September 12, 2008

Half the herb garden. We are looking at chives, lemon balm, and the melon sage plants, which have rebounded after my mini-harvest a few weeks ago.



My flatleaf parsley has grown out of control... it is as tall as I am and flowering like crazy.



Oregano might be the easiest herb for me to grow - I've already filled 4 spice jars with dried leaves, and here are the plants filling back in again. At the bottom of the picture you can see the random tomato plant which has decided to grow on it's own. My dill just didn't do well... it may be too fragile of a plant for me to grow.



My Julianne tomato vine is the most prolific of all the plants this year. It is weighing down my tomato wall and producing tons of fruit (look! Some is even ripe!) A few more days of decent sun and I might have enough to do something with it.



Here's the center section of the tomato wall. It looks like that mystery "yellow" plant I picked up is the same kind as the six pack of plants - a "yellow pear tomato" - they are shaped like pears, about the size of cherry tomatoes and very sweet.



The porch roma tomato vine has kept to it's name... it seems stunted regardless of the amount of space I gave for it's roots to take off. It is dense, but full for sugh a little guy.



This little fella is right next to my roma plant. I didn't plant it, it's just one of those random guys that came up on it's own, and has one teeny tiny little tomato growing on the very end.
It's the Charlie Brown Tomato Plant.



One of the pear tomatoes.



Now... this squash was labeled to be like zucchini, only yellow. They have yet to grow to a decent size before starting to rot at the ends, so I've had to pick them while they are roughly the size of a pickling cucumber. They taste good... they are just smaller than I expected.
My other squash plant just produced it's first squash.
It's September.
Oy.


Here is one of the tomato plants that decided to grow on it's own in the herb garden, right up next to my thyme. I know it won't produce any fruit, it's way too late in the season, but I can't bring myself to pull a plant that I've been trying to grow every year since we moved here!



The vine of another mystery tomato plant... this one has lots of fruit. I suspect it's a cherry tomato type (I had those planted last year, one of the vines fell over and a bunch of tomatoes fell off. I'm guessing that's why the seeds are sprouting in odd locations)



An overview of the entire garden.



This year I planted what was labeled as "creeping rosemary" in my hanging baskets. Rosemary is resistant to drought, which is why I figured it would do OK in the baskets (since I forget to water things) It is doing well and has grown, but it's not dangling so much as it's stretching. I call it the Alien Rosemary.



I didn't grow these cukes... but my neighbor signed up for a veggie co-op with a woman at her work and came home with bags of giant cucumbers - which she gifted to me with a "So... you were planning on making pickles tonight, right?" I've put up 18 pints of Grandma's Bread and Butter Pickles (and two additional which didn't seal properly are now in my fridge) I may have sliced the first batch a little thin, as they don't seem quite as crunchy as I would normally like, but the second batch seems to be better with texture. The flavor is great either way (imho) Over the years I've tried Grandma's recipes for dill and sweet as well, but the bread and butter recipe is the one everybody likes, so I'm sticking with that one.

August 3

Yeah... it has been a while. Sorry SMT! I meant to update last week (and the week before, and the week before) but things kept getting away from me and we went out of town and [insert plausible excuse here]

I took the pictures in the sunshine... should have waited for the shade to get lower contrast, but maybe next time it'll be cloudy.


I had to finally pull my lettuce. It grew like crazy, but I let it go too long and it just tasted bitter as all get out.
Nice to know I *can* grow lettuce though.
Here is the right half of my veggie garden. The tomato vines are growing like crazy and the one in the center and the one on the far right have fruit. The others are still just in the flower phase. My yellow squash is finally producing, though they are far smaller than I expected. (I guess they are the baby variety)
We had such a long winter this year that everything is running several weeks late. I remember last year at this time one of my vines was already toppling over and I was up to my ears in cherry tomatoes. Though I didn't actually plant any cherry tomato plants this year (couldn't find them) They mystery "yellow tomato" plant is producing some oddly shaped little guys.


The "Window Box Roma" on the far left truly is... the little squat plant is just not stretching very far at all, though it has more fruit than any of the others. (you can barely see it in the shadows... next time I'll shoot on an overcast day)


The herbs are turning out to be great fun. The borage (see the blue flowers from the last update) became overgrown and finished flowering, so he was removed. The dill... *sigh* I just don't have good luck with dill... it's so frail. My onions (if you look in the upper right corner of the bed you might see the greens) are laying out to dry for two days. I think next year I'll put green onions in where the dill is now... I actually eat those and have had good luck with them in the past.

Today I did a decent harvesting of the herbs. I now have a bunch of lemon verbana, melon sage and oregano drying in my laundry room.

