Spring planting has finally arrived!

By Maia Mazur

This week on the Redwood SustAg farm, we have begun our spring planting. We began this process by weeding the desired area in our bed to plant, and placing some very awful smelling fertilizer on top. In my personal bed, weeding was the most strenuous task. There were so many species of weeds that had taken over the majority of our bed, most of which were deep rooted and difficult to remove. I found that the sickle was the most efficient tool to remove the weeds the in the shortest amount of time.

To top it off, we placed about an inch of compost to provide vital nutrients to boost root growth for the seedling transplant. An important part of seeding transplant is to find, and use the proper spacing to allow enough room for the plant to grow to its full potential. Some of the groups failed to do this, and were asked to re-space, and re-plant. Spacing your plants is important because if it is not done, the plant is more susceptible to nutrient deprivation, mildewing, and lack of sunlight.  Some of the seedlings that we were able to plant in our beds were squash, broccoli, lettuce, and other greens.

Besides the progress that we were able to make in our individual beds, we were able to plant some strawberry seedlings into the C beds. The C beds had been previously sheet mulched, so the soil became very fertile for strawberry growth.