It has been awhile since my last post. As the year comes to an end, I have still been picking tomatoes and carrots out of Keyhole Farm gardens and making plans for the start of the new year.

In November, I received an e-mail from Kellie Peden, at River Ridge Elementary school in Steiner Ranch, in which she wrote of their PTA gardens: “I have been meaning to follow up and let you know how happy we are with our Keyhole Gardens that we got from you.”

The school has three keyhole gardens that are used for educational purposes.

“We have had them for about three years and they are still going strong,” she added, and provided some photographs, published herewith, that illustrates how they label the gardens.

Also in November, I traveled to The Coventry Reserve in St. Paul, Texas for a workday there where they have six Keyhole Farm gardens.The Coventry Reserve is a “community of discovery for adults with special needs.” It is a splendid example of achievement, caring, and innovation. I was very impressed with the people who work there and the volunteers.

Conducting the horticulture part of the program was Melissa Perkins, who helped direct the volunteers and students in pulling up the plants in their gardens and preparing the beds for a new crop.

Others were busy decorating the facility for the holidays and doing general maintenance work. I have never seen such dedication and hard work.

I found the layout of their garden landscape quite unique and very enticing as a way to showcase the gardens and easily work them (see photo at right taken after the crops had been pulled).

Margretha Girvin of The Coventry Reserve also sent a few photos of the gardens in bloom earlier in the year, while being worked by people involved in the facility.

More and more schools are utilizing keyhole gardens obtained from us to enhance the teaching of the valuable ability to raise one’s own crops and that magic that transpires when the seeds jump out of the ground with immense greenery and splendid crops.

It is never too late to embark on keyhole gardening, for crops can be grown year-round. At Keyhole Farm, our emphasis is placed on Spring, Summer, and Fall, but we have had success in the wintertime, too. Usually we spend our winters getting ready for the coming Spring, deciding what to plant, prepping the garden beds, and beginning to start some of the seeds indoors in anticipation of warmer weather.