As I am sure you know, winter is in full swing. In central IL, we’ve had some ups and downs, but lots of unseasonably warm days and more rain than normal for this time of year. I have not done any winter planting nor seed starting as of yet… too early for that. But, I wanted to give a little glimpse of what things look like currently.

Here is the garden. Our oats died (at around 15*F) and laid down nicely. I am trying them as a cover crop for the first time. My hope is that they’ll be a ready-made mulch, as I can plant right into them in the spring. The orange flags mark where I planted fall garlic. I have seen a couple signs of life there. Lots of the garden is covered- either by straw mulch or oats.

I have a tarp still on the north side of the garden. We are hoping for a load (or 2) of organic cattle manure compost coming this winter sometime.

This is a close up of the oats. My oldest is there, coming out to let me show him where to put the compost.

And this is the compost pile. My Sweet Husband and the boys spread out what they could of it on the garden, just south of the tarp, but a lot of it hasn’t broken down yet and may be hard to till in the spring. They had some chicken bedding to spread though, which helps. We ended up taking the tough, viney material above and putting it in with the chickens to have them help move it around and, hopefully, break it down.

The boys and I turned, loaded, and spread the broken down bits of compost (not yet soil, but a good covering!) into areas of the garden that were bare.

Seed catalogs are in! Early this year… but I always love them in January as I plan my garden out. What does your garden plot look like at present?