Not a whole lot to report on the garden, as we don't have anything that's going to produce much this year, but I figured it was time for an update.



The basil is doing quite well, and we've been using it in a lot of our meals. I also have some dill and cilantro growing, but they're coming up pretty slowly.



In addition to our lime and lemon trees, I picked up a pomegranate tree.



The grape vines are doing well, and is climbing across the wire in this picture. I'll probably add another two, so we'll have a total of four of them in the garden.

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FINALLY.

I moved my family down to central California after living in Washington for seven years, and we had to leave our wonderful 1/4 acre garden behind. It's been over half a year since I've been able to get into a new house (we were living with my in-laws while our house was being built), and my wife and I finally got some plants for our back yard...




Seedless "Flame" grapes. I have confirmed that they are delicious. I plan to have four of these vines planted at the four corners of my garden to serve as an edible wall. Yum.




Lemon (top) and lime (bottom). My wife goes through a lot of citrus in her cooking, so we may end up having to buy another one of each of these.

Visible in this picture is a PVC pipe sticking out of the ground. The dirt around here is pure clay, so it's difficult for the water to penetrate deep, which is no good for trees. I took a piece of PVC pipe, drilled some holes into the bottom of it, capped it, and have an irrigation valve running inside of it to water the dirt at and below the roots. Cheap, easy.


Raspberry. You probably never need to buy more than a single stalk. They tend to spread.


Sad little basil plant. We go through quite a bit of basil, so I may need to start a patch from seed instead of spending lots of money on adult plants.

That's all we've got so far. It's a little late to start from seed around here, where it's 95+ degrees all summer long... but I might try some indoor herbs and see if I can get some traction that way. I'm still trying to get used to the growing seasons around here... it's very different compared to western Washington.

Also, it rains in Washington. Not so much in the central valley of California. Irrigation systems are a must, and this is the first time I've worked with one. The whole thing about drip lines and running small 1/4" lines to mini-sprinkler heads and all that... fun! I went to an irrigation shop today and they have all kinds of neat irrigation components to play with. Fun fun fun.

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I haven't been good about posting pictures from the garden this year. I've taken plenty of pictures (I've got some here from July), but because I keep waiting until a "better" picture, I've ended up having them pile up until now.

July:


I've got two blueberry bushes, one of which produces very plump and delicious berries, and another that produces tiny berries which aren't worth eating. I planted a third bush, hoping that adding to the gene pool might generate more delicious berries.


So much broccoli. I filled a 4x10' bed with third-generation broccoli plants that I started from seed, and pretty much had so much broccoli that I couldn't keep up with it. I have now have a billion seed pods, from which I hope to collect lots and lots of seeds. For people who are interested, I may sell packets for what will be a fourth-generation crop.


Because we planted THREE zucchini plants (just to be silly), we gave a lot away. I brought this basket to work, and had so many zucchini coming up that I could have filled this basket every day. We also had a volunteer squash plant come up. I don't like squash so much.


The ginger did really well outside. I have another picture in the Late September batch of photos that shows how much I've got growing as of this weekend. They don't do well in the cold, so I'll probably select a few choice pieces and grow them indoors.


The grapes came through for me this year (they don't produce the first year you plant them), and here they are, still green. Later, I have pictures of them ready to eat.


Did you know you can eat radish seed-pods? Instead of pulling up the radish from the ground, if you let the radish go to seed, and if you collect the seed pods when they look like this (before they turn reddish and woody), they have the same taste as a radish, but the texture and consistency of a snap pea. Delicious!

August:


Our carrots, snap peas, and cucumbers did really well, and we had some friends over to enjoy a tray of fresh-from-the-garden vegetables. There are also chives that we cut up into a cucumber salad which came out great.

Early September:


It's sad that asparagus grows so slowly. We have quite a bit of it growing right now, but we can't eat it yet. I guess this much growth in the first year is typical, so we expect to have something great next year.


My diviner's sage isn't food, but it's fun to grow. It did really well outdoors, but is also not very cold resistant, so I'll have to bring it in soon.


My grape vine isn't large enough for me to bring in baskets of grapes, but even so, the kids enjoyed plucking the little grapes and munching on them as they played in the back yard. Hopefully I can get a larger vine growing.


We're growing this plant, but we didn't harvest it at all this year. Maybe we should before the cold kills it off.


I tried growing soy beans this year. The plants are VERY slow to grow, and take a while to get established. I was pretty convinced that I wasn't going to get anything.


Once the soy plant gets set, it actually produces a LOT of bean pods. I spent a lot of afternoons shelling them and eating them while sitting in the garden.


The cherry tomatoes were much more successful than my roma tomatoes, and I think they tasted better, too. They also don't require as much bracing, since the fruit isn't too heavy for the branches. These plants are a second-generation crop that I picked up from my brother-in-law; I think I'll try to harvest seeds from this plant and replant next year with them.

Late September:

I'm personally not a fan of ornamental plants, but my kids seem to enjoy having these baby pumpkins around. I suppose I'll keep them growing.


Here's a shot of the ginger, pretty much ready to climb out of the pot. I think I'll need to build a wide pot to help it spread out more. I haven't used any of this ginger yet, but I think that I'll try to harvest some soon. Ginger beef is delicious.


I'm digging for something here...


