Location: DIGs
Summary: Transplanted white onions, prepped potato seed, planted one "row" of potatoes, transplanted cabbage in between potato mounds.
Extended Report: Today I LLOOFed with Penny in the DIGs yarden. I arrived a little after 8 am. The morning was dramatically cool in juxtaposition to the weekends heatwave. The little rain we got the evening before was not enough to leave any noticeable moisture in the garden. For the first 30 minutes or so Penny gave me a nice tour of the DIGs garden space, the hobbit greenhouse and an overview on neighboring relations.
Most of the yarden design had already been pretty well roughed in, with much already planted, but I always find it challenging to truly envision what's going where until it is actually there. I started by cleaning up a bit of the grassy clumps and exposed roots which had been unearthed by previous yarden attendants. It was a nice gental activity while my brain began waking up and body began re-familiarizing itself with how to move carefully and mindfully within tight planting zones.
While digging around, Penny found a plastic googlie eye in the dirt. She lifted it up between her two fingers and said "look at this!" Then we discovered that it was not just a single googlie eye, but two! It was two googlie eyes connected with a decomposing piece of cloth, complete with a red smilie face! She had discovered Digs the DIGs yarden mascot! We placed him in the front over looking the sidewalk on the pea mount, so he can watch over the front boarder of the yarden and let dogs know which plants are ok to pee on.
I then had a little solo time and began transplanting white onions in groups of three, along the east boarder, with enough spacing so that something else can be interplanted along that boarder. As I was transplanting, a really friendly black cat came to lick water from the head of the watering can and kept me company. It was cool to have this creature come around who was obviously super comfortable with the garden environment and the strangers working in it. This creature had total respect for the pathways, tools and resources surrounding this project. So cool!
Another occurrence while onion transplanting was a neighbor walking by. She said "Hi Penny," and I said, "Oh, I'm Nellie." She made some sort of comment like "The garden is looking good." She was possibly being genuine, but this occurrence reminded me of the social aspect within urban gardening and the challenges of pursuing a vision while also respecting neighboring expectations for what yards are "supposed to" look like. This work challenges the norm but in my personal opinion, showcases beautiful design and function!
When I completed the boarder of onions, I set up some workspace to zen out while prepping potato seed. I sliced up a big bag of fingerlings, a small bag of a pretty deep purple variety and then a small batch of a larger variety of potato. When I was finished with this, I joined Penny back in the garden and she showed me where I could refine the berms intended for the potatoes. As I played around with the shovel in the dirt, refining the berms, I was reminded how challenging communication can be when it comes to these things. I began second guessing if I had interpreted instructions properly, but it was a small enough strip that I just rolled with it and then began planting some potatoes. Penny gave me what I think was some fish emulsion to sprinkle in the holes as I planted. She also reminded me that potatoes like to be mounded as opposed to "cupped" - like the cabbage transplants I would later interplant in between.
I wrapped up my first LLOOFing day around 1pm with the planting of seven cabbage transplants in between the potato mounds. By this time the sun started to come out and warm up the earth a bit, but not nearly anything compared to the heat of the previous day. It felt really good beginning my day interacting with the earth.
