With the spring starts happily growing indoors and awaiting the last frost date in April, today's sunny, spring-like* weather meant getting down to the business of putting the square back in square foot gardening.I have tried a few different materials to mark off my grids over the years with all surviving only a single year's exposure. This year I am trying a nylon string made for outdoor use and so I spent a good part of the day tying the string (and myself) into little knots.
The square foot grids serve the useful purpose of being guides for plant spacing throughout the year when individual squares are turned over for different seasonal plantings, but they also serve as something of a study in contrast with their clean, angular lines soon to be mostly obscured by nature's riot of a summer garden.*A note on the continuing deception of Punxsutawney Phil - as I was preparing garden beds today I saw that the beautiful weather had tricked some of the Jersey Knight asparagus into putting up tender shoots despite two nights of freezing temps headed my way later in the week.
2015 was the first year in the ground for my 2 year old crowns so they were left in peace all year without a single spear being harvested. I am determined to get to sample a few spears this year and will be covering them with cloches on the coldest nights to protect the bounty that must be split between the crowns and me this year.