Garden progress 2012

Well, it finally got sunny enough today for me to go out and take some pictures of how the garden grows! It's still about a month before my LFD, so there's not much going on here YET, but it's coming!

Here are some new tophat blueberry bushes I got. I thought they were dead, but they're starting to show a little life here and there, so I'm going to keep trying!



These are some raspberries I bought last year and got up on some twine. They've taken a real beating this year, what with the warm temps fooling them into producing leaves and then the cold snaps freezing those leaves right off again.



My strawberry bed and some garlic coming up in the next box over. There's also more raspberries beyond those guys, and in the back next to the concrete slab are some chives that come up on their own every year. The strawberries already have buds!



I technically added three new boxes this year. Two 4x4s plus one 1x16 which is actually four 1x4s but only because that was much easier to make than a 1x16!


I'm still cleaning up from the freak snow storm we had on Monday (we got over a foot of snow!). This is a great shot of my animal-proof fence, too.


Here's my baby cabbage! I just transplanted it last week.


And my baby broccoli!

What a great garden! Thanks for sharing your photos. I'll bet you're just itching to get the growing season going full-swing.

A picture really is worth 1000 words! GREAT-looking garden! I really like your animal fence. It's there, but not intrusive. I made individual cages for my beds this year and although they work great, it's mildly annoying getting them on and off all the time. My only problem with making a nice fence like yours is that one of my pests is a resident peacock - he would hop/fly right into the garden if the top were open... I can only hope that someone, somewhere will want peacock for dinner one of these nights and then he won't be my problem anymore...

Thanks for the compliments, guys! Giv, I am indeed itching to do more in the garden! It makes me so jealous to see everyone getting all their plants in and I have to wait. Even in my own regional forum, I think I'm one of the latest LFDs!

Kitty, I really do like the way I have my fence. It's easy to get in and out and it's not an eyesore (which is good since my garden takes up 1/3 of my yard, lol). But I can see where you would have a problem with a peacock! How frustrating! Maybe put a peahen statue at the other end of the yard...?

Don't feel too bad Sapphire; we have opposite problems in a way. I will have trouble growing in summertime, and will be able to grow some things throughout the winter. Hence my choice of Rookie Topics for this week.

I got my garden started only 3 weeks ago, which is quite late for summer crops in my region. So, while I'm still looking at seedlings in my garden other people of my region have full-blown gardens they're enjoying the fruits of. I might be able to enjoy a tomato or two in another 2-3 weeks, but many of my other plants seem to be hit hard by the heat and not growing terribly fast. Several of my herbs are clearly having trouble. I'm just glad the boxes get dappled sun/shade a couple times a day so the plants aren't as badly stressed. Our heat is tough to grow in, especially without the summer rains we'd normally get if it weren't for the drought we've been in for several years.

You've got yourself a nice little plot there sapphire
Looks great!

@Sapphire........don't worry about the late start. It'll all catch up in the next couple of months and you'll be in a jungle of lovely green with fruits popping up here and there. I, too, in zone 5a, have to wait longer than many on this board, but I also get two cool-season crops a year, both spring and fall. My biggest trial is trying to grow eggplant. They need nites in the 60s and many nites here, especially in the spring, aren't warm enough to get a bountiful harvest. My eggplant harvests have been small so I'm putting some in pots this year to bring them indoors on cooler nites.

As you grow, you'll learn what you can do and how early you can start some things or how late others. It all comes with practice. So far, I'd say your garden is looking great. I love that you have fencing around it to foil the critters. Good luck to you. Be sure to keep posting pictures. I love the pictures.

Here are some updated pictures!


So I'm a little bit obsessed about gardening. I decided to add more space to plant in, and cut up an old concrete form into 12 inch slices and filled them with store bought potting mix. I also put in a long porch planter (the grey one in the corner) to plant my sprouted store bought celery.




Ok, now for the baby pictures!

My baby daikon radishes!


Baby potatoes!


Baby Amish Snap peas!


Baby Russian Red Kale!


Baby broccoli!


A baby radish JUST emerging from the soil.


Baby cabbage.


Baby spinach! I don't know if this is real spinach or the New Zealand spinach I accidentally planted. I guess we'll find out!


Lots of little onions.


My bushy strawberries and garlic.


I have lots and lots of strawberry blossoms!


This is the side of my front porch. I bought a couple of self watering planters to plant morning glories in and have them climb up as a curtain for the porch. On the other side of the porch (where there is soil instead of driveway) I'm planting runner beans!


My very last daffodil! It's so crazy because my other daffodils faded out two weeks ago, but this one just bloomed yesterday! Ah well, I was a late bloomer too.


