Leeks!

It's never fun smooshing the slimy bodies of paralyzed green aphids off of the undersides of greens, but, alas, I was doing it again this evening, washing the mustard greens. I think the most dreaded part of gardening is spending the back-breaking hours washing produce.

And I learned my lesson with the leeks. Today I pulled ten FAT, LONG, WHITE leeks from the ground (every other one in the front bed, so that the others could continue to expand)! They are truly a success, and I owe part of their success to my friend S who gave me the babies. But I did learn my lesson in "hilling up" and making sure to avoid dirt in between the leaves. I should have hilled them up even more. The remaining ones are scrawnier and even more dirty.

Year-Round Calendar

I'm working on a year-round calendar, for year-round vegetable gardening. There are a number of books, publications, and notes from classes that I've compiled, and in determining what I have to do each month in the garden, I always have to reference EVERYTHING. It gets confusing and difficult. I always miss something.

So I now have all the reference material covering our kitchen table, in an attempt to create the perfect year-round calendar for OUR garden. It's a daunting task. Perhaps when I am done, I will post it here (not that it will be of any use to anyone but us...).

Canning 2009!

A friend of mine instructed a few of us on some basic canning/jam making.

For a while now, I have wanted to can and preserve fresh fruits and vegetables so that we can use all that our trees provide, as well as span out our fresh fruit into the winter months (without relying on strawberries from Mexico or Chile...).

There are a number of places on the web that have lots of information, but there's nothing like getting a first-hand instruction, and there's nothing like trying it yourself.

This Summer and Fall we made plum jam, applesauce, and dill pickles! I still have figs and mulberries in the freezer in order to make more jam. Here are some photos from the process.

Pictures from Summer and Fall

Below is one of the new beds I made out of chunks of cement we had in the yard. We are still growing chard, kale, Brussel's sprouts, and broccoli in these beds. The lettuce is all done. I wanted to keep some lettuce going for the winter, but never got to it - you have to enclose it here somehow to keep the heavy rains off, and it was just too much for me to tackle.


Above you can see the lettuce growing in the shade of the hardier Fall plants, a technique I plan to use more of next year! Below is a little immature green bell pepper! We had a handful of them this year and they did surprisingly well in both the ground and in the black pots.
Below is an area in which I am trying to inspire the herbs to grow! Basically, I had an odd assortment of herbs that were not doing well in pots; I also had echinacea and rosemary that were already established in the area. So I planted everything else here, and we will see how Darwin's theory functions come next Spring. I have basil, thyme, sorrel, borage, mint, parsely, and cilantro... plus some leeks that are doing well to the side of the area (you can see their young stalks in the background).
Here is one of the cement beds with a lot of kale in it. The kale had some aphids this year, but did very very well and is still thriving. I hope to keep harvesting from it winter-long.
Below is part of the backyard, where I had everything in containers except for one cucumber and three tomato plants. Here you can see basil, tomato, and rosemary. You can also see my nasturtium that FINALLY grew in the foreground - of course, it will probably not last through our cold, rainy winter. Nasturtium grows like a weed in California and I miss it up here.
Here are the leeks in the front bed, still doing strong:
And here are the front beds, this past Summer. The tomato plants and the chicory are gone, but the rest remains:
Here is the cucumber plant, that we got ONE cucumber from at the end of the Summer. It was very very tasty, and hopefully we can grow more next year!



And above is the front bed that is not doing so well right now. Here was its promising beginning - the beets, and other hardy Fall plants (cabbage, cauliflower, broccoli...), but my lack of attention to this bed brought aphids (even with row cover) and dry, parched soil for too long. Only a few of these plants are thriving, sadly. I pulled up a handful of the beets and some of the broccoli and planted garlic bulbs three weeks ago, mulching them with leaves from the trees. Hopefully we will have a better garlic crop come next Summer!

Something is Eating the Leeks!

And it looks like this (someone else's image). We don't have rabbits here (not that I know of!) so it must be a squirrel, cat, dog, raccoon... that is really all I can think of. Hmm... only a few have been chomped on, but it's a mystery that needs to be solved, considering I am planning on eating every single leek I have.

Hello, Winter Gardening!

It's been a while since I made a post here. We've been busy with guests, travelling, and with a lot in the garden. What I've been doing in the garden:

-Pulled all the tomato, pepper, and eggplant plants (all the hot weather plants). I salvaged the remaining 8 tomatoes and one of the pepper plants that still had mature-ish peppers on it is now drying in the kitchen.

