Garden Update

We are now consistently hitting lower to mid 90s for daily high.  With the high temperature, comes explosive growth. :D

Here's a look at the SFG boxes in the backyard.  We now have 6.  I got a bird bath for my birthday to make water available to the bees and other insects that come to the backyard (And to entertain my cats...).

The Spring Veggies Box is overflowing with fresh goodness! :D  The peas in the back are really productive right now, and some of the greens are already bolting.  You can see the yellow flowers of Bok Choy, and pale pink flowers from Radish. ^^;

These pretty yellow flowers belong to Bok Choy.  I guess it's already too warm for them.  They look like rape flowers.  The bees seem to love the flowers though.  I also like the cheerful lemon yellow flowers. :)

And here's a look at the Bee Garden Box.  The Pansy, Snapdragon, and Lobelia I planted fairly early in the season have really taken off and are blooming profusely.  I love the fresh colors! :D  I see different types of bees in this section of the backyard.

A close-up view.  I really should have pulled those "cat deterrent" sticks out.  XD  They're ruining the otherwise lovely view. T_T  I really love the watercolor-like hues!

I put fresh blooms and sprigs of mint in the bird bath to make it look pretty as well as giving bees places to land.  :D

I know this is not a bee, but a wasp, but you get the idea. :)  The insects (bees, wasps, butterflies, lady bugs, flies, etc.) come to drink from the bird bath.  I don't mind wasps at all.  I see them in my garden every season, and they are good pest control (They hunt for caterpillars and carry them away.).

Cornflower (or Bachelor's Buttons) in blue, purple, and lavender.  The deep magenta color is from the Sweet Williams.  The bees love these flowers.

Summer Veggies Box.  Cabbage plants are taking up good amount of space up front.  You can see tomato plants, eggplants, banana pepper, and an ornamental pepper plant.  The overgrown radishes are going crazy in the front as well. ^^;

And this is one of the two newly added boxes.  This one is planted as my Herb Garden (Although I did put a cherry tomato plant in the middle. ^^; ).  I have Sweet Basil, Flat-leaf Parsley, Thyme, Orange Mint, Dill, and Cilantro.  Too small to see just yet are seedlings of Garlic Chives and German Chamomile.  They sprouted up very quickly in this soil mix and are doing very well.   I love having fresh herbs for cooking. :D

The other addition this year is dedicated as a Corn Box.  There's nothing much going on just yet, so I will add the photo of the Corn Box in my next update.

Adding More SFG Boxes

It has been an unusually cold and long winter, followed by drastically different temperatures swinging between killing frost and 80s for some day's highs during most of spring in our area.  This type of spring is very hard on the spring-blooming ornamental trees and bulbs.  I've seen reduced blooms from lilacs and wisterias in my neighborhood, killed or severely delayed performance from red buds, roses, and other plants in general.

Our Spring Veggies SFG box was planted in March (see my previous entry), but some of the seedlings were killed by frost (like Swiss chard and spinach), and had to be started over.  So things were slow to get going. It also pushed back my spring planting for tender annuals.  I'm still in the middle of getting our fifth and sixth boxes filled with soil mix and planted.

Here's a look at the Spring Veggies box.  All green and filled out nicely.  ^^  The peas in the back of the box  is showing some cat-traffic damage. :(   Because the weather has warmed up so fast, my Bok Choy is already bolting. T_T  The salad mix is producing nicely -- enough to give our chickens daily treats as well as give me salads. :D  It's so nice to be able to eat fresh greens again!  Also, the broccoli that comes out in spring is so tender and mild, compared to broccoli that grows in the heat of summer.  Although these four broccoli plants have not produced a large head like we see in grocery stores, it's produced little versions of it, and they are so mild and tender I don't mind the small size. :)

Here's our Summer Veggies box.  This was last year's Corn box, which was later planted with some chrysanthemums and some winter greens.  Two of the chrysanthemum clumps have survived the harsh winter, so they will stay in this box and provide us with some color.  Meanwhile, I've planted some cauliflower plants (the two in the front are doing so much better than the other two behind them -- one of which has already been pulled by me due to what looked like root rot), two hybrid tomato plants, red pepper, two Ichiban egg plants, sweet banana pepper, and an ornamental pepper.  I've decided to stay away from the heirloom tomatoes this year.  I had a very disappointing tomato performance last year due to some disease, so I'm planting disease-resistant varieties this time around.

