Finally, the last garden project for 2026
I had not planned to start a vegetable garden this year, at least not in the huge enclosed kitchen garden next to the house. It had sat fallow for three years and grown into a deeply meshed weed bed, a mat of long roots and French crab grass and a kind of grass that grows into big tufts that are almost impossible to dig out. I did not have the stamina or courage to try to remove this by hand. The garden is big (around 30’ x 30’). It has a row of asparagus on one side that is still delivering after more than a month—much to our delight. In the bottom corner there are a couple of artichoke plants (although the winter freeze almost took them out). An old very misaligned composter sits in the shade under an overgrown laurel tree in the top corner by the hose faucet. That’s it. But there is a sturdy 5” high fence around the garden, with a gate, and a wall at the top end closest to the house (and the lindens), which is very convenient for putting things down as you garden (and sitting on to take a break).
I understand that the previous owner had an extensive garden to accompany his farm and gourmet B&B: I know he kept chickens and rabbits, and grew truffles, olives, and snails and planted a second orchard at the edge of the field (he also had a rather grumpy goose, a donkey or pony, and I think goats. I’ll correct this when someone corrects me!). Most important, he seriously enriched the soil of the garden. On top of the usual stony, chalking soil, is about 18” of rich (river?) clay with none of the rocks that mark field and farm. Rich soil is amazing. But it also grows weeds. My plan last year was to put down a thick layer of cardboard using some of the piles we still have from the move. It seemed like a good way to get brown matter into the soil and smother the weeds (wood chips is better my BIL tells me). But to do that I had to remove the print, which was daunting. When my sister introduced me to weed membrane I decided to use that, but I still had to get the weeds under control. Daunted was the word.
The right equipment makes all the difference
One day I was talking to the amazing neighbor whose engineering and general stone, wood, and mechanical skills are helping Walter renovate the old house across from his mother’s (and who keeps the car and Mildred running when all else has failed). I was laughing about how we are running a small farm using garden tools and fantasizing about having a heavy duty weed-wacker and a rototiller and whether one should buy the latter or rent one. He said “I have a rototiller that someone gave me. I can come over and do that for you tonight if you can get the weeds down.”
So I spent the rest of the day with the weed-wacker on superdrive and got it down to a clean crew cut if not a full shave. Walter helped to dig up the clumps that were too hard for me, and off we went. It took several passes to cut through those roots, but we ended the day with a 15’ x 15’ tilled bed. That is a lot of bed.
I decided to put down membrane anyway, and I ended up weeding another strip along the bottom and side to make a 23′ x 20′ growing space. I’m not totally sanguine about the use of plastic, and next year when (hopefully) we have fewer weeds I will use grass clippings as mulch to keep the weeds down and the moisture in, but also enrich the soil. One step at a time, though! Next year I also hope I will have functional composters and a ready supply of compost to enrich this already lovely soil. For now I am feeding the plants with commercial (organic) products and using plastic membrane.
Deciding what to plant
Once that was all decided, the next step was deciding what to plant. I always grow tomatoes, peppers, basil, and herbs, although since I moved to New Jersey, aside from three years planting in the Copper Beech allotment, the garden has been large plant pots. I’m used to buying or starting a lot more plants than I want/have room for because in suboptimal conditions not all of them survive. So I bought lots of tomatoes — six each of four different kinds (Noire de Crimee, Saint Pierre, Andine Cornue, and a mystery that might be Carmello) and four different cherry tomatoes to grow in pots by the door. That’s a lot of tomatoes, and so far all 28 are going strong! I was a little more restrained with the peppers, sticking mostly to bell peppers and a few hots of different strengths to liven things up. I also put in a few “salad peppers.” Don’t know what they are, but I imagine they are mild and hopefully tasty!
Between them are rows of basil. A lot. Some plants were grown from seeds, others came from the amazing Fête des Fleurs et du Miel held at the end of February in Laguépie, where I also got most of the tomatoes and peppers (and a passion plant to supplement the part of ours that died last year). We also have Thai basil that I planted in one little pot last year but has seeded itself all over the courtyard and into any flower pot it can find, so I put some of that into the garden for the color. More color comes from companion plants, chives, marigolds, borage, and nasturtiums. Pretty and edible flowers that may help ward off pests, although a colony of ants has set up in one of the borage plants so maybe not! They moved dirt half way up the stem and are treating it like an underground burrow. There’s a lot of them, so I don’t want to get too close, but they look like the picture of Polyrhachis ants on Wikipedia. I’ll take pictures for my next bug post and two total bug fans in New Jersey.
Corn
Finally, two of the three sisters in the part I extended at the bottom: corn and squash. I know I am supposed to plant pole beans as well, be we don’t really eat them so I’d be canning and freezing and then compositing. I have heritage yellow and white corn, and five squash plants (a traditional courgette; a spaghetti squash; a Kuri, two Ronde de Nice, which Tom used to grow and I love; and a mystery squash whose tag I lost and whose leaves don’t help!). The squash are knocking it out of the park, literally. The first Ron de Nice I planted demanded to go under the fence by the corn, and in two days that one runner has grown over a foot and another is getting friendly with a tomato plant.