-Winter-pruned all our fruit trees. I did some of the pruning myself on the smaller trees, and then we HAD some pruners (they'd say they were arborists, not "pruners", which they were, in all fairness), come and prune the plum, and the fig. The fig tree got massively cut down which is very very exciting. They were cool guys who came by and were very willing to tell me how to prune correctly and why certain trees can be massively hacked and others can not; they also demonstrated orchard style pruning versus "ornamental" pruning or pruning for general care. I learned a lot! They also took out the two eucalyptus trees, sadly, that needed to go.

-Planted garlic and shallots! This year I decided not to accidentally plant the garlic in the shade, like I did the year before. So hopefully it will grow big and strong this year. Not sure if I mentioned, but last year I planted it in a little pocket of dirt that was mostly in shade. I'm STILL not sure what to do with the mini bulbs that appeared. Probably have to toss them at this point. Over the garlic and shallots, I put a layer of leaves that had fallen from the trees. Apparently, the leaves act as a very good mulch for these bulbs as they break down.

-Mulched the yard with the pruned clippings. Well, I should say my sister, who was visiting did all of this! Prepared areas for wildflower planting in the front area by the street. I am almost ready to plant wildflowers, just waiting for someone named Sam to come get the extra mulch that is sitting by the curb.

Otherwise, I generally assessed the garden and did some cleaning up. We have leeks, chard, four kinds of kale, collards, mustard greens,, mizuna, brussel's sprouts, broccoli, cabbage and cauliflower all doing well. The brassicas have been very heavily attacked by aphids, to which I've counter attacked with various oils; but the plants still seem healthy. (My row covers were not that well monitored so I suspect this was the cause!)

The lettuce and spinach we have eaten and I again did not plant successively as I should have, so we won't have more until early spring.

The beets - same seed that did so well in spring - are very sad. I am sure it is because I watered too infrequently this summer when we had those heat waves! (D was learning to run and liked to practice this every time we went out by the front of the house, so that is my excuse.) I had to pull the golden variety entirely and the Bull's Blood crop is looking oh so sad. And I was SO looking forward to beets this winter!!

Cutting Myself Slack

So I realized this week I have been very very hard on myself. In general, but that is another post for somewhere else. In terms of growing vegetables, this is after all the first BIG year I have tried this. I have had a lot of success and your average amount of failure. The yard does look like hell, but it's all I can do to keep up with watering (and even that I am not doing enough of) and preventing bugs, fertilizing and harvesting all the millions of tomatoes. With D underfoot, constantly demanding my attention (literally every 8 seconds, I am estimating), it's a wonder I am doing this with any kind of follow-thru.

I think of farmers, but they have a system down, and a lifestyle down. It's hard to pretend you are a farm in the city. It makes for constant readily apparent incongruencies, both in system and lifestyle. Especially your first REAL year at it. I did grow vegetables last year but they were mostly in the shaded beds and so nothing but lettuce, squash and a few tomatoes happened.

What has happened since I last posted:
- I realized that I have not been watering enough in general this summer and I am having a lot of dry compacted earth. Note for next year: use straw mulch in raised beds and wherever there is dryness.
- The tomatoes have been going crazy. I never thought that a five gallon bucket of tomatoes would only yield 4 cups of pureed tomato. No wonder those plants produce so much! We have given so many tomatoes away and still more come. Especially cherry tomatoes. We are overrun and I swear next year we only need 5 plants, not 22.
- We had lots of record heat for a few weeks and the brussels sprouts bit it. I don't think there is one survivor. I really want BS this winter, so I am thinking of buying STARTS! NO! My garden will not be entirely from seed after all.
- The beds out front are doing bizarre things. First of all the slugs have found them which is a bummer. So have the cabbage moths. But there are four beds. In the larger beds, the moisture is barely staying in the beds; in the smaller beds, the moisture retention is better and the plants are much much larger and healthier. These smaller beds are newer and did not have a previous crop, so perhaps that is why. But is mulching the only solution? I've been liquid fertilizing everything the same... hmm...
- In October we are having much of the fir tree limbs cut to get more light into the garden which is exciting, and also to prevent sudden impalement from above as we sit around the firepit. Also the two Eucalyptus trees must go, which will be sad but also better for the beds out front. The fruit trees will all be massively pruned.
- I have been also learning about preserving (canning, jamming fruit mostly, but also how to freeze and dry things properly for best future use). W and I made plum jam with about 5000 plums from our tree. It turned out good! We have 22 jars of it, so if you personally know me, look out for some this holiday time.