I read up on the tomato diseases last summer when my plants came down with symptoms.  Some of the articles did mention that there were increased cases of certain diseases that were being spread by the tiny flying insects in dry southwest.  Unfortunately, the increased popularity of heirlooms in home gardens has also inadvertently contributed to this spread.

Something I've also been staying away from growing in my gardens is anything in the squash family.  In my area, there is a problem with those nasty stink bugs.  I've seen plants get completely destroyed by these hard-to-kill (without resorting to nasty chemicals) bugs.  I don't use any type of pesticide on my plants (both ornamental and edibles).  And if I were to battle these stink bugs, I'd be so busy patrolling, removing, and killing them on a daily basis, I'd waste a lot of time which could be spent doing more fun things.  Incidentally, our SFG boxes had "inspired" one of our neighbors last year into growing some veggies of their own in their backyard.  They had three zucchini plants among other things, but these plants were all killed by the stink bugs well before the season's end (Their banana peppers did very well though.).

Here's a look at the Strawberry box. :D  Look how lush it is!  We are really excited about the strawberries this year.  I've had some experience growing them in my childhood and I remembered how well these plants did the second season after planting -- we had berries rotting on the ground because they kept coming faster than a family of four could eat!  I worried about them so much during winter since it was so cold and I had forgotten to give them straw mulch in the fall for protection.  Luckily, they had thick snow covering them for most of winter when it was the coldest.  But during the early spring's unpredictable weather in extremes, they were pretty much exposed except for the couple of nights when freeze warming was issued and I did cover them with tarp.  Under all these leaves, there are a lot of white blossoms and some developing berries.  I can't wait to smell the berries!!!

The following two shots are from our Bee Garden SFG box (last year's Summer Veggies box).  We are planting the entire box with flowers.  Right now, only about half of the box has things growing, but I will post a photo of the entire box soon. :)

Getting Started on the Spring Veggies

I haven't written an entry in a few months about the Square Foot Garden in the backyard during the winter.   This past winter started out mild for a while, but then things turned bitter cold with a nasty inversion that stayed with us for several weeks with temperatures dipping into the negatives, which does not happen very often where I live.  The water in the chicken coop partially froze on some nights even with the heat lamp on.  The snow, once fell, stayed on the ground for weeks on end.  Things were slow to warm up and I simply couldn't imagine I'd be getting ready to plant at the end of February like on an average year.  I've just started seeing daffodils on some people's front yard.  My own daffodils just popped up with a few inches of green showing up above the ground.

With the last day of frost usually being at the very end of April to early May in our area, it's time to put cold hardy veggies outdoors.  Although today was a cold day, it was clear and sunny, so I decided to get the boxes ready for the 2013 gardening season. ^^  (I'm always too depressed at the end of the season to clean the dead growth and debris from the garden so things get picked up in the spring.)

This is what the spring veggies box looks like today.  Except for the four baby broccoli plants to the left, everything green is carried over from the previous year (Sweet Williams, mesclun, and onion).  I had dead leaves all over the box that were cleared out.  I'm expecting to see a lot of volunteer marigold plants since there were four last year and a lot of seeds were dropped. ^^;

I decided to double the Swiss Chard squares, plus increasing the number of plants from 4 to 9 per square, mainly because I ended up picking them continuously once they reached 6 inches or so last year that they never got the chance to grow to full-size to occupy the full space.  I loved eating it myself in various dishes, but the chickens also love greens, so two squares probably won't be quite enough.  I've decided to give Bok Choy a try this year.  It's one of my girls (hens) favorite greens, and like Swiss chard, I love it, too.  We're also hoping to add two more boxes this year - one for flowers and one for herbs.  Other change I'm making this year is putting some veggies together in one square -- like planting radish around broccoli in a single square.  We'll see how this works out in the coming weeks.

