As temperatures plummet below the freezing point, I thought I would take a moment to reflect on the successes and failures of the 2023 garden.

Lessons

Lesson #1: Don’t plant Holy Basil in the berry patch. It was my first time growing Holy Basil and I completely underestimated the size of plant. It got bushy and big real fast and took over the entire bed shortly after I harvested the strawberries and gave it a good pruning.

As the weather got hot, the Holy basil go so big that it over-took my blueberry bushes and stunted them. I like to joke that it ate my blueberry bushes but it’s not funny. Let’s just say I will not use this plant as a filler in my beds in the future.

Lesson #2: Be patient and wait until potato foliage is dead before harvesting potatoes. Another first-timer mistake. I should’ve waited until all the foliage died before harvesting the potatoes but I was worried the fungal disease on the red potatoes will affect the other potatoes as well. I will be planting potatoes in a different spot next year and will be more patient.

Lesson #3: Go back to the basics. I’m not certain whether this is a good thing or a bad thing but I might have spent too much time and money on soil amendments, believing the soil needs amending even though it’s brand-new soil. I think I need to stop looking at gardening as this complex thing and just go back to the basics.

Lesson #4: Melons. Even though I harvested 3 small cantaloupes this year, I think, for the most part, I failed to grow watermelons and melons, in general. After failing to grow melons in the same spot 2 years in a row, I will not be growing melons in this spot next year as well as I will be growing melons with quicker harvest time.

Lesson #5: Squash. Because of the cold winter and the above-average amount of snow and rain, pest pressure was especially bad this year. I have been growing squash since 2019 and have never seen squash bugs until this year. They are nasty evil little things and at every one of my squash seedlings.

Plans for 2024 Garden Season

In September 2023, I expanded the garden to include a pollinator patch, a new in-ground bed, and 2 new raised beds – one of which will be used to plant asparagus in the spring. With all these additional space comes great opportunities.

After tasting so many tomato varieties over the years, I’ve finally discovered my favorites in 2023 – Sun cherry and Sun Sugar. I am usually pretty sick of cherry tomatoes by the end of a gardening season but I haven’t been tired of these 2 varieties. I like that they are not huge producers unlike the varieties I’ve grown in the past. Therefore, the harvests weren’t too overwhelming.

I have mentioned the Indigo Rose tomato on this blog before about it having a water-down bland taste. Well, it’s growing on me. This tomato actually has a quite sophisticate taste. I found the taste to be quite complex and it comes in layers. To experience the taste, I usually would find myself taking a bite and then closing my eyes to let each note play out in my mouth. So yes, I will be growing this again.

I think I will be reducing my tomato varieties in 2024 to just these 2 varieties, plus the Indigo Rose tomato, San Marzano tomato, and perhaps, I’ll try the tomato variety I brought home from Japan.

Goals

In 2022, I made a goal to grow more leafy greens in 2023. Easier said than done when the above-average snow and rain brought an overwhelming amount of earwigs to my garden, which decimated my leafy greens. I could’ve done something about this little problem if my mom didn’t drag me to the UK.

The unfortunate thing about earwigs is that they live in the soil, therefore, no amount of insect fabric could’ve prevented them. The only thing that seemed to work against them was insect powder and keeping the garden bed dry. So I’m keeping my essential garden beds covered this winter.

My goal for 2024 is still to plant more leafy greens but I hope that by covering the beds with frost blankets all winter, it will prevent the soil from freezing, thus allowing me to plant once the daylight hours exceed 10 hours again, which will be in early February.

My other goal for 2024 is to plant more pole beans and less bush beans. I find I like the texture of pole beans more than those of bush beans. The outer layer of bush beans gets tough very quickly which pole beans stay tender longer.

Overall, I think the 2023 gardening season was a successful one. I’m thankful for the rain, which worked in my favor at times though I didn’t appreciate the wind, which broke a couple of the stakes supporting the tomatoes while I was in Japan. I have no doubt that with all the effort I’ve put in during the last week, the 2024 gardening season will be another fun and exciting one.