So considering all the OTHER garden related things I have been doing (making jam etc), I should really really cut myself some slack. I should actually be amazed at myself! But I can't help looking out into the yard at the shriveled brussels sprouts and dead chilis and get depressed. I decided this past week I am no good at gardening when it gets really hot without relief. I have much more respect now for people trying to garden in say, Australia.

Another great thing I found this past week that is going on here in Portland: Sellwood Garden Club. Awesome!

Chile Failure!

Oh boy, big note for next year: if you let D mess up the labels on any of the starts, be sure they are NOT the pepper starts. Hopefully next year none of the starts will be lacking in labels... however: for fear of cold nights and early rains, I decided (upon reading I could) pulled all my green chiles off of their plants and decided to ripen them inside. Not a good idea. Mainly because I didn't know what kinds of chiles I had, and apparently there are different ways of ripening them, depending on the variety.

I assumed (not sure why I'm assuming anything as a novice vegetable gardener, but it is my style) that there was a sort of standard way of ripening chiles/peppers, as there is with tomatoes, etc. Apparently not. Some like to be in a bag, under the counter, dark. Others you can put in direct sunlight. I read a "how to" on the latter, and so put mine on the windowsill. After the smell of hot chile was too strong in the house I thought why not put them outside in the sun - same thing.

I think I've killed them all. They are white! Well, blotchy. And flabby. It's very sad. They were such an accomplishment! I grew two handfuls of chile peppers west of the cascades! The black pots worked! And then I put them out to die before I could even try one!

Well, people lost entire food supplies during the depression; people are starving all over the world, so I suppose I should look on the bright side of things. I did have successful pepper plants! I did grow chiles! Some of the plants are still producing! Next year do not lose the labels, do not let your child mix up the plants, and do a little more research before pulling all your peppers off ahead of time because you think what you are doing must be right!

Tomatoes!

Tomatoes are starting to ripen!

We picked our first tomatoes on Friday. So far, the plants are very healthy and the fruit is perfect! I believe I picked some Early Girl tomatoes and definitely some cherry variety but not sure which.

The squash plants are getting big now. The eggplants and peppers are growing fast and putting out fruit that is growing fast now.

We are in the middle of a heat wave here in Portland and I'm a big concerned about my very little starts, but so far they are doing alright.

To do in the garden for the next week/weekend:
-Finish filling the new raised beds with dirt (we have two new concrete lined ones IN the garden
-Plant the kale, chicory, lettuces, chard, brussel sprouts, etc the first week of August
-Harvest mulberries and figs and plums and save mulberries and figs for canning/jams
-Take stock of what we have and see if we can guess how much MORE we need (of Winter gardening plants!)

I think that is it! Oh, and of course harvest my perfect little eggplant!

Perfect Little Eggplant

Well, container planting seems to have been successful, as I have a perfect little eggplant outside! The pepper plant next to it has been demolished by slugs, and I am hoping my eggplant avoids this fate. It seems the eggplant plant out front though, is having some trouble, as it has yet to bear fruit. And this one is far bigger, so I thought it would bear some fruit before the others! Again, D was playing with the starts and they got all mixed up, labels falling off, so... I do not know the varieties of anything that is maturing in the yard. Note for next year: toddler-proof labels.

I will try to start putting up photos, starting with one of my perfect little eggplant!

Soil Testing!

We have various plots where things are grown, each with different types of soil and different nutrients being fed on a regular basis.

In the front boulevard, we have raised beds: two with humus brought in from Nature's Needs. this humus seems to be nutrient rich but is very dry and water absorption is an issue. The other two beds have soil from the old raised beds (topsoil and compost blend).

Inside the garden, we have the wheel area, which has clayey soils and soil that has been amended with compost/chicken manure. The two other beds IN the garden have the soil from the old beds. Also this area gets constant droppings from the huge fir tree, so the soil is more acidic.

Then, in the back, we have the random ground soil which seems to have a lot of sand to it; we also have potted vegetables out back.

SO: next year perhaps a soil test in various locations would be good. Perhaps some areas need more of something. It would be nice to even them all out some or see how different they are!

Catching Up and Fall Planting Notes

It's amazing what I can get done without D around. W and her went away for a few nights and I have been getting so much done in the yard. Funny, it doesn't look much different to the outside eye... but:

I took two hours today and pinned up all the tomato plant parts that were dragging on the ground. It's good to see we have various varieties going strong. Two hours, because we have 20 plants! What we lack in other vegetables this summer (due to my faulty planning), we make up for in tomatoes!

