You too can have a (COVID) Victory Garden

by Kent Petterson

The soil is warm and moist and the weather is cooperating here in St. Paul. As we social distance and find new alternatives for our time, I would suggest you try raising some food in your home space if you have it or a community garden or with a friend who wants to share space.

We have two community gardens here in the neighborhood, one at Jefferson and Victoria and the other off Otto at the Sholom site. Both have space available as of this writing. Check at the sites for information.

You don’t need a lot of space. Ten feet by ten feet of soil with sun would be a good start. You can always get bigger as you are successful. Good organic compost to improve your soil is available at the Pleasant recycling site. The compost is free to anyone with a bucket or truck to haul it away.

It is not too late to get started. We can still plant anything on the list of commonly grown vegetables and get a crop this season. It is too late to seed peas, lettuce and spinach this month, but you can prep and be ready to plant in August when many folks are doing their second seeding of these cool weather plants.

Now is the perfect time for tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, green and yellow beans, winter and summer squashes, basil and other herbs. Other vegetables that may already have been planted such as beets, carrots, broccoli, kale, cabbage, eggplant, onions, swiss chard and many others, if planted in June, will reach maturity in a normal year.

Plan that your Victory Garden will become an organically growing site, both safe and evolving from year to year. It will get better with your attention starting now. It is OK to get going this month, don’t wait until next year, as this year is the time to start. Good luck!