Planting time

Heading out to the garden. All of the beds have been stained, reinforced and filled with good compost and soil. The walkways will soon be filled in with mulch, and there are still 3 beds that will be built, but today I have to plant.

Ready to plant tomatoes...These tomatoes are Burpee Big Mama's. They're great for paste, sauces, slicing and canning.

Using a clean, sharp scissors, trim the lower leaves off, leaving 2 to 3 top branches of each tomato plant and bury them deep. They will put out roots from the stalk making your tomato plants vigorous and able to absorb more nutrients and water.

I know they look like a tree, but doing this and burying them deep will give you a much more vigorous plant.

Now that they're buried, give them a good drink. To keep diseases down on your tomatoes, it's good to prevent soil from splashing up on the leaves. You can mulch around them with peat moss or straw.

12 tomato plants planted and staked. I also planted two packages of Nasturtiums inbetween the tomatoes in each bed. Hummingbirds and bees love Nasturtiums...plus they're also edible and go nicely in salads. First two beds filled! On to the next ones...