I finished filling the other two beds that we are trying to use for Fall / Winter planting. I planted many of the chicory, broccoli, cauliflower, and cabbage starts. I read up on Steve Solomon's advice for leeks and trimmed the stems. I thinned the carrots which seem not to be doing so well; I also thinned the beets and the cauliflower that I direct seeded.

I made a big batch of Steve Solomon's complete organic fertilizer in an old doughnut bucket. Why we have a doughnut bucket I do not know, but we do. I also spread some fertilizer around the plants.

I started lettuce seeds (again!). I have had such a problem with lettuce this year. I didn't plant enough in the Spring and then recently my starts fried out in their trays with the hot weather we suddenly had. So, all I can do is start again. Gardening I have found is all about "oh well, start again". It's hard for me to be ok with that kind of work, because I usually have a plan for anything I do, and then I execute the plan. Not so with living things! Sometimes they don't start when you want them to; sometimes you don't nurture them enough or realize they need some help.

I also started kale, chard, mustard greens, and some other things.

I am wondering about the number of plants I have and if I need more: cabbage, cauliflower, brussel sprouts? I have no idea. One of the hardest things about year round gardening is that I have NO IDEA how many plants I need to feed us! Trial and error. It is only the first year of really trying this, so I must be patient.

It's been HOT HOT HOT here. It was 92 degrees yesterday and almost as hot today. I have been able to really water the plants alot, which has been good.

It seems that no matter what, any time I pick up Steve Solomon's book, I realize I am doing SOMETHING wrong. Very discouraging to say the least. Today I was reading about water. It was getting very very specific and I stopped reading. I got the point I needed to know - that lack of adequate watering leads to root stress, which leads to poor root development, which leads to plants not able to mature as they would. In general I think I water enough, but apparently with the ground wet 6-8 inches is not enough. I do know though that I have two problems:

I start sowing seeds about a week too late
I do not water well enough
We have different beds with different types of soil (amended differently), so what works for some does not for others and makes for difficult application of fertilizer, water, etc.

I think both of these things contribute to most of the problems I come up against. Those problems being mainly one: that plants don't mature to the point I think they should.

All in all, I spent about 10 hours between yesterday and today doing work in the garden (what I consider BASIC work that was in desperate need of doing). It's amazing how much more I could do, but I have other things to accomplish before my alone time is up!

More Winter Planting

Today I got quite a bit done - finished the other small beds out front. Now we have two 4x8 beds and two 3x3 beds. I also, much to my Dad's horror, made another bed out of chopped up concrete. I read extensively about concrete and whether or not it leaches chemicals into the soil, and came to the conclusion that it is not a concern. Apparently most of the chemical leaching is done when the cement itself is made (due to the heavy metals in the machines it is made in); the other time chemicals can leach out is when it is mixed for use. Once it solidifies and is formed, this no longer happens. At least that is what some scientific article all about cement and concrete said, somewhere on the web. I also consulted a few organic forums/resources and all agreed that it was not a concern to them. But my Dad's horror lies in the appearance. Apparently it's way to trashy for him. Well, it's free (since we already had it) and holds the dirt in.

I planted a million leeks. These were from a friend and they look strong. But she gave me hundreds it seems. Oh wait, I said millions. Well, a LOT. My own leeks are growing, but very slowly, and I'm hoping they will gain some speed. I also planted some chicory, collards, beets (yes more beets!), and cauliflower.

I've also decided to keep the "wheel" in the center of our garden as is. W and I are doing much rearranging in the garden, and had plans to break open the wheel of bricks and make more rectangular shapes at the top (better for laying out a vegetable design), but I decided that the wheel is very nice as is, and with all the extra beds we are making, I think using the wheel for things like pea and bean trellises and tomatoes and potatoes, even squash - that will make good use of it's circular shape.

We have already pulled several large ornaments/herbs that we had far too much of and were blocking space and sun. It's all in progress. Hopefully I can put up some photos someday.

We also had an arborist come by and give us an estimate on some pruning and removals. It wasn't as much as I expected and it's very exciting knowing that soon there will be MORE sunlight and happier fruit trees in the garden!

I also restarted my lettuce seeds after noticing some moldy seeds. Perhaps they were too moist, but I don't think I did anything differently this time. The rest of the starts are getting used to the cool Portland July nights in their little trays, soon to join the big kids in their open spaces.

