June Garden Tour

I thought I’d spend today’s post giving everyone a little update and tour of my gardens!

Here is one of my window boxes along the deck, planted with scarlet runner beans (the green) and some red wax begonias. I planted the beans from seed into my soil mix (1/3 compost, 1/3 peatmoss, 1/3 vermiculite) then I added the wax begonias after they were up and growing so there would be some color and foliage that you could see from the house. I am hoping that the bean vines will start leaning over and trail downwards from the deck. Right now they are pretty sturdy and seem happy to stand upright. . .

Here is a picture of what they look like right now lining the deck.

Here you can see the 4 pumpkin plants that I planted behind our shed. The pile of dirt they are in is what was left over when they dug the fencepost holes for our fence. This year I mixed in some compost, then planted the pumpkins. Last time DH mowed he mulched them with the grass clippings. The fence you see to the left is the cemetary fence (our property backs up to the cemetary.)

On the other wall of the shed DH built me this compost bin. We’ve been throwing organic matter into it for a year. We decided it really need a break from new matter to finish breaking down stuff, so we started a small wire pile somewhere else in the yard. Then I read about planting vines directly into your compost. So I bought these two little plants-the one on the left is an acorn squash, and the one on the right is an ornamental gourd. I hope they don’t cross pollenate! Then DH mulched the top of the pile with more grass clippings. (for those of you who wonder, we don’t fertilize or spray our lawn, and neither do any of the neighbors, so the clippings are fine)

Here are two of the small cedar whiskey barrels that I planted. They are filled 1/2 way up with recycleables to take up room, then the top half is filled with the soil mix. The one in the foreground are some Tromboncino squash that I planted from seed. They are supposed to be similar to zuchinni but of a vining rather than bush type growth. These are below the deck and I will be running strings up from the planter to the deck for the vines to climb. In the back are some pattypan (otherwise known as “flying saucer”) squash that I bought as plants at the nursery. They seem to have some white spots on the leaves, I don’t think they are going to make it.

Here is my small strawberry pot and a neat pot I bought to fill with some herbs like sage, oregano, etc. Obviously these are mobile. DH moved them up here to mow the lawn and I haven’t put them back yet.

This is one of the two stacked planters (it is sitting up on top of another planter that is exactly the same, but flipped over) it probably stands about 3 feet up. This is planted with 2 butternut squash from the nursery, and 2 acorn squash with I started from seed but didn’t do too well. There are 2 swiss chard in the center that I transplanted from the big garden beds.

Here is the big view of the two “square foot” gardens.

This is the orignal garden. In the back are the peas with beans planted in front of them. I figured the peas would be pretty much done by the time the beans needed the strings to climb, we’ll see if that was a big miscalculation or not! We’ve been snacking on pea pods for the last 3 days or so. Yum! Then in front of that you see left to right some cabbage, a few cukes, and a couple of tomatoes (all not seen very well) then in the front the bushy stuff on the left is turnip greens (I’ll do a much larger fall planting in August or so) some butter crunch lettuce (which we’ve been eating every few days) and then some radishes (which are doing a whole lot of nothing!) Also planted to fill spaces already vacated by lettuce and spinach, but not up yet are chard, scallions (which I think aren’t germinating) and kholrabi.
This is the second bed. Across the back are “violet podded stringless beans” on the left, then new zealand spinach in the last two squares on the right. I also planted more scallions in a thin row right in front of the beans, but nothing is happening there. Then on the next row there is swiss chard, a couple of bell peppers, lima beans and then basil. 3rd row has carrots, more peppers, bush beans, summer savory and basil. Last row has “slo-bolt” lettuce, 2 peppers, bush beans, dill and parsley.
Here is one of my front flower beds with the petunias that I started out back in my winter sowing experiment. I am so excited to have flowers! They actually look much better than the picture seems to. I put candytuft around the outside, but they haven’t started blooming yet.

But these candytuft (the little white flowers you see right next to the stoop and the little purple ones you can barely see in front of it) have bloomed.

Yesterday I spread around some organic fertilizer to all the veggies and flowers, then last night it obligingly rained, so that should help things along a bit! I also have tomato plants alongside the house I didn’t take pictures of, as well as two little ground cherry plants that don’t seem to be doing much yet. And I have 2 blueberries I should have planted weeks ago that are still sitting in their wrappers. . .

All in all I’m pretty pleased. My front flowerbeds don’t look as grand as the ones in the neighborhood where folks went out and bought annuals already in bloom, but they certainly cost me alot less (although I did go out and buy wax begonias and impatiens for the front, and those wax begonias for the back) I am sure that my beds will catch up in a few more weeks in terms of flowers etc.