The corn, though, is behind. Some of that is my fault because I started it in pots and then read that I should not have done so. I wanted it to get a started while I was away, including getting water. I was very careful not to damage the still small roots when I planted it, but it has taken some time to get established and should be a foot taller than it is at least (Juan Carlos says his is 4’ tall, but I don’t know when he planted it). And then something decided the stems look tasty. I think a good old cut worm (which exist in some form on every continent aside from Antarctica according to Wikipedia) but the guy in the garden store in Les Cabannes also showed me a picture of a rather scary looking beetle that he said is in the soil in the valley (where my soil may have come from) but not the plateau. Either way, it cut and seems to have eaten one stalk a night and then took four in one night. Seven in all. I sprinkled the Diatomaceous Earth he sold me around the stems (this is what it is for the non-gardeners) and put as many cardboard tubes as we could find/fashion around as many stems as I could, sunk into the ground an inch. So far the remaining plants are all accounted for. It is probably too late to plant replacement corn, but I did anyway. They are still too small. I’m hoping a soaking hose will jump start the process.
And . . . we’re done with the final garden. Nope!
The next steps are (1) supporting all those tomatoes as they get laden with fruit, (2) working out how much to water them and everything else, and hopefully (3) deciding what to do with them once harvested. I will have entries on the latter two [check back for updates]. Meanwhile, here’s my “recipe” for folks from the US growing tomatoes in France.
Supporting the tomatoes — an equipment recipe for US gardeners
As US readers know, a trip to Lowes or your favorite box or garden store will supply you with cheap wire tomato cones / cages of different heights that support tomato, pepper, and basil plants most effectively in pots or in garden plots. When they are firmly anchored in the ground, all you need is a few twist-ties to hold even the heaviest branch in place, keep the tomatoes off the ground, and make harvesting easy. (Added bonus, turned upside down they make bodies for halloween witches or ghosts and frames for tinsel festooned garden Xmas trees for those who decorate their yards for these holidays, as did I with great glee.) In France I cannot find anything like them although I am trying some fancy plastic version that requires construction of the several thousand parts. Who knew I should have loaded wire tomato cages into the moving truck?
The fun thing about not having cones but having four of each kind of tomato, though, is that I can try different methods of support and see which works for which kind.
Tomato Sprials: I remember when these were all the rage in the US. Apparently they still are here, and you can buy a spiral at E.Leclerc for €1.98. You put the spiral into the ground next to the tomato when you plant it and gently wrap the stem around the spiral as it grows.
- Downsides: You have to seriously prune the plant, basically cutting off all lower branches so that one central stem can be wrapped around the spiral as it grows and put all of its energy into growing tall, and, presumably producing fruit.
- Positives: The plant grows tall. This may work best for plants that don’t produce a lot of lateral branches or have a tendency to bushiness. The denuded plant looks odd to me, but you can grow a lot of plants in a small space with this method, and the fruit is easy to access. Great for square foot gardening or planting in pots.
- Conclusion: As I have 4 of these I will use them again, but probably in pots for cherry tomatoes. I would not buy more.
Individual stakes: Put the stake into the ground next to the tomato when you plant it and just tie the plant to it as it grows taller (make sure to use a sufficiently tall stake).
- Downsides: Once again, trimming lateral branches makes this easier, although you can also tie lateral branches to the stake to some extent (you are not trying to wrap the stem around the stake as you do with the spiral, just support them so there is more leeway, but branches can still be hard to tie).
- Positives: Like the spiral, this is a space saver and a tidy way to keep your tomatoes in order. Probably the classic way to support tomatoes (at least before tomato frames).
- Conclusion: This will probably be the way I go in the future (especially as Walter bought 8’ rebar posts for me to use!)
Cats cradle string / espalier: You put in a stake between plants 3 and 4 and tie string between them, criss-crossing between each plant just like the kids cat’s cradle game. As the plant grows you essentially build a trellis a few inches at a time.
- Downsides: This works best if the plants do not get too top-heavy or produce multiple branches. I think some serious pruning in the early stages would help (although not as drastic as with the spiral). The strings make it very hard to move around the garden, especially when the trellises are too high to step over.
- Positives: I was surprised by how well this worked TBH. In effect the string creates an espalier, allowing the fruit to grow sideways in two directions and up. You get to keep more foliage and lateral branches (as long as you loop them into the string as they grow). I don’t know if you get more fruit, though. This is the cheapest way to support the plants and access the fruit and it leaves the plants looking like tomatoes while also bringing some order. The espalier looks pretty cool.
- Conclusion: I will try it again, but for heavier plants I will probably space the posts after every second plant (the string still creates a different effect than simply attaching each plant to a post or spiral)
Galvanized steel cages / cones: Usually three or four spikes at the bottom and a cone shape with wire hoops every 6” or so, getting wider at the top. Just stick the spikes into the soil around the plant so that the plant grows up inside the cone. Tuck in any stray branches and if possible rest branches with fruit on the rings.
- Because it is wider at the top it can support the plant as it gets taller and produces lateral branches. You can trim those or leave them as you wish.
- Takes up more spaces than a stake or spiral, but still keeps the plant compact and easy to access.
I love and miss these. The plastic ones allow the same support but are a pain to make and at $10+ each for short towers, who can afford to buy 40+ to support unruly peppers and basil as well as tomatoes?
Built structures: The other way I did not try is to build a big frame and grow the plants up a rope using the same techniques as the spiral. Probably the most efficient method and the least expensive if you happen to have a lot of 2×2’s lying around and the tools to make huge frames and attach them to your raised beds.
We are still harvesting several stalks of asparagus a day and have developed creative recipes if we don’t just sit and munch on them as they are. (Here they are sautéd in olive oil with spring garlic — fresh, not dried; steamed and tossed in a light oil and lemon juice dressing; and the centerpiece of a parmigiano pasta).
I’ll post an update once we start harvesting other things. Right now most of the tomato plants boast at least one green tomato.
Meanwhile, the featured image shows the garden complete with bird scarer (we hope), different tomato supports, and drip hoses (see post on June 21, 2026 to learn about that)