Fall, Winter Planting

I have to have more faith in my seeds!

Some have germinated but the lettuce is dragging its feet. I know, 6 days often for lettuce, but I'm still antsy. I am also unsure if I've started enough. Spring planting was not enough. I should have done a second round two weeks later, but with the Fall I want it to be a success! I want to be sure there will be enough to last us through the winter. No matter what I do that will probably not be the case, but it's a goal.

So I'm waiting for the seeds...

Sanctuary

How crazy the birds are now that it is really summer here in Portland. I was sitting in the living room today and there was so much squaking and chirping outside, it sounded like we were on the grounds of a bird sanctuary! It made me laugh and then feel glad. We really have a great spot. We are in Portland, the city, but our spot is quiet and full of big Douglas Fir trees and a lot of birds!

When D and I take walks, it's like being in the countryside (sometimes). Then a big low-riding Cadillac will drive by blasting Blame It (On the Alcohol), and I'll remember I'm in the city. But in general, it's silent at night and full of wildlife during the day. You can see the stars and the moon clearly at night and D says "Mo!" and points to the moon.

My dad was just here talking about all the green we have, and it's true. Portland is GREEN. That, and the houses aren't smashed up against eachother. Growing up in the BIG city, I never saw this much green, heard this much wildlife, heard this much silence. It's nice for D, and nice for us too! Feeling very lucky where I'm at.

Garden Overhaul Plans

W and I keep arguing about the garden. He wants it to have greenery year-round. I want to grow a million vegetables.

When we first moved in here, we both fell in love with the garden. It was full of plants, fruit trees, ornamentals, even a few vegetable beds! How lucky! I remember feeling very much in awe of the woman who created the space - she was so knowledgeable to grow all these plants herself (we found out she had done so many years ago from bare dirt).

The more I learn about gardening and plants, the more I realize she really didn't know what she was doing. There is one huge hazelnut tree and three big fruit trees on the south side of the garden. Beneath those, on the south side, are two raised beds. Nothing can grow there! I've tried for two years now to get something to grow there - lettuce gets about 4 inches high and then stops. They are completely in the shade by early June! Plus the trees are crowding eachother so badly (even with pruning) that I think one will have to go.

There are two Eucalyptus trees in the entrance-way. I talked to an Arborist after our bad winter storm (when I was afraid one of them was going to topple over). He said, "You know, so many people plant Eucalyptus here in Western Oregon and they always have to be taken out because the soil and climate are not at all right for them."

So, sadly, we are going to have to make some changes. We may have to completely remove the Eucalyptus trees and the cherry tree. The cherry is smashed in between the two other trees and I'm afraid that we will have a lot of disease on our hands soon if we don't remove it.

The fruit trees in general need lots of help. They are ok, but I'm currently reading The Backyard Orchardist in hopes of learning how to better take care of them. We like fruit too! Not just vegetables, and I want to be sure that we are keeping our trees healthy!

So tonight W and I talked about really re-arranging things. It will be a LOT of work, but it will be a lot better. We love the herbs and the plants in the garden, they just need better spots! We are also going to start a tree for D, hopefully a little peach tree.

Visit from a Master Gardener

Our yard was visited by a Master Gardener the other day. I am taking a class once a month on year-round gardening here in the Pacific Northwest (I posted a link in the resources section if anyone is interested), and the instructor is an OSU Master Gardener. He volunteered to come see how I was doing in the garden, so I gave him a tour of things with D on my hip.

The good news is that he said my plants for the most part look great. The bad news is, yes, we have a difficult plot to garden in considering the overhanging trees to the south and the aggressive turf.

Also, apparently, I was growing two weeds that I thought were bell peppers. I said, "And those peppers over there are doing GREAT!" He said, "Which ones?" and when I pointed again, he said, "I hate to break it to you, but those aren't peppers, those are weeds." So sad, so embarrassing.

Guess I might not be a Master Gardener. I'm going to try, though. Someday!

Fail! Fail! Fail!

Every time I look at my sad, pathetic bean and pea trellises, I just cringe with embarrassment. Failing on trellising big time. I know I posted about this, but it's just SO BAD I had to say it again.

Places and Books of Learning

Over the past few years (three, to be precise), I have done a lot of reading and a lot of learning. Here are some of my resources that I highly recommend to anyone wanting to grow vegetables in the Willamette Valley, or in general in other parts of the country. One thing I learned was to read books that are particular geographically; otherwise there can be a lot of misleading and erroneous information. Also, buy seeds from seed companies that supply mostly to your region. Otherwise you may be buying a lot of varieties that may not do well for your climate. You can probably grow any variety, but it will be harder to grow it well and may yield less.