We will be making the boxes, plus an extended run for the chickens in the coming months.  I will also continue to plant the existing boxes with warm season vegetables.

The girls are now over 6 months old and producing eggs regularly.  From left, clockwise: Tapioca (all black), Dorito (brown), Frigglish (black & white), Puccini (gold), and Coco (white & tan).  They have discovered cooked oatmeal.  It's one of their favorite treats.

Day 57

   Day 57 of the Spring Veggies Box.  The salad squares are still producing a lot of greens to give me salads every day.  The spinach is starting to slow down and started to bolt (trying to flower and set seeds).  The carrots still have ways to go before we can harvest. ^^;  The sweet williams have really started to grow and began shooting up longer stems with more buds.  I'm so glad I mixed in some flowers for color.  Also, there are insects that come to my garden and flowers will help entice them.  I see a fair number of wasps in my garden, but they are not at all interested in us.  They seem to patrol the greens, looking for worms and other insects to capture.  I have seen a few ladybugs here and there, but not many.  The snowpeas have caught up in height to the Alaska peas, but they are not liking the heat by the look of yellowing leaves at the bottom of the plants.  I will start them much earlier in the season next spring.  And I will plant a little more densely than suggested. ^^  I am thinking about a fall crop though, for which I will have to sow them around first or second week of August, I believe.

   My garden fairies are starting to be obscured by the plants.  The bachelors buttons (tied with a string to a railing) are still blooming strong, but starting to turn a little yellowish at the bottom.

   The Corn Box.  Looking very green and vigorous.  I still have issues with my cats trying to get into the box and laying between the rows... XD

   The snow peas in the Spring Veggies Box are producing nicely.  I like to just munch on them as I water the boxes every morning.  It's cool, sweet, and crunchy -- such a delicious combination.

   I have really been enjoying the Swiss chard "Neon Lights" this spring.  As you can see in this picture, the colors are gorgeous on the stemps and veins.  They are mild enough to be used in most anything.  I take outer leaves often and use in soups and stir-fries all the time.

   And last update today is on the Summer Veggies Box.  Everything seems to be enjoying the hot weather.  All three tomatoes actually have flower buds although you can't see them in the picture.  The Italian parsley is looking less leggy now that they are out in the sun and no longer in the hot house.  The four o'clocks seemed to take forever to germinate, but they did come up and slowly growing.  Of course, when they are seedlings, everything grows so slowly.  I am finally seeing bean seedlings show up.  I really don't know what took them so long.  I was expecting them to germinate in 7 to 10 days as the packet said, but it was more like 20 days (Starting to suspect a batch of old seeds in new packets for 2012?  Do seed companies do that?).  In the little black seed starter pack (in the upper left of the box), I have seedlings of flowering kale/cabbage -- pink Kamome, a Japanese hybrid.  I have never grown flowering kale ever, but always enjoyed their rose-like appearance and color late in the season when nothing else seems to be growing.  I purchased a small packet of seeds from a seller on eBay.  They germinated in 5 days.  I will be moving one into a square in the Summer Veggies Box and hoping to get two big pots to put in the front yard.  I'm also thinking about starting another box for late season color -- flowers like kale and chrysanthemum.  We'll see. ^_^

Day 50

   Our first SFG box is celebrating Day 50 today. :D  It's been a wonderfully fun project for my family, but especially for me, who is a huge salad fan.  The box has been very productive and I have been able to eat greens every day for quite some time now.

   This past Thursday and Friday were extremely unpleasant with high winds gusting at upwards of 70 mph all during the daylight hours while the temperature was in the mid to high 80s.  The peas showed their dislike of the hot weather by turning the bottom leaves yellow and dry. ^^;  Considering that I had a late start on these guys (sowing them on April 8th), I can't complain.  Our area's spring is notoriously short.  The daily high has been consistently in the 80s to lower 90s for weeks now.  One thing that made me pleased was the pea support.  The PVC pipes, rebars and the strings held up well in those 70+ mph gusts of winds (which, by the way, knocked down a good size tree limb right onto our roof with a huge BAM!).  The peas are holding onto one another as well as onto the strings and they're standing tall today as if nothing happened.  The "Alaska" peas are at 2.5 feet, which the Asian snow peas are catching up in height.