I've decided I like herbs, but I need to pay better attention to harvesting times if I'm going to use them.

Cilantro I planted because Dan likes to cook with it sometimes... but only sometimes... so I let it go. Turns out it flowers *really fast*... and I tried to cut it back so it would grow bushier instead of sprouting flowers, but it doesn't really work that way (apparently) I now have long stalks with little "fruits" on them... which I will let dry and become coriander seeds.

My thyme seems to flower quickly too... but I've been on top of it and harvesting bits here and there... clipping the flowers to make it grow out more.

The lemon verbena is just crazy big. I'm not sure I'll ever cook with it (maybe I'll drop some leaves in my tea sometimes) but I'm drying a bunch and will possibly use it for some kind of potpourri.

the flat leaf parsley was bent over to the dirt and I didn't want it to rot, so I cut pretty far down last week & have a fresh bunch in the fridge. We actually cook with that fairly often, so I'm glad to be growing it so well.

I'm learning a lot this year with my first "real" herb garden. I kind of expected them to act somewhat the same, but the plants all have a mind of their own. Oregano and chives seem to be the easiest to deal with... I chopped one oregano plant to the ground last month, and to day packed the dry leaves in my spice jars (filled 3 spice jars with dried oregano leaves!) and today cut some more branches down. I'm trying to cut just some to keep each plant in tact so it doesn't look like a massacre happened in my herb garden. Maybe some day I'll find that balance between keeping it pretty and keeping it useful.

June 21, 2008

This spring, turning to summer, has seen another "unusually cool" string of weather (which begs the question, how unusual is it if it keeps happening year after year?) But to spite the lack of hot sun, the garden appears to be plugging along. The tomato plants are surviving... not thriving yet, but at least the 40's at night haven't killed them off. The herbs are going like crazy:



I have a whole lot of oregano I should cut down and dry already. I'm attempting to keep the thyme from flowering, but every time I look at it there are more new little white flowers trying to seed.

I'm very excited about the lettuce in the background there... the night that I took this picture I enjoyed some of those leaves pictures in my salad mix. The tomato plants are not full enough to stand out of the background on their own, but they are being real troopers so far.

All three basil plants have, unfortunately, been discovered by some critters that enjoy the taste of basil as much as I do. Lesson learned... basil should be kept in a pot closer to the house where it is safe.

The raspberries in the back are also growing like crazy... nice to have some plants that enjoy our mild climate. I weeded the area last weekend and we're going to need supports soon as the plants are starting to want to lean here and there. I can already see new shoots spreading as well.

I planted borage in my herb garden because it was suggested as a bee attractant to help with pollination of the vegetables. I had no idea the flowers would be so interesting looking:





This next image is of the area we have dubbed either the "right flower bed" (standing on the deck, looking into the back yard, this is the group of trees/planting area to the right) or the "bird feeder bed". It looks a little chaotic with the various shades of greens and large bushes running into each other... but when we moved into the house 4 years ago this bed was relatively barren - not only for the lack of plantings, but because the deer were regular visitors who delighted in keeping the area nicely groomed.



We need to clean a couple things up, but I'm actually quite happy with the chaos of plants running into plants - for one thing it's a much nicer backdrop than chopped bushes and bark dust, and for another... proper plants taking up all the space keeps the weed way down.

And I learned something new this year... did you know that "tea rose bushes" actually produce roses?!?!? It's a crazy notion, I know... but keeping the deer out of the back means the tiny little buds are no longer dessert offerings to passers by, and the bushes are (probably for the first time ever) able to produce honest to goodness flowers.



I'm not sure what this plant is, but last year it attracted a sizable butterfly, when it cropped up from underneath the driftwood by the deck I made a point to clear some space for it. Last year we had about 5 or 6 tufts of white flowers, this year the plant spread to three places, each with something like 8 to 10 tufts. I haven't bothered to check the species of this winged visitor, but he's the first that I've seen to hang out by my deck.




We have lots of work ahead of us tomorrow and next weekend, including finishing the remodel of the waterfall/pond area. I'll have before and after pics ready when we're all done.

May 26

I wasn't expecting to work too much in the yard this weekend. The forecast kept saying "rain, rain, and more rain" and I interpreted that to mean that it would rain.

Silly me, believing those funny weather guys.

Saturday morning dawned dry, so we packed up and headed out to a giant nursery up in Snohomish. There I finally found some tomato plants, though they were not the plants I was looking for.

I wanted to do just cherry tomatoes this year, maybe romas, but that was it - it seems that anything larger just doesn't seem to ripen in my yard.

The nursery, though acres and acres in size, had no cherry tomato plants to be found. They did have romas, and something called Jullian - which look like romas only longer and thinner. I also picked up a yellow pear tomato plant (looks like they are pear shaped, and slightly larger than cherry) and a mystery plant labeled simply "yellow".