I hope to update this post as I read and learn more! So come back!


Books

Steve Solomon's, Growing Vegetables West of the Cascades (and other books)
- a real definitive guide to understanding from the ground up how to be a vegetable gardener. His books are less of a reference guide and more of a manifesto. He obviously puts his heart and soul into what he does and his books help you to understand how to do this if you know nothing about growing things. I think the first chapter is "Think Like a Plant" or something. This perspective has helped me troubleshoot when things go wrong ("Ok, what would I need if I were that plant?"). Oftentimes I don't know the answer, but it gets me meditative and contemplative in a calm way, rather than "Shit! All the beans died! Damn! Now I have to start all over!" I probably still would have to start over, if all my beans were to die, but I'd go back to that first chapter and think, "Well, why did the beans die?"

Seattle Tilth's Maritime Northwest Gardening Guide
- an excellent resource for growing vegetables here. It's a booklet that goes month by month, what to grow (specifically what varieties) in the garden in our climate. It says for each month - what you should start inside, what you should start outside in a protective frame, what you can direct seed outside. Really great; the only thing that is hard I find with this guide is that it doesn't just have "squash", it goes strictly by each particular type of squash only. So it may say to start X variety of squash indoors in mid-March, and Y variety of squash indoors at the end of March, while Z variety of squash can be direct seeded in July outside. Well, if you aren't growing THOSE varieties, it's hard to use. For a beginning gardener like myself, I need something a bit more general. Like "most tomatoes can be started indoors now" would be better for me. You can get this by looking at the guide, but you have to sift through it for a while and sort of see when most of the kale is being planted. That too is misleading since there is kale you can plant in spring and overwintering kale that you plant in Fall. The guide doesn't go into any of this, so you need a bit more education I'd say before really utilizing this guide.

Ed Smith's Vegetable Gardener's Bible
- although he is a Vermont (yikes!) year-round vegetable gardener, this book is fantastic as a quick reference book. The chapters are brief, with lots of pictures; the first half being about his techniques and the second half about each vegetable in detail. I'd recommend this book to someone starting out. I wish I'd had it three years ago!



Classes

I recommend taking classes if you can! I think the key to good classes is that they should be affordable (very affordable or by donation or free) and lengthy (ie comprehensive). A two hour class for $60 for instance automatically sends up warning flags that this will be an information kind of class without a lot of practical hands-on (so to speak) information. There will probably be coffee and donuts, lots of glossy pamphlets about the organization giving the class, and lots of introductions about the teacher and the organization. I've sadly taken a few of these kinds of classes and they were never worth it.

A few years back both W and I took an organic gardening 101 class through Oregon Tilth's OEC out at Luscher Farm. It was great and really comprehensive, two full days and lots of time for personal Q&A about your specific situation/garden. I am not sure how the classes are now, but they are probably quality, since it's Oregon Tilth. Oregon Tilth's newsletter I get each month is still printed on newsprint with minimal color and house to a lot of interesting articles about important issues - a true sign of a good nonprofit. Check out current classes here.

I also recently started a class at Livingscape Nursery called What to Do in the Garden Each Month with Master Gardener Tim Lanfri. This class has been perfect for me. It meets for a few hours once a month and you discuss what you should be doing in your vegetable garden that month! Perfect! Tim is great and very open to troubleshooting your particular problems/questions. The nursery seems to have a number of good classes that are very inexpensive or free to the public.

Starlings

The baby starlings are learning to fly out back. Every year, they return to the nest they have made in the edge of our roof. I know this is probably something a savvy homeowner would repair and seal up; it was noted in the previous inspection of our home (the previous owner also let the birds be!). But we like the birds, and I try and let wildlife live whenever possible. The house already has a million things wrong with it, so sealing up a nest is the least of our worries, really. Plus there is a small window upstairs that acts as a magnifying glass into the nest area, so we can watch the birds and their progress without them noticing us!

