the bees have moved on to this new favorite attraction. golden-chain tree. fixes nitrogen, makes bees very happy and lights up the yard with bright yellow blooms.
another corner of the yard is painted purple.
one more nice surprise in the shrubbery department is the tall oregon grape (Mahonia aquifolium) at the foot of the driveway. this is our state flower, and our local medicinal substitute for the endangered antimicrobial/antiinflammatory goldenseal.
speaking of grapes (actually i wasn’t- oregon grape is unrelated to grapes), my sweet wild grape seeds have finally sprouted!
goji and passionflower (maypop) seeds have also germinated. i got my goji seeds out of the dried goji berries in the bulk section at the co-op. i’ve read that if you order them from a seed catalog, you’ll get them the same way, stored inside their berry, which protects them until you are ready to extract them and plant.
the garden began providing actual food this past week, and we’ve been enjoying super fresh salad greens and radishes. i found a mutant heart-shaped mustard green, and tossed it into the mix, figuring whoever got to eat it could use a little extra love.
it might even have been this character who ingested the heart. participating in where your food comes from makes you want to eat your food. even salad. even if you’re five.
lettuce is so pretty.
pac choi is, too. we’ve had a few good days of soaking rain, and i love the way each plant arranges droplets of water along its leaves in its own unique way.
the timing of the rain has been good. the earthworms and i could sense it coming and the evening just before the sky opened up, i scurried around putting seeds directly in the ground using steve solomon’s method of creating little seedling “pots” right in place. make a small depression with a pot or jar, add potting soil with amendments, seeds, and a little rain. this section will hopefully sprout lots and lots of dill in between those lettuce transplants.
the next big task will be to transplant lots of tomatoes, many of them into these ghetto sub-irrigation planters made from 5 gallon buckets. that is how i grew most of my tomatoes last year, but this year i have more plants than buckets, and more garden space than i’ve ever had, so some are going to go straight into the ground. not all of the planters will fit inside the greenhouse, so those will be split up, as well, and i imagine we will spread out our tomato harvest over several months this way.
whatcha got growing around your farm?
My parents were avid gardeners whenever we lived someplace that allowed it. There's never a better carrot than one fresh out of the ground, and what's more fun than carving pumpkins you watched grow (and take over). I'm not growing any green things (beyond my jade plant, Frank) but my geckos' eggs hatched this past weekend and now I have a baby gecko – and possibly a 2nd running around loose in my apartment haha.
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i've never seen oregon grape…and i thought it WAS a grape! thank you for introducing me.
i've also been totally into the prettiness of lettuce. some heads look like roses, others like lace. it's cheering to know that your big boy eats his salad. i'm still trying to be tricky with fern by introducing her to salad in the garden…which she'll eat if she can pluck it, but forget it if you put it on her plate.
loving the water droplet pics, and the tip about gogi berries. really curious how those plants turn out! xoxo
marygood recently posted..Deconstruct to Reconstruct