They also did not have any zucchini plants - yellow squash, but no zucchini.

Wha?!? Either they sold out, or the weather has just been so bad that the greenhouses aren't moving.

We made it back to the house about mid-afternoon, and still no rain... so I went to work in the back digging holes and removing the wild foxgloves from the garden beds.

Last year I put up these posts with the nylon lattice for the tomato plants and they tipped under the weight of the plants. This year I dug them into the ground further, and spread the plants further so hopefully we won't have a repeat of last year.

First, here is an update of the herb garden (freshly weeded - those forget-me-nots are prolific as hell) I added a few basil plants.



Here is the beginning of the Tomato Wall.



A couple of the plants were actually quite large to begin with, and I sprang for those to help get a jump start on my garden (since my growing season is so short) The two little squigilly guys are a couple of yellow squash plants. My lettuce is growing pretty well... it hasn't been eaten by critters yet, so I guess that's good, eh?

May 4, 2008

Upon further investigation of the path next to the house, I did find hoof prints towards the front of the yard, where I know I did not see the deer jump. The trail shows where he jumped from a lower part of the hill to the path. About 10 minutes prior to seeing our visitor at my rose bush I recall hearing what I *thought* was Dan coming home through the back door, but then he didn't walk in the door so I didn't think much of it. I realize now that it was likely the sounds of hooves on my deck that I was hearing.

I've moved some of the yard waste cans to block the path. I realize the deer can technically jump the cans easily, but I also placed my wood-carrier (metal "U" shaped) at a distance from the cans that would make jumping look like a bad idea.

Hopefully.

This is my 4th season in this house, and I finally have a real honest to goodness herb garden planted.

Angle One:


And from the other side:



I went a little crazy buying herbs today... some of them smelled just too good to pass up. When I arrived home with my new additions I walked past the fire pit and was surprised to see that some of the herbs I thought died out over the winter had actually come back. So, those are moved up to the beds as well.

I also learned today that dill is an annual, not a perennial... which explains why my dill never comes back. (One would think I would have noticed that little tidbit of information sooner *rolling eyes*)

I've also tempted fate by planting lettuce (that little row of leafy stuff where the dirt is turned over in the back bed)

The nursery doesn't have much in the way of summer veggies yet because of our extended cold weather... maybe next weekend!

Oh, and we were discussing the ugliness of the cinder blog garden bed edge, and how I am constantly battling the grass that wants to grow inside the blocks. We have thought about covering the tops with wood (which would look nice, but I think it would not last long, and attract bugs) and I've thought about just taking some of the larger rocks around the yard and covering over the tops (but Dan is convinced the grass will still grow from underneath) We've also thought about filling them with dirt and planting flowers all the way around, but I realized today that leaning over the wall to actually work in the garden part would be near impossible for me.

Today Dan suggested we just get capstones. I'm liking that idea.

May 1, 2008

You know what I could use a nice, fresh from the garden raspberry sauce on?

Venison. Doesn't that sound yummy? I sure think it does.

Gee... I wonder where I could pick up some nice... fresh venison.

Hmm... maybe if I set up a bear trap next to my rose bush, I could snatch up a nice fresh bit of venison.

*sigh*

I'm not trying to sound evil... well... maybe a little (though I should feel bad about my thoughts, particularly given what my friend Foz just recently went through at his job) however... I'm relatively ticked off at the deer that I found in my back yard.

You know, the back yard that has been fenced off to prevent deer from wandering through?

Granted, we are not entirely gated off. There is about a 6 foot span of space on the side of our house that is only blocked by a make-shift temporary fence to keep deer out until such time as Dan can finish that gate. This area is a steep slope, ending in a retaining wall that leaves about a 3 foot wide path to walk down along the side of the house. Technically they could jump from the slope down into the fire pit in the back yard, step up to the deck and be in the yard... however the deer around here are lazy, and tend to avoid being that close to the house. I've watched them from my dining room... several times... wander along that slope, hit the temp fence, and wander back. Why jump into what is clearly a "human zone" when there is so much nature to mope around in?

The deer today is apparently of the ambitious sort. I didn't see where he came in from.. but there are only 3 possibilities.

1) Since the undergrowth of the neighbor's house has been cleared, it now has enough room to get a running start and leap the 8 foot chain link into our yard.

