I finally planted all three of the main pots for the deck. I want to keep the deck mostly herbs, but there are a few veggies and flowers thrown in for color or due to lack of space in the garden.
Leftmost Pot: Mini Yellow Bell Pepper, Gypsy Marigold, Sweet Marjoram
Middle Pot: Purple Sage, Lavendar, Lemon Verbena
Rightmost Pot: Several Large Leaf Basil, Dianthus
Clockwise starting with the largest:
Catmint/Spearmint, Sweatleaf, Chives, Oregano from seed, Sage from seed, Oregano from last year
I had no idea vegetables could grow so quickly! Every time I go outside I am astounded by another growth spurt. The last two weeks I sowed many a seed and transplanted the rest of my indoor grown starts.
MAY 20
Transplanted into garden:
Tomatoes - Still need to decide on staking or caging... maybe some of both.
Peppers - Cubanelle, Hungarian hot wax, Hot Thai, and Mini Yellow bell. One of each into garden, still have a back-up of each inside in 4" pots.
Japanese Eggplant - May have started indoors too late, but planted into corner of the garden anyway, will try growing on trellis. Who knows.
Lemon Cucumber - from winter sown container. None of the babylon sprouted, so I sowed some seeds around the lemon cucumber. They are all probably too close together, so I may cut out a few once they are stronger. Again, will try to train to a trellis.
Pole Beans, Blue Lake - from winter sown and added more seeds as only had three sprouts.
MAY 21
Direct sowed more seeds:
Carrots - Cool purple ones. Garden soil is pretty rocky, so they may be small and deformed. I hope to plant a shorter variety into a container with better soil.
Spinach
Pak Choi
Buttercrunch lettuce
Cabbage
Amaranth - One last ditch attempt at direct sowing these guys. The winter sown and indoor sown that have survived are finally putting out decent sized true leaves. There may still be hope.
The Salad Area - Marigolds just added to hopefully deter pests
Bibb Lettuce
Buttercrunch Lettuce
Pak Choi - Harvested the first batch of leaves this week! Used raw as salad and it was okay, but not great. The leaves were a bit old as the plants were slow to grow indoors and then outside in the cold. I am hoping the next batch will be a little sweeter now that the weather is warming up. I plan on trying lightly steamed or stir fried.
Oregon Spring tomato
The first tomatillo bud!
Lemon Cucumber
Borage Blooming
About a week ago Jared and I took a trip about an hour south to One Green World, a nursery specializing in exotic and rare plants. We went for the kaffir lime tree, the leaves of which are used in our favorite thai soup. The tree is more than two feet tall and already has lime buds! I definitely didn't expect it to fruit this year.
We also came home with a male and female arctic beauty hardy kiwi. The fruit are the size of grapes and fuzz free, but definitely still taste like kiwi. Someone brought a bunch in to work last fall and I ate more than my share... yum. These are great because they live outside in the shade... which we have plenty of. We don't have to worry about bringing them inside in the winter (the kaffir lime tree is a little higher maintenance in that regard).
Rapidly growing veggies
Plants mom kindly dug up to share last fall
The indoor only cats took a tour of the overgrown grass
Once again, I have neglected to keep track of exact dates for transplanting and sowing seeds. When will I learn? However, this month I did take lots of pictures, so here is my best guess at the garden calendar based on the photos and my memory.
May 5
Transplanted winter sown veggies and plants:
Sunflower
Pak Choi
Bush Bean, Burgundy
Bush Bean, Roma II
Bibb Lettuce
Amaranth into pot on deck
Basil into pots on deck
Transplanted indoor sown:
Red sunflower
Oregon spring tomato x 1
Sage into small pots
Oregano into small pot
Transplanted store bought:
Dill
Cilantro
Basil, siam queen and large leaf italian
Marjoram
Rest of swiss chard into pots and replaced few in garden that wilted
Space hybrid spinach
Burgundy bush bean after transplant
Tomatillo hardening off
Potted swiss chard bright lights
The garden bed starting to show some growth
March had given me a glimmer of hope... maybe the last frost will be a month early this year! Then came April. Not just rain showers, but plenty of hail showers and a snow shower too! There was an almost two week stretch where nighttime temps would reach freezing every night. This led to a bit of a gardening slump. At the beginning of the month I finished up all of the winter sowing that I could do. Then came the bad weather, so I couldn't get out in the garden much. It was mostly a time of waiting.
APRIL 1
- Tried transplanting one Oregon Spring Tomato with frost protection... still died a few days later.
- Started hardening off all of the tomatoes, broccoli, cabbage, dill, and cilantro. This was also done too early since the weather turned ugly for the rest of the month.
- Winter sowed more amaranth (the direct sown have not yet germinated and the indoor sown have no true leaves yet).
APRIL 4
Amaranth outside finally sprouting! Later each and every one of these dies. =(
APRIL 6
Indoor sowed in peet pots:
Japenese egglpant - apparently it is too late, but I am going to try anyway.
Tomato, Double Rich and Sweet 100 - Timing looks pretty good, decent size by time I transplanted, but not leggy like the earlier ones. Was given free seeds for the hybrid, so don't really know what is going to grow.
Pepper, Cubanelle, hot thai, and hungarian hotwax - Good healthy looking plants, but small. In the future will start same time as the mini yellow bell.
Winter sowed lots of free seeds received from SASBE... only a few of them actually came up. The successes were:
Sweet William
Blue Sage
Lemon Mint
Garlic (from seed... don't know if it will make cloves or not)
Goatsbeard
APRIL 7
Direct sowed:
Space Hybrid Spinach - spinach performing well
Mangold WIterbi Chard - lots sprouted, then my dog walked on them and there are only two left. something keeps eating the leaf tips, so they are very slow to grow... still less than 1" tall