   Here's a picture of the flowers from the Asian snow peas.   They are white with an orange-pink tinge and different from the pristine white flowers of "Alaska" peas.

   Now that the temperatures are getting so high, I'm thinking about putting up shade cloth to help keep the plants cool in the spring veggies box.  I am seeing a few of the spinach and lettuce plants starting to bolt.

   I found our first normal size strawberry in our strawberry box today. :D  The color is just beautiful against all the green leaves.

   The corn box on Day 34.  The first crop, which you see on the bottom half of the picture was planted 2 weeks before the second crop.  They have maturation dates that are almost 3 weeks apart, so there should be about 5 weeks separating the pollination times of these two crops.  Corn plants, once they get going, grow so fast with such vigor.  Especially since it's been many seasons since I grew any corn in my backyard, this has been exciting.  I'm very curious to see how well they do in the SFG box.  So far, so good!!

Day 41

   It rained overnight, which is a treat for us since it rarely happens, and everything had droplets on them this morning.  The smell of rain was wonderful to wake up to.  Here's a picture of the Spring Veggies Box on Day 41.  Found a few paw prints in the green onions square.  I don't know how the cat managed that with all those sticks in the way. XD

   The peas have started to bloom.  They have pretty white flowers.  We'll be eating peas soon!

   One of my tomato plants.  This one here is "Black Krim".  It's my first year ever trying this heirloom variety.  I'm looking forward to seeing how this plant's fruits will taste. :D  I have a total of 3 tomatoes planted along the north side of my Summer Veggies Box.  They will have a support to climb on -- eventually.

   The Strawberry Box.  Every plant is growing nicely and filling out the box.  Some of the leaves are really big.  We have only seen sporadic fruiting up to this point, of tiny strawberries.

Day 39

   The spring veggies SFG box on Day 39.  As you can see, I've been eating the radishes and they are almost all gone.  I will be planting something else in these two squares soon.  Although I've had a side salad or a meal-size salad made with greens from the two Mesclun salad mix squares for every meal for the past two days, it's hardly noticeable in the way those two squares look -- they look really full.  It is so nice to have easy and continual access to fresh, organically-grown vegetables.  I have not seen any pest in the garden and nothing has had any holes either. ^_^

   One square I have yet to start harvesting is the Swiss chard square.  They are just not getting to be between 5 and 8 inches tall (The tallest is the orange one, and the shortest is the magenta one.) and I'm going to let them grow a little bigger before I'll start taking the outer leaves for me. ^_^  They sure are beautiful!!

   Also beautiful are the pea plants with their light grey-green leaves and elegant tendrils.  The tallest one in the crowd, among my "Alaska" peas, measured 24 inches today.  And I noticed some flower buds starting to show. :D  Exciting!

Day 34

   It was hot yesterday and we are seeing even more growth on these plants on Day 34.  It has been windy this morning and I gave them a drink before taking this picture.  Soil looks darker when wet, providing a nice contrast to the greens.  The radishes have really started growing fast -- they're bursting out of their squares.  The "Alaska" peas on the left are now about 12 inches tall.

   Corn Box on Day 17.  Neat rows of corn seedlings on the right half of the box.  They were still in the shade of the house when this picture was taken, but they'll come out of that shade by 9:30.  It has been many seasons since I grew corn in the backyard, so this is exciting!

   Now onto other things in the backyard.  Here's a sunflower seedling (Along with elm tree seedlings and tumble weed seedlings ... I must bust them before they get big and become a nuisance.)  This sunflower is getting plenty of sun (Look how dark the stem is already.) and plenty of moisture.  I have also given it a drink of sea kelp solution already.  I want to see HUGE sunflowers this summer. ^^

   Morning glory seedlings.  I have planted two different kinds in several spots.  These guys popped up first.

