simple and away from chemicals, I am using  an old trick my grandma used to use.  Filling small containers with beer.  The slugs are attracted to the beer, climb in, get all drunk, and drown.  Not a bad way to die all things considered.  It does mean though, that each day I need to chuck out the slug beer goo, and refill with more beer. Now.... I love beer, but I am not about to use anything of quality to drown slugs if I can help it.  Thus, for $6 I picked up a six pack of PBR, cut the bottoms off some coke bottles, and placed the slug traps around the problem plants.  It worked earlier... worked really well... perhaps this time I will need to put at least ten more traps out to keep them from eating everything.

And to round this post out, here are a few photos of the garden as it is, including the  tomato plants that are now standing nearly 4 feet tall!!!