Starlings seem to be hated everywhere by bird enthusiasts and backyard gardeners. I guess they are pretty tolerant of our disgusting urban environments, much like pigeons, and seem to reproduce and compete with other "desirable" birds. Apparently they are not native to North America, but so many things are not, and it seems people like to pick and choose the non-natives that are fashionable, and those that are not. Starlings are apparently not in fashion any more. Kind of a dorky site, but an interesting overview:

http://www.pleasebekind.com/coexist/starlings.htm


In any case, the young birds are learning to fly and it's very sweet to watch. Learning to walk seems hard enough, having just watched D go about it for many months; I can't imagine learning to fly! It's nice too for D having the birds out back - she can see them up close and point and marvel, if a toddler can really "marvel" at anything. Granted, the birds think she may eat them and they send out their warning screech, which only adds to D's joy.

Backyard Thoughts

We had an unusually snowy winter last year and a few things died. We had two jasmine plants in the back. One died, and the other seems to be struggling to stay alive. That said, the backyard is starting to fill out again after the brutal winter. I have some Mediterranean vegetables in containers out there which will start to look great once they get their flowers and fruits! Plus they will be edible! I need to get a few perennial climbing vines however that will be hardy enough for the wintertime. I'm tempted to try jasmine again, but am also thinking of honeysuckle and some others.

We need to get some stepable groundcovers for back there for the "grassy" side. We have some thoughts, just no time to execute as usual. Otherwise, it is cozy, and we hope to start eating dinner back there soon, as the days are warming up! D loves to climb the steps and "help" me pull weeds.

Lessons Learned So Far This Year

There are a few things I've learned so far this year, and here they are:

Use sterile soil for germinating seeds. Although I agree with Steve Solomon that a good way to eliminate weak plants in the beginning is to cast aside the idea of sterile seedling soil, I'm not sure if this is more important than the treatment of the plants once out in the garden. No matter how "strong" my starts were, since the weak had died from the damping off disease, all of the pac choi was demolished by slugs, and many others were fatally attacked. I think my efforts are better served focusing on row covers, deep watering, trellising.

Label pots themselves so plants don't get mixed up. I like to think I'm beyond this. So does my toddler.

Establish a better germinating area in the house.

Broccoli raab are huge plants and W doesn't even care for the taste, so next year, perhaps one or two plants only.

Limit broccoli to five plants tops! Not sure why I planted so much broccoli this year, but I did.

Tomatoes limit to five plants, plus five paste tomato plants. Again, waaay to many plants!

Work on a better pea/bean trellis for next year. Pea / bean teepee is good; perhaps they can take up their own pie-section in the Wheel with the teepee trellis.

Do not plant anything in partial shade no matter how convinced you are it will be ok; it will not be!

Humus from nature's needs is fantastic! Get more next year.

Two rows of spinach is plenty; cover against leaf miners!

Put out slug/snail bait before you put out plants - 2-3 weeks before.

Next time, focus on planting lettuce better - smaller plantings, 10 days apart. Use a calendar so you don't forget!

Peppers and eggplants - just a few plants each; see how pots do this year.

Basil - for some reason is hard to start. Start outside and plant a LOT.

The Garden So Far

This year we are trying new things. We have the following areas where we are growing edible things:

In front of the house, on our "boulevard" strip by the curb, we have:
Front Bed 1 (southern-most 8x4 framed bed, humus/soil mix)
Front Bed 2 (next in line, same as above)
Front Bed 3 (northern-most framed bed, this one only 4x4, amended garden soil)

In the front yard we have:
Shade Bed (this old 8x4 framed bed was here, along with another, when we moved in, virtually entirely in the shade due to mature trees to the south of it!)
Areas A, B, C, and D on the northern most side of the "herb wheel" in the center of the yard. (each area is a pie-shaped, small, maybe five square feet area, mostly clay soil with added compost)
Cobb Bench Bed (where an old cob bench was, this is just a mound of existing soil from a former shady raised bed)

Then we have areas in the backyard, sandy/clay areas along the fence - not much room, perhaps about 8 inches wide... we also have many black plastic pots we are growing things in, plus some small areas in between other plants in the front yard where we are growing things (like the onions and garlic).

What is growing:
Well, in Front Bed 1 we have some lettuce still and also beets, which are not yet mature. We have some collards growing as well. The three rows of spinach are done, and about a third of it went to the leaf miners! The rest of it was delicious! I just yesterday planted another few rows of lettuce.

In Front Bed 2 we have broccoli getting mature; the broccoli raab is done; we have four tomato plants and some basil doing well. We also have two tomato plants in the walkway area that are doing ok but are crowded by grassy weeds!

In the Wheel area we have 10 broccoli plants, maybe 8 tomato plants, snap peas, beans, a few peppers and eggplants.

We have onions and garlic maturing.

In the Shade Bed we have some lettuce doing poorly.