2) It came from the side of the house and actually wandered in through the fire pit, up onto the deck, and into the yard

or

3) It squeezed through the space between our fence post and the neighbor's fence post (which from a distance doesn't look that wide, but this sucker was kinda skinny)

If he jumped, there is nothing we can do. The neighbor's yard is actually fenced all the way around with 8 foot chain link... but a tree came down in one section way in the back and deer have been leaping over that kink in the fence and into their yard regularly. Since the fence is down, they don't let their retriever run the yard (he's on a running line) so the dog can't keep the deer out unless they fix their fence (which in theory would keep the deer out anyway)

If he came up the side of the house, we could resolve that by finishing the fence. I presumed he came in that way, so when I walked him out of the yard that's the direction I herded him. He got to our side of the temp fence and paused... looking down, judging the distance, looking at me, looking down, looking at me... finally he jumped from the top of the fire pit wall to the path next to the house, and then immediately back up just on the other side of the temp fence. So... even while being chased from the yard, it was reluctant to walk along the side of the house, favoring the hill.

I saw no evidence that he came in that direction. I could find no hoof prints in the gravel, no indication that it walked along the side of the house, nothing showing where it might have gone from the fire pit to the yard. There is also nothing eaten on that half of the yard.

So I walked the yard and found he had eaten stuff on the other side... just a few nips here and there of the tops of some plants under the trees to the left... and of course my rose bush. I stood at my rose bush and looked back towards the plants he ate in the next bed over... and the next thing in my line of site beyond that spot is the corner of the fence, with the 1.5 foot gap.

Over the past few weeks we've found evidence that someone's dog has been in the back yard as well... so I put a call in to Dan (who also thinks venison sounds yummy) and he has added "fix weak point in fence" on his list of things to do this weekend.

So far the deer hasn't gotten to my raspberry stand... so here's hoping.

April 11

Alright! I *think* the snow in our area might be done for a while... though technically our last frost date is officially April 15... but anyway...

So first pic is of my blank garden beds. We cheated this year - due to time and weather restrictions - and hired a crew to come and do our spring yard clean up (basically pull the winter weeds and drop a lot of compost everywhere)

The landscapers pulled all the weeds, but left the foxgloves that started themselves in the beds. These will be moved to new homes.
The two pots have the extra raspberry plants... we really need to find a home for these.
Yeah... I know we need to mow the lawn something awful. I'm hoping it'll be dried out enough this weekend to get that done.

This shot is of the 30 some odd raspberry plants I put in the ground last month. They are starting to green up, so they stand out against the fence.

My plan is to put stepping stones along the raspberries to help keep a nice path to the berries.

A new year, a new adventure

Heh... whoda thunk I'd start this blog up again in February?

My next door neighbors are avid gardeners... and I tend to get inspired by their enthusiasm. When we started having multiple days in a row last week with no rain I had a feeling they'd start to dig up their yard and put seeds in.

Me? I'm not that inspired... I give up on starting from seeds... but I do admire their enthusiasm.

A few years ago they decided to put in raspberries - which is decently native to the area and therefore a rather smart idea. They started with 12 plants... 6 died, but the other six sprouted runners that came up all over the place. They dug up a few canes, and also bought 3 more plants for their second row. The rows doubled in width easily, then more sprouts came out further away from the original rows, making it nearly impossible to walk between them. Last year they dug up the wandering canes and used them to double the length of their rows, confining them with some support posts and guide wires... and as runners came out the sides again they dug them up and stuck them in pots to over winter. Last week he was pointing them out to me and asked me if I'd like "a couple plants"... and since this is bare root time, it's a good time to transfer them over.

This weekend I came home from shopping to find a wheelbarrow filled with compost and about 47 raspberry canes.

A "few" plants?!?

After Dan put in the fence across the back of the property last year, we put a few canes in (also from the neighbors) but we hadn't gated the front of the property yet, and the deer wandered in and ate a couple of them down. Now that we are decently fenced and gated, I feel pretty good about expanding our raspberry area along the fence... so I dug about 20 or so holes and dropped in about 30 of the tallest canes along 5 sections of the fence. I'm not entirely sure, given the light changes because of the trees surrounding, how well they will grown and produce fruit in the various sections, so I figured one long row, and we'll see what works where.

As to the garden beds.... I still want to do herbs up there in one of the plots, but the expanded bed is long enough - I've decided - to throw in a couple of cherry tomato plants and some summer squash. I know I said I was giving up on tomatoes, given that they originate from Mexico and I'm far too far north for them to work well... however... cherry tomatoes do decently well, and ripen much faster than regular tomatoes so they don't require so much heat. I'll not bother with cucumber though... the main reason I grew them was for pickling, and not only are small batches annoying to deal with, they also require a lot of heat, and it's infuriating when I don't get enough to grow them.

So... since I dug in the dirt yesterday, I guess it's officially the beginning of my gardening season. Next task: winter clean up - my yard is so frightening looking right now *shudder*