These are Red Robin tomatoes I planted WAY early under my grow lights. I plan on giving them to my mom and my MIL for mother's day. They're super dwarf determinate tomatoes that are supposed to only get 8-12 inches high. I planted them so early that these ones have blossoms! They're also relatively cold tolerant, and you can grow them in a windowsill all year long and get a winter harvest as well. So I figure it'll be a really fun gift for my moms.


Another shot of the Red Robins. They're really short but quite stocky. They're about six inches tall at the moment.

lookin' good.

I second that , looking good!

I am so jealous of your Tomatoes. Mine grown inside under lights have failed. I dont know why I am keeping them , They have not grown a millimeter in over two weeks.

Strawberries look lovely !

Looks like everything is coming along just fine. Nice looking garden.

thank you for sharing update pics with us!!

we really enjoy watching everyones gardens grow over the season

your veggies look great!

hugs

rose

Your garden looks so good! You've got to be so very organized. I hope I can keep it all that clear and protected.

It's time for another update! I actually took these pictures last weekend and I'm just now posting them, lol. I've been kind of busy... But I decided since it's so rainy today, I may as well sit down and do this while I have the time!


My raspberries. They recovered nicely from having their leaves frosted off this spring. They have buds now!



My Oregon Spring tomatoes, supposedly a very early determinate type.



My two 2x4 beds. The one in front is the strawberries, and the tall stuff in the other box is garlic. As you can see, both strawberries and garlic are HUGE.



Along with being huge, the strawberries have a TON of berries.



And they're early!



I planted my Super Sweet 100 and Brandywine tomatoes behind the garlic. I was afraid they wouldn't thrive there, but they're actually really taking off.



And look! Garlic scapes!



Here's a front view of the two 2x4 beds. The garlic is really tall. It's about waist high or more on me, and I'm not short.



In the back yard, here is one of my two tophat dwarf blueberry bushes in a (plastic) whiskey barrel. I thought they died in the late spring frosts we had, but they're really taking off.



These are my experiments! The plants on the ends are celery that I bought at the store, cut off the stalks and planted the base. They're doing amazingly well. The ones in the middle are heads of lettuce that I did the same thing with. The lettuce did better at first but are now dying



This is my Swiss chard. It's growing super slowly (those seedlings are a month old). I hope they make it.



These cuties are my Red Robin super dwarf tomatoes. They are full size right now! They stand about 10 inches high, and they have dozens of open flowers at the moment! I'm really excited to see them covered in berries. These plants are so amazingly sturdy. Regular tomatoes have some bend and give when you move the plant or the leaves around, but these ones are immovable. Which is good, because the pictures I've seen of them when they're fruiting show them literally covered in fruit.



Lookit! It's a baby summer squash



An overview of my garden from the back of it. It's really getting bushy and green.



Potatoes, peas lettuce and peppers are doing great.



I have some really nice radishes too!



I'm also starting to get some broccoli crowns!



These cuties are my Blue Jade corn! It's a really cool blue heirloom variety that is supposed to only grow 3 feet tall and is great for containers (or sfg ). The leaves of the plant have blue streaks in it! It's very pretty.



This is a bad shot, but these are my pole beans. Purple podded pole beans! The stems and leaf veins are purple.



My Egyptian walking onions are doing quite well. They have these little "seed" pods at the end of the stalks, but in actuality, those little pods contain a curled up stem that has a little seed pod at the end of it, lol. It's kind of weird. I just replanted these last fall, and since walking onions are biannual, those aren't topsets. I'm going to keep and eye on them and see what the little pods contain.



Here's a good shot of a pod!



And here are my daikon radishes! They're so big compared to my other radishes! They're practically taking over the tophat I put them in. Hopefully the carrots have some room to grow too.

Beautiful garden. Do you know what species your strawberries are. I'd love to grow some that grow so profusely! They should grow in Pennsylvania.

I have to be honest... I have no idea what my strawberries are, lol. I do have one small Ozark beauty in there (an everbearer), but the rest (June-bearers) are just strawberries in my book.

However, I don't think the specific variety is why I have so many berries this year. I think it's the very odd season we've had. We had really hot in early spring, then really cold in mid spring, then really hot in late spring. All of my berries, including my Ozark beauties, my wild strawberries, as well as my raspberries, are blooming profusely. I've noticed that wild raspberries and blackberries are also going nuts in our area!

Thanks for the quick reply. I am hoping to build a pyramid bed and plant some before too late in the fall. I want them to root well this year so they might produce next year. We had a similar spring here in PA and my blueberry bushes seem to be loaded with berries that should be ripe in the next 3 or 4 weeks. Just getting started with veggie beds, but doing well so far.