How do our gardens grow?

[Moutaineer]

It's my first summer in my new home, and I've spent a significant proportion of it bent double, digging in the dirt. We inherited a flat acre corner lot of neglected largely nothingness, interspersed with weeds.

We put in a ton of trees and a fence to start with, which looks so much better.

I won the Battle Of The Russian Sage... but it took several hours with a backhoe in the end to get most of it out, followed by two days of backbreaking digging to vanquish most of the roots. I refilled the beds, which are either side of the front path, with good soil and compost (had a huge load delivered from the barn) and have planted them with a delightfully vulgar array of colorful perennials. I was doing some deadheading out there earlier surrounded by happy hummingbirds.

I put in some raised beds and a rose arbor, and my roses have put their feet down and taken off pretty well, though I am suspicious I may have thrips, which will have to be dealt with, but I dont want to kill the useful pollinators in the process, so I'm letting the ant population run rampant in the hope that they will do them in.

My veg and herb gardens have been a joy. Peas and chard and salad greens, radishes and the first carrots and lots of fresh herbs so far. I picked the first Zucchini today and the yellow squash are hot on their heels. And the beans started blooming this week. I have my first red tomato, and my one sad looking pepper plant seems to be making the effort too.

My work in progress is a rather large shade bed with 4 enormous half dead willow shrubs and a very large silver birch tree which has spread auckers far and wide
. It's got black much and old landscape fabric, with bindweed abounding beneath. I think it will keep me occupied for the foreseeable future!

[Canyon]

Wow, you have been busy! But it sounds like the back-breaking work has been worth it! Are you now at a lower elevation than before? I'd love to see pictures of your "delightfully vulgar array of colorful perennials" and other projects.

I lived at 9,000 feet for a while and enjoyed being able to have salad greens all summer. I did try to grow sweet corn once; it grew to the size of those little tiny ears you put in stir fry!

I live at 4,600 feet now. The garden is doing great. We sold our old trusty Troy rototiller because it was just too dang heavy for either of to use easily and got an electric tiller which has been very useful. I've had a few tomatoes, green peppers, green chiles, lots of basil and zucchini. My rows of sunflowers are blooming their hearts out, pumpkins are sprawling all over. I even am managing to stay ahead of the weeds!

[Moutaineer]

Canyon, we've moved from 7000 feet down to 5600, so very different growing conditions--well, no growing conditions prior as no soil and no water and lots of hungry critters, to fertile soil and irrigation water for which we own plentiful rights, (and even though we are in the dry and water-poor high desert southwest, this is a "use it or lose it" State as far as water rights go, so if you've got it, you use it!) I'm still planting largely "deer resistant" though, except for the roses.

The front path plants are still a bit small and uniform-looking as they've only been in for about 3 weeks. I'm aiming for a more cottage-garden look eventually when everything grows up and into it's neighbors--I also want to add some iris this fall, and some Lady's Mantle in the Spring, but this is what I have so far:

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Lots of yellows and blues and reds, and white daisies, and some red standard roses that look like they are out of "Snow White"

These are my raised beds and arbor at the back of the house--the big trees are along the creek behind us.

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[StraightForward]

Wow, you've gotten a lot done in a short amount of time. It looks great!

My native garden has become kind of overrun and being grounded, I did a little more maintenance that in past years, then got busy with my new job and just stopped and left a bit of a mess. There will be a major cleanup happening in the fall and some new rock mulch going down. The fight with bindweed is never ending.

The veggie garden is getting more of the benefit of my being home. However, we're having a terrible tomato year and I don't know why. Luckily I planted 22 plants, so I'm bound to get a decent harvest eventually. The eggplants and some of the peppers are following suit and not producing much. However, I do have the fridge stuffed with cauliflower, and got some nice broccoli and cabbage as well. This has has also been my best year so far for raspberries, and I have a few quarts in the freezer for future smoothies. Of course we are drowning in summer squash and the novelty of zucchini noodles has already worn off. My fig tree benefited from the mild winter and didn't die back all the way, so I'm hoping for a good fig harvest this year.

Right now I have some tiny seedlings started in hopes of a fall crop of broccoli and cabbage. We'll see; fall crops are very weather dependent here, and it's kind of tricky to get the plants to the right stage so they can produce without bolting in the heat.

[Canyon]

Moutaineer - very pretty! Your front walk will be really stunning once all those plants fill in. And I love how your arbor frames the building in the background.

Ugh, bindweed. The more I pull it out, the more it comes back with a vengeance! I've given up and spray it with glysophate/2,4D when it is little. I did try biocontrol with these mite a few years ago, but our land is under sprinklers, and that apparently prevents them from working well.
https://www.colorado.gov/pacific/agcons ... biocontrol

[Moutaineer]

SF, it's so interesting how your climate and growing season is so different from ours when you consider how close we are. I've only just started picking squash...

We went for a walk round the neighborhood this morning. My tomato plants are not up to the luxuriance of those of some pf my neighbors, for sure. I'm betting they have greenhouses to get an earlier start (which is a wish list item around here ) I had one almost ripe tomato last week.. Went out to ceremonially pick it for lunch on Thursday and it was gone! Harrumph! I have now put up defenses against whatever it might have been that swiped it.

[StraightForward]

Moutaineer, we are definitely in the intermountain banana belt here in Boise. I have okra.

Here is a lineup of today's pickings. I can't figure out what the deal is with the lack of tomatoes. And the ones I have are tiny.

[Moutaineer]

Wow... that's impressive!

[piedmontfields]

Love the garden shots! Very nice output, SF, even with small tomatoes. M., your new garden layout looks awesome! I had to laugh at fighting back Russian Sage, as I actually I have to baby that plant a bit where I live.

Here are some views of the productive garden in our very different from your location (wet, humid, hot, and sometimes very dry mid-south).

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[Moutaineer]

Fabulous, Piedmont!

Something stole my first ripening tomato... wah! I now have a cage over the tomato.bed.

[piedmontfields]

You all would laugh at our "deer fence" around the main veg garden. It is just a few strands of electric fencing, about four feet high (any deer could jump it). We bait it in spring with peanut butter to "train our deer" to stay away from it. Occasionally we reconfigure it to make it scary and new. It is very common to see them grazing around the outside of the garden where there are lots of nice grasses and forbs.

If we lived in town, we would need a 15+ foot solid fence, or better, a human sized cage for secure growing. That works well for keeping all creatures out!