I love fruit

We've really been enjoying the modest amount of fruit we've harvested this year.

We didn't get much out of the strawberries this year (I transplanted them in late summer, then didn't adequately fertilize or mulch then). The kiss of death was the peas I grew over top of the strawberries... created a nice sheltered place for slugs and they just loved to eat the few strawberries we did grow. The most important thing is that have a plan for next time!

The blueberries were a huge hit though. We picked and devoured then for weeks! The kids did almost all the picking, and shared most every day. As the wound down, the kids and I went on vacation and one blueberries were our only casualty of our trip. We trimmed it back but I think it's unsalvageable. It's definitely ordering a replacement; we'll do that this fall.

For the first time ever, we saw baby figs forming on our black figs. Unfortunately, they didn't last long. Think I needed a lot more fertilizer. We're also working on the orange tree. It's been struggling. First we fertilized, then we realized we needed to re-pot it. Finally we decided it needed more sun. There are still no oranges, but it's still pretty!

Our peach tree is unfortunately plagued with peach twig borers. The fruit is dropping off and the twigs are damaged, so I ordered an organic spray (Monterey Garden Insect Spray with Spinosad) to treat it. We'll see how that works. We're still thrilled to see them, even if we don't actually get any. They'll do better next year!

I ate one luscious black raspberry, and the new growth this year is astounding. I expect a great crop next year. By starting with small bare-root plants next year, I didn't expect anything this year, so even getting one was a real treat.

Lastly, we went for it and bought a hardy kiwi this spring. It's having a pretty quiet summer settling in, but I'm hopeful for a good show next year! That one's in my boy's plot. He's excited about his budding fruit garden!

Potatoes, onions and kale

This little bed is loaded with experiments. 

First off, the potatoes, small new organic potatoes I chitted, feared I'd cut too small, so threw out, replaced and chitted again, have taken off.  They're about 4 feet tall now and starting to bloom.  Wow!  The only regret I have is that I didn't dig a trench to plant them in.  I just planted them at ground level and hilled up soil around them as best I could as they started growing.  Because of space restrictions, there isn't as much hill as they might like.  Next time, I'll try the trench and back-fill it as they take off.

Next, and my overall favorite in the garden this spring, is the onions.  I bought a rubber-banded bunch of yellow granex starts from Holcolm's Garden Center this spring and have a nice row fattening up right now.  I planted them thickly, only two or three inches apart in a row almost two feet wide, and have been thinning them for green onions for a couple of months now.  Lovely.  Can't get enough!  I also lined the lettuce bed with a single row.  I think I'll do more of that next year to try to head off the slugs.  They've been my biggest pest of the season this year so far.  I'll also try some better keepers next year.  Yellow granex only hold about a month.

Lastly...  the kale (originally paired with pak choi and dill).  OK, these suffered big time from the slugs.  I have a three kale plants, one just now almost big enough to harvest a few of the outer leaves from.  I started and restarted these, nursed them along with lots of diatomaceous earth, but saw a cabbage moth landing on one yesterday.  From plague of slugs to plague of cabbage moth caterpillars...  life just isn't fair for the brassicas this spring.  I gave up on the pak choi but I will be keeping a close eye on the kale for cabbage moths.  Those I will not let go so easily.  The dill's coming along, but it's another one I had to restart a few times.  I can't figure out why I can't grow decent dill!!

Surrounding the three rows, I planted a row of French marigolds.  My questionable seed-starting techniques nearly did them in, but they're making a come-back and I'm excited for their happy little yellow buttons to appear!

Tomatoes with parsley, carrots with radishes, and peppers surrounded by lots of basil

This is exciting. I have been waiting for fresh basil ever since I discovered how much I love, love, love pesto and other basil-seasoned dishes near the end of the season last year. I love it so much I forked over beaucoup bucks for a small bunch of hydroponically grown basil very late last fall. Since then, I've been counting the days and was thrilled when my early indoor seedlings started appearing. But they didn't grow much. I thought it was too cold, but eventually came to realize they don't like my starting medium. I came to this conclusion after transplanted seedlings took off. Back to the drawing board on that one...

