For the last few weeks, we have been moving seedling trays out to the beds and placing them into the dirt. This year we are trying something a little different. Adding garden soil in with the beds and using shade cloth seems to be making a notable difference this year. Last year we ran into troubles starting late, using no shade cloth and having a minimal amount of dirt. But now I think with the additional resources added they should do much better this year.
I cut the shade cloth to size and pin it up on the fencing for some beds and for others I screw it into place. It would seem having it hang over a bit works better, these tomato plants are not as happy as the ones that are completely covered.
First I dig holes to put the garden soil in. I dig deep enough to place a small bed of dirt inside.
Then I place a few hand fulls of garden soil into the holes. This is much better than the native clay soil and woodchips/hay in the beds now. Giving them enough garden soil I hope their flourish.
Next go in the plants, here we have some Trinidad Scorpion pepper plants (very hot), chiplote peppers and naturium. Placing the vining plants close to the wiring and the non vining further out so they can grow in their own area and not be affected by the vining plants hopefully.
With the seedlings in the ground it will take some time for them to adjust.
Going with a over planting strategy in case some die.
The shade cloth comes in rolls, but I also bought some precut cloths. This will be pinned up once I cover up the garden soil with the native clay and dirt.
With the plants covered around their roots it would help hold in moisture. But I will still water them every day as they get quite hot.
Getting the shade cloth to stay on windy days has been a challenge. But I found if I roll a stick into the cloth and pin that it holds up much better.
I can pull it down whenever I need, but I tend to just water through the cloth and only take it down if I need to adjust or apply some pest killer stuff.
The fenced in area seems to be working well keeping out deer and such, with a eight foot tall fence not much can get over it.. maybe a black bear but thats about it.
The horse shoe beds have been filled with broccoli and cauliflower and cantaloupe.
Some lettuces are growing under this shade cloth. All of the cloth I use is 40%
We can see the tomato plants under this one are doing well. I think covering the sides helps with the extreme sun at the end of day when its no longer over head.
One of the beds has already grown so much we pulled down the shade cloth and will see how they handle it. The pea vines were trying to attach to the cloth instead of the fencing so maybe it was time to drop the cloth for them.
Besides getting chewed on some aphids these pea plants are doing well. I treated them using some insecticidal soap and seems to have done the trick.
The other side of the bed has some smaller pea plants and pepper seedlings growing, so I keep the cloth up on them for a few more weeks and take it down once they are big enough.
Its really nice seeing all my plants I grew late winter/early spring are doing well now in the ground. Feels like good progress is being made here.
Thanks much to 
