Earlier this year, I had the brilliant idea of putting hoops over my garden.  I cleverly did this using some PVC plumbing pipes.  They came in 10 foot lengths, and I used brackets to hook them to my garden at 2-foot intervals.  I was then lucky enough to find that Gardener’s Supply sells big sheets of garden cloth.  I have to say, Gardener’s Supply is very close to my heart because they are based in Vermont, but on several occasions now, I have gotten items that didn’t really live up the quality I was expecting.

I put the garden cloth on as days started getting hotter here in Florida.  I cleverly hooked it to the pipes with big binder clips.  I was so happy with the result.  But then I left for a week, and when I came back, the cloth was in shreds.  I just don’t think it was strong enough to hold up to heat and rain.  When I touched it, it practically disintegrated in my hands.  As you can imagine, I was very disappointed.

Over the summer, my garden got no attention whatsoever and was left to whatever fate befell it.  I was surprised upon my return to see that one of my pepper plants was full of red peppers.  Unfortunately, they were rotten, but I was still amazed that they produced so much in my absence.  There were three that were still good, and I picked them.  I then proceeded to clean the weeds out off the beds.  Underneath them, I found a small pepper plant that looked pretty healthy.  I think all I’ll need to do this year is get a few bags of organic compost to mix in and then plant some seeds.

One trick I’m going to try is to plant the seeds from the lettuce I ate this spring.  I’m not sure if they’ll grow, but how wonderful if they did.  That would mean that the lettuce completed a cycle – from seed, to plant, to seed and back to plant – all in less than a year!