We Live for Lockdowns

Ah, yes. It's another wonderful lockdown at Blessington Correctional Facility. This postpones the graduation ceremonies for students who have completed vocations or education programs to some unknown date and time, goofballing anyone who had taken the time off to come see their loved one graduate -- we're sorry, please try your call again later.

More concerning, it keeps those of us in Horticulture from tending our garden beds! I had spent last week in the process of turning over the soil, saturating it (because it was extremely dry underneath that thin top layer), turning it again, trying to separate grass and other plant matter out of it to ensure I would have a good base to work from.

My plan was to go turn the soil over again on Tuesday, try to get more grass and roots and other detritus out of the bed, and ask our instructor about solutions for the clearly insane amount of limestone in our gardens. The scientific process in my head says to pour an acid like vinegar (or stronger...) on the limestone to make it brittle and easy to break up, but does not know what this would do to plants that would need to go into that soil afterwards.

I was also hoping to find out if there is anywhere that we are allowed to acquire additional soil from, so that I could raise my bed by a couple of inches in case I cannot do much about the limestone: having only 2-3" of depth in the bed is actually kind of... pants.

I even wanted to find out what sources of calcium are available that do not use animal bones, because something, some innate sense in my head is telling me the soil is calcium-poor, and several plants will rather desperately need the calcium enrichment. I expected to hear the only choice is animal bones, because this is prison, you can't be a vegetarian or vegan here.

Instead, Tuesday morning, we were told to go back into our cells, close the doors, and watch the ceiling, walls, and floor sweat so badly that the entirety of our dorm is a hazard zone for anyone without traction control.

By the time I return to my garden bed, I expect a whole darn layer of grass will have grown over it again. 😆

Until sometime next week, I guess, my garden.