   A new plantings of dianthus near the jellybean shaped pond in the backyard.  Now we have solid magenta kind and magenta and white bi-color.

Little Mushrooms

   I found a tiny surprise this morning when I was checking the SFG boxes.  Right in an "Alaska" peas shade were two little mushrooms.  They are about 1.5 inches.  As much attention as I pay to these boxes, I doubt that I missed them yesterday, so they must have come up overnight.   My area is very dry, so we don't see a lot of mushrooms unless in the mountains or in the shade after a rainstorm.  The soil mix for SFG must be doing an excellent job keeping things moist.  These are the only two I've found.

   Aside from their tiny stature making them look undeniably cute, I think they are beautiful.  The texture of their tops reminds me of ribbed sweater.

   I removed the soil around the roots of the radish to see how they are coming along. ^_^  Bright red!  Still a little small, but they're definitely getting there.

   Something else that is getting colorful in my spring veggies SFG box is the "Neon Lights" Swiss chard.  In the SFG book, Mel recommended 4 Swiss chard plants per square, so I planted about 4 to 5 seeds per spot, hoping that I'll be able to get one of each color that was in the mix -- red, pink, yellow, and orange.  When they germinated, the red and pink/magenta seedlings look almost identical and so did the yellow and orange babies.  So I waited until a pair of true leaves grew.  By then, the oranges looked a little darker than the yellow guys and the red ones looked more intense than the pink/magenta ones, helping me identify and thin according to desired color.  They are about 3 to 3.5 inches tall right now.  Clockwise from lower left: yellow, orange, red, and magenta/pink.

Day 32

   Now that many of the veggies have reached a certain size, daily growth is more noticeable. :D

   Corn seedlings in the morning sun.  They also grow fast, and therefore, a pleasure to watch.

Day 28

   The spring veggies box on Day 28.  It's hard to believe it has been 4 weeks since we got this box started.  It's also been a lot of fun to keep visual record of growth.  I slept in this morning, so this photo was taken in full sun when the boxes were out of the house's shade.  Everything looks brighter. :D  You can see the radishes are starting to overflow from their squares. And the Alaska peas (farthest back to the left) are about 8 inches tall now.  The corn box (SFG Box 3) is just now starting to see seedlings appear.  They are still too little to show up well in photos, so I'll wait a few days before taking pics of them.  It took them about 11 days to germinate.

   The irises from the front yard.  The pale blue ones do so well in my yard and they have dominated in good years and bad years.  I have not seen the two-tone pink ones in several years, so I'm delighted to see them come back.  I think they look lovely together.

   The white peony I took a picture of on Friday, May 4th, has fully blossomed.  It was already too heavy for the stem to support the weight of the bloom and it was drooping. I had to prop it up with my left hand for this photo. ^^;  So many soft white petals, accented with streaks of magenta.  I love it!

   My camera has a really hard time capturing the deep magenta hue.  Same thing happens when I take a picture of Sweet Williams and the First Prize rose.  The color of this peony is actually bluer and deeper magenta.  It just started opening yesterday, so it still has a little more to go before it looks as stunning as the white one.

   One of the two pots of canna I have in the front porch.  They are one of the giants of summer plants, and therefore, really fun to watch them grow.  Especially now that the daily highs are consistently in the mid 80s, they are really liking it and show their appreciation of the hot sun by growing fast.  The seedlings of dwarf marigolds encircling the pot are also doing well.

   My Russian Olives in the front yard have started blooming and they smell absolutely wonderful!  It's a refreshing, green scent, not like the other spring flowers like lilac and wisteria, but it wakes up your senses and makes you want to take a deep breath and keep repeating.  I just LOVE the smell of these tiny yellow flowers.  I grew these two trees from one-year-old branches that were rooted in the soil medium.  When I got them from a friend, they were no thicker than a pencil and not much taller than a foot.  They are now about 15 feet tall and equally wide after 15 years.