Back Yard Garden Zen, June Edition
It’s been a while since I posted anything about the backyard garden, but today we completed some pretty incredible work. I’ve got photos.
The week before the trip to Austin, my parents dropped off more used cedar, which I used to make our new bed. I found some time to pick up a bunch of compost a day or two after I built it, but we only got to begin filling the bed and planting today.
At the far left is a tomato plant, two eggplants next to it, and a variety of flowers.
I still need to pick up some more compost to fill the back half of the bed. We’ll be filling that with okra. In the back, along the fence, you can see the frame Christina put up for the lima beans.
Here are a couple of views from the deck: as you’ll see, the new bed takes up a good chunk of the yard:
At the far left you can see our greens bed.
left to right: broccolli, beets, turnips
I’m not sure what happened, but our broccoli went to flower very early. Someone down at the farmers market told Christina other people had the same problem: the weather may have been a bit drier than is best for broccs. On the other hand, our beet greens and turnip greens are going nuts, especially the latter.
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I love turnip greens. I’ve never liked the astringent taste of collards, but when I bought some turnip greens on a whim at the grocery I was delighted to find they have the same nutty crunch and mild bitterness of broccoli rabe, at a fraction of the price (they were only 50 cents a pound). Best of all (like beets) of you use cold frames, they grow year round.
The hops have also been coming along really well. I have two vines of Nugget and one of Cascade.
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For a better idea of how big they are, the deck floor is about 5 feet off the ground.
…adding that the hops are growing at about an inch or more a day. On Friday the Nuggets were about chest-high. By Sunday evening, they were nearly up to my neck. I expect them to be taller than me by the end of the week.
Finally, the strawberry plant has put out only a few berries. Christina says we’ll have more next year as the plant spreads.
And on that note, this guy is getting some dinner and an ice cold beer.
June 2nd, 2008 at 12:06 am
Wow! That looks awesome! I promise to take any extra beets off your hands….
June 2nd, 2009 at 11:12 am
[...] Last summer, I planted hops for the first time. Here’s a picture i originally posted on June 1, 2008: [...]