Thanks @Sueby. I did pick up a copy of Crockett’s Victory Garden at the library book sale. It’s set up the same way to show what you should be doing every month. However, it does seem more specific to Boston’s growing climate which is heavily influenced by its location to Massachusetts Bay. I’ve been observing what the local farmers are doing to help. I have noticed them using cold caps on their early crops. Omg! $7.00 a bale. It’s twice that around here. I’m sooo jealous.
Holy moly! I just paid $3 a bale (but my guy knows I'm ag and I'm an old customer.)
I was just joshing around. I so actually use Farmers Almanac as well a other sites. It's valuable to know what others actually have success with though as well, especially when there's often multiple methods to any task in the garden.
I actually do ask my neighbor for leaves. He uses a lawn sweeper attached to his ride on mower so I don't have to worry much about fertilizers or herbicides he uses on his lawn. [Note: If he used a lawn mower (or cutting deck in his case) like I sometimes do I would not take the leaves because the higher risk of introducing herbicides.] He just drops the leaves in piles on the lawn next to my house and then I haul them to the garden by wheel barrow or mulch them and just carry the bag from the mulcher and dump it in the garden. While I have 6 maples on my 1/3 acre property, my garden, chicken run and duck run easily use up wall the leaves. If I do happen to have some extra I fill one of the compost bins with leaves and spread them later or just use as brown matter in the compost like you do.I know it's redic, but I just don't have enough leaves to use them in the garden! And we have GIANT old oak trees all over. I save them to add layers of brown in the compost throughout the winter & then I use them to spread on the snow for the chickens. I thought about asking my neighbor if I could have hers, lol. So I get straw for the garden, it seems to last thru the next summer as a weed barrier so I'm ok paying the $7 a bale or whatever it is. Gosh, it's probably doubled because of COVID this year.