Rather than transplant these to larger pots with richer growing medium, I just stuck them in the ground and most are making a comeback. Yippee! I might salvage these afterall.

I'm growing two varieties this year, Genovese and Pistou. The latter are from saved seed from last year. Hurray!!

Along with the basils, I planted three varieties of sweet pepper starts I bought from local farmers at the market. I'd still love to get my hands on a chili pepper. Not sure where I'll put it but I'm just taking things one step at a time...

The carrots, though a little too thinly sown, are doing well. I've also been harvesting radishes from in and among them.

And the tomatoes... I've been looking forward to these Super Marmande tomatoes ever since I read about them. At some point I became convinced that we were best off with salad tomatoes and thought these were smaller but I just read it's sometimes called the beefsteak of Europe. Regardless, it's an heirloom and is a favorite in the south of France. How bad could it be!? Between the tomatoes I planted a few tiny parsley starts. I give them a 50/50 chance of making it at this point. No worries there, though. There's lots of parsley tucked in here and there among the flowers elsewhere in the garden.

We also have a mystery tomato in a side bed - some unlabeled rooted suckers from a friend's garden. They might be Amish Paste, which would be a nice alternative to the Marmande.

Lettuce and other green things

Lettuce and spinach have been the stars of the show lately.  The small fifteen or so square feet I have devoted to the two has more than satisfied our needs for leafy greens.  Not too much has bolted yet -- a single spinach plant here or there.  On the other hand, all the arugula up and bolted - I quickly harvested it in the hopes of salvaging it but unfortunately left it too long so I had to toss it.   Cilantro's about to go...  I think it's about time for a batch of Mexican Lasagna.

I started a new set of mixed summer lettuces a couple of weeks ago and transplanted a few into the garden yesterday.  They're looking kinds peeked today so we'll see if they survive!

Other than that, I have some beautiful rhubarb chard in the greens bed.  We haven't tried it yet, but they're just about ready to give up some of those beautiful leaves.

Almost forgot!  After the arugula bolted, I dropped some broccoli raab seed in among the remaining cilantro.  They're coming up.  We'll see if they're any better than last year's utter failure!

All of this is surrounded with a single row of nickel filet beans just coming up now and another single row of yellow granex onions.  More to come on the onion front later...

Black raspberry bramble?

I took advantage of the good weather to clean up the black raspberries. They each put out only one or two new shoots last year. I wasn't expecting much from them last year; they were such small bundles of bare root when I got them in the mail last March. Still they lived and that made me happy. But when I went out there to clean up the dead leaves around them I found that three of the tips had rooted! So now I have six very small black raspberry bushes! It's starting to look like a bramble of sorts! Wonder if I'll get any berries this year?

Spring is here

Wow, what an incredible last few days we've had.  With temps in the high 70s and low 80s, it almost feels like summer!

I took advantage of the weather to catch up on some gardening tasks, including planting out spinach, chard, arugula, carrots, and some more lettuce and radish seeds.  I also stuck a few more strawberry plants, courtesy of my gardening friend Kyle, in the ground and even put up the other pea trellis.  That last one's been on my list for a month!

Things are looking really good out there, if I do say so myself.  I don't know why, but it surprises me that spring is really here at last.  Here are some shots of the peach, arugula and strawberry blossoms I'm finding out there right now:

All caught up

I managed to get all caught up with seed starting and other gardening tasks.



I'm sure it won't last long though.  Next on the list is more spinach, chard, arugula, carrot, and potato.  I picked up some small red and white potatoes for chitting.  They're on the window sill right now looking a little shriveled but hopefully on the cusp of sprouting.  Oops, seems I maybe shouldn't have cut them in half.  Have to think about that!  Do I want to buy more?  More on that later...