POTATOES! My three daughters are showing off some of the tubers I've dug up from my square potato bed. My oldest is holding up a tiny one, my youngest has two brown potatoes, and my middle child found a good-sized red potato.


Most of the potatoes are red, as seen here. The wheel barrow is FULL of potatoes.


Yum.


I'm not sure why I'm so intent on growing wheat. Two years ago, I found some wheat growing on the side of the road, and figured I'd see what I can grow. Last year, I had some growing and harvested those seeds which I planted early this spring, and now I've got another harvest of seeds.


This packet is for a third-generation crop of wheat. I think I have enough to grow a crop that will be capable of producing enough flour for a single loaf of bread. But if I do that, I won't have any seeds left for the next crop. And if I carve out enough land to grow enough wheat for a single loaf AND another subsequent crop, I'm not quite sure that it'll be worth the effort! I suppose that, instead of making flour, I can just supplement any breadmaking effort with some crushed grains from the garden, that would be worthwhile. In which case, I should probably consider growing some other grains as well.


It's been a very good year, overall. We've had SO much food growing, and an increase in variety that I've really appreciated. Of course, our water bill tripled during the growing season, so weighing out what is worth growing against how much it costs to keep things growing is something to consider. There are some plants that I feel are "valuable" to me, so the time and money invested is worth it... but some of the plants either produced very little, or weren't delicious enough for me to want to repeat, so I'd rather use the space for more of the food that I enjoy the most.

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It's already the middle of June, so it's probably time to show off my garden so far. I still have things I haven't planted yet (snap peas, more potatoes, beans, etc.), but I have enough here to make me smile.


Having gotten permission from my wife to carve up more of the back yard into a garden, we've laid down some 4x10' beds to grow LOTS of stuff.


Here's the rear area where my garden has been for the last few years.


Artichokes. They take FOREVER to grow.


Asparagus. :: sigh :: They take even longer than artichokes. In fact, I don't think you can really harvest asparagus for two YEARS after you plant seeds.


My blueberry bushes are doing great - lots of little berries forming. If blueberry bushes didn't just look like gangly sticks during the cold season, I'd have these growing everywhere.


This is my third generation broccoli that my oldest daughter and I planted in January. It's neat to harvest seeds and to watch the seeds turn into food year after year.


Lots and lots of carrots. You're supposed to space them out a bit, but I literally just dumped the seed packet into the dirt. I don't love carrots like some people do, so I don't really give them too much thought.


I've had this golden sage for a few years - it survives the winter just fine, and it's grown quite a bit. I thought I would use it more than I do, but I don't cook as often as I would like. That, and this sage is good with red meat, and we just don't eat very much red meat in our house.


I planted grapes last year - it was a Home Depot special that came in three varieties - green, black, and... something else. What other grape colors are there? Anyhow, it didn't produce at all in the first year, but this year...


We have grapes! Two of the three varieties have sprouted little bunches of grapes, and the third variety is just now starting to grow large enough to do something. We shall see. So far, all the grapes look green to me.


My lemon thyme has grown large enough for me to split it up into three plants. I've given one of the splits away to a friend, and have the remaining two on my back deck. I use this a lot more than any other herb - it's great on chicken, fish, fried rice... pretty much anything, really.


I've never had lettuce grow this well before. I think that my compost has finally matured, and the plants I'm growing are just thriving in it. The lettuce heads are big enough that just two of the plants provide enough lettuce for a salad. AWESOME.


Here's my next batch of lettuce and some bak choi cabbage. I have no clue what kind of lettuce it is, but it's about the best lettuce I've ever tasted. It has some sort of nutty flavor to it, and just a single 1" leaf goes a long way. I can't wait for it to get huge.


My onions and garlic are doing quite well. I haven't planted any bulb onions yet, but I think I probably should. It'll be nice to have several varieties of onions growing. Onions go well with everything.


Here's my small red potato bed. I had hoped to do the rising-box trick with them, but I don't think I'll get around to that this year. I'll just keep putting more dirt on top of them until the dirt starts spilling out of the box.

I actually have a monstrous section behind my rear garden to grow an entire field of potatoes, which I plan to do. Potatoes are great.


This is a third-generation radish crop. I actually prefer to let the radish go to seed and eat the seed pods instead of eating the root, since the yield is so much larger, and the seed pods are much juicier.


Here's my rhubarb plant. I'm not sure when/if the stalks will turn red, indicating that they're ready. It's possible that I have a different kind of rhubarb than I originally assumed. I'll have to do some more research and see.


My strawberry plot is doing quite well, although there's some critter that's been getting into my strawberries. I think I may end up investing in some traps to snag the critters before they eat up all my berries.


We've put down three zucchini, which of course means that we'll have a trillion zucchinis growing. If you're reading this blog and you live anywhere near me, be warned - you might end up with a basket of zucchinis on your door step.



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My wife finally gave me permission to carve out a much larger chunk of the backyard to convert into a garden. We've made a few trips to Home Depot to pick up some more 2x6s, had five yards of pea-gravel delivered, and are now borrowing a friend's rototiller to tear up the grass...


Here is a shot of three of the 9 beds planned.


Here's some plants growing from my old boxes towards the back of the yard:


Onions and garlic


Raspberry patch


Rhubarb


Carrot patch


Strawberries

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