My potatoes are ready to go in the ground. But neither me nor the bed are ready. And the storms are not helping. Ironically, I built a fence to give Pepper more freedom. The potatoes moved into the greenhouse, and I give you a tour of my first batch of seedlings.

I just got to the garden, and there are chickens weeding.

The neighbor put up a fence for his animals. It makes things both easier and more complicated. Especially while they were mowing my parking spot.

The weather was turning from bad to worse, so I decided not to put up my own fence. April is a moody month in Germany. And this year, it’s even weirder than usual.

The potatoes could continue to wait for their planting in the greenhouse. They’d be just fine even if it got colder. But temperatures would drop below zero again for a while, so I made sure to get the potatoes off the ground a bit.

Those of you who have been here for a while might recognize these as the crates I’d used in the kitchen. It was meant to be temporary. I guess I’ll now have to come up with a new solution for the shelves.

I briefly considered building the shelves. But I still wasn’t feeling well, and the weather was doing the rest. Instead, I stacked the potatoes on the unbuilt parts. It would do. They only needed to be off the ground. I left the greenhouse unfinished and headed home. On the way out, we checked the rain barrels which had already collected some water for us.

The next day brought an eagle sighting and better weather.

With frost on the forecast, all of my seedlings still had to stay home. I am excited to get them outside. The artichoke has finally sprouted. But I think it’s time to resow the spinaches.

A lot of the tomato plants are doing really well. I’m especially excited about the Zuckertraube, one of the sweetest tomatoes I’ve ever eaten. The name means sugar grape in German.

One of my cucumber plants is unhappy. I think it is a watering issue but am not even sure which direction.

The boldo is doing great considering the tough winter they’ve had.

The wine grapes are starting their second and third sets of leaves. Exciting!

On the balcony, the radishes are doing very well. Some of the second batch have sprouted already. Someone has dug up the seeds but I just gently covered them in soil again. The rosemary is blooming. I’m hoping they’ll put on some growth, so I can propagate the plant.

I will give you a tour of the garden in the next episode. First, let’s free Pepper from the pole.

Some of you might recognize that this is an electric fence. It is rated for Pepper-sized dogs without power, though. Supposedly, it’ll also keep out the chickens.

I am putting the fence into a temporary spot while the neighbor is letting his animals weed my beds. I just want Pepper to roam free while I work.

This garden will only be mine for a few short years, so temporary solutions or things I can take are the way to go. If I was staying longer, I’d build a proper fence. With this setup, Pepper can roam freely in both the garden plot and the food forest.

The fence kept getting tangled on itself but otherwise it was easy to put up. It might be a cheap fence but I think it seems good quality nonetheless. Yay for once!

While I am happy to find chickens in my beds at the moment, I won’t want them there once there is a harvest. As the neighbor’s fence is obviously not keeping his chickens in, I am doubling up against his fence. Once I had the rough position, I went through and properly fixed the posts.

One of the garden neighbors came by to give me some thyme he’d dug up in his garden. I accepted happily.

I decided to plant them above the tulips in the planters even though it will likely mean no more tulips here. There are a lot of tulip in the flower beds in the garden plot. And I don’t want these to be empty most of the year.

I also planted the lavender that had been on the windowsill outside the garden house. One of them isn’t looking good. It is the one that kept falling all winter. Maybe it will recover.

I knew I couldn’t yet hang the bird house but I wanted to plan the position–and an excuse to climb a tree.

With the plants saved, I finished the rest of the fence. It is still ironic that I am putting up a fence to give Pepper more freedom. He used his new-found freedom to stay in one spot as king of the trash pile.

Meanwhile, I finally built my shelves for the greenhouse. I think this is the sixth or seventh job of this thing. It was bought used in the Netherlands while we lived there, and has been in various places since. It is getting a bit rusty but it has one more life in it, I think. Actually… does splitting it into two half-high shelves count as two lives?

I am spreading cardboard to smother the grass inside the greenhouse. Hopefully, this will work. At the very least, it will give me a semi-even surface for the time being.

These shelves will be used to grow seedlings but also to store some of the gardening tools that I need a lot.

I spread the cardboard in the second half of the greenhouse. I put down two or three layers everywhere and tried to get as much of the grass underneath as possible.

Some of the parts are a bit worn out but they’ll work one more time.

This shelf will sit on the sun-facing side for now to grow the sun-loving seedlings soon. This also adds a bit of protection against curious eyes. This garden is way too open for my taste.

I am very happy with the result in here. The potatoes have a spot for now–and there is plenty of room for seedlings and plants.

Next time, we’ll do a tour of the garden.
So long, and thanks for being here.