Last fall, Anne and I signed up for a plot in the community garden in our soon-to-be hometown. Camas is northeast of Portland on the opposite side of the Columbia River. It's a sleepy, little river town with a population of around 20,000.
The town was founded in 1883 and is named after the Camas Lily, a native flower. For most of its existence, Camas has been dominated by a large paper mill, but the mill is slowly being decommissioned, and now, Camas is better known for its schools and cute downtown.
Last year, we bought a house in Camas as part of our retirement planning. We are currently renting out the house but plan on taking up residence sometime in early 2022. In the meantime, our little garden plot helps us feel like we are part of the community.
This spring, we are planting our new garden for the first time. We started by pulling weeds, adding a load of soil conditioner and roto-tilling. The plot was pretty sad looking at first, but by the time we were done, it was beginning to perk up.
Since then, we have been adding a few plants each week - first strawberries, rhubarb, onions and garlic, then corn and a volunteer borage plant, and finally, tomatoes and peppers.
A couple nights ago, I soaked two varieties of green bean seeds, and we put them in the ground the next day.
Both varieties are pole beans, so we had to set up some scaffolding. Since we have never planted pole beans before, I'm not sure if our scaffolding is strong enough. I guess we will find out later in the summer.
We still plan on adding basil and some flowers. Marigolds are at the top of the flower list, because of their bug repelling properties, but I hope we can add a few others for variety. After that, all we have to do is wait, water and weed. The good news is we already have little green strawberries, so if we are luckier than the rabbits, we'll have something to snack on in the next few weeks.