In back, we have three tomato plants, plus three more in pots, eggplant and peppers in pots...

I think that is all.

We have a number of fruit trees, nut trees, herbs that are all established in the yard, plus many ornamentals. I don't know how to take care of the trees, other than some basic pruning. I do my best to watch for pests, but otherwise, I need to read up on what an orchardist does! We have:

Filbert hazelnut tree
a young hazelnut tree of the same(?) kind
two apple trees, still very young
two asian pear trees, still very young
a plum tree
a cherry tree, which has yet to produce cherries
a few seaberries
a mulberry tree
some kind of a currant bush
a fig tree
a couple japanese maples
an artichoke plant
a huckleberry bush (the non-fruit kind)
two eucalyptus trees
the big douglas fir tree!
other random trees that are ornamental
rosemary, sage, lavender...
medicinal herbs such as yarrow and some others.

It is really amazing when I write it all down. We love our garden. The only hard thing is it makes growing a lot of vegetables very hard. I am trying my best, but often get so frustrated when I see books on growing vegetables, showing rows and rows of vegetables, without grass or shade in sight! I wish we had so much more land, so that we could have an AREA for the vegetables. I'm really into intermixing things, as in guild/permaculture style, but when it comes to vegetables, it's very hard to plan and execute things in that kind of a setting. You spend more time trying to organize the garden and less time actually planting, or at least that is what happened to me this year.

Vegtables vary in size and needs, and trying to squeeze them in "wherever they will fit" in the yard makes for difficult gardening. You spend more time making sure the grass doesn't encroach on the brocolli than you to tilling your soil or fertilizing your plants.

About Growing Vegetables

I am trying this year to grow vegetables year-round for my family. Last year I tried to grow some vegetables - got a lot of tomatoes, some squash, some spinach, some lettuce... that was about all. I had a new four month old baby, was breastfeeding constantly, and tired mostly.

But I read alot about gardening for vegetables, did a lot of research, talked to people and went in this year with big plans and a lot of seeds. Not all of those plans are manifesting in success, but we are growing alot. This section of the blog will be documenting my successes and failures as the year goes by. I plan to grow vegetables that can be harvested throughout our generally mild Portland winter, and we will see how that goes!

Everything that I am growing I started from seed myself, either indoors or in the garden, unless otherwise noted. All methods and supplies are organic unless otherwise noted. We have a standard 50 x 50 lot with a house on it in a semi-urban area of NE Portland. We started with a beautiful yard, and two raised beds in the shade under a plum tree! I couldn't get anything to grow there very big. This year we made two 4x8 raised beds (12 inches deep with organic humus brought in!) in the front of the house (on the boulevard strip). We are also using the sunny part of the herb wheel in the center of the garden as a growing area. There, I just have mounds of compost going. We are also trying to use as many sunny spots as possible, as well as an attempt at container gardening for peppers and eggplant and tomatoes, who generally like a lot of heat. We are still trying to grow things in the shady bed (the one left), but probably will abandon this next year.

Since I am starting this blog in the beginning of the year, the next post will summarize what has happened so far and then I hope to post often to follow the months for the remainder of the year and into next year. It will hopefully be ongoing. I'll try to put up pictures too. We'll see. With a toddler around, it's hard to imagine having the time to do this (see About Motherhood)!

I also use "I" and "we" here: I am the one planning and implementing the actual growing of vegetables, W is also a part of the process, often helping to build raised beds, do other manual labor, discuss what to grow, help with weeding, etc. It is our house and our family, but when I am doing something specific I use "I". D also helps in the yard by moving starts around, putting soil in odd places and sticking her hand in the sprinkler quite a bit.

About This Blog

This blog is about our home garden and the things that go with it. I have been learning to grow vegetables here in the Pacific Northwest. We live in the city, but there is a lot of space out here, not like in San Francisco, where I grew up. There is space between the houses, crickets and bats at night, and a lot of trees (a lot of trees).

The weather out here is pretty conducive to year-round gardening (with the occasional extra bad cold spell), which is exciting. 2009 marked my third year at an attempt to grow anything, flowers or otherwise. This is a chronicle of our yard and what we are doing year by year. Mostly it is a way for me to chronicle for ourselves what we are doing, but I hope it is of some interest to other vegetable gardeners.

Sometimes I also put up some random things that are nature-related, or that are food-related. I am also learning to preserve the harvest, which is part of food gardening. There may be other avenues to explore as well as I find more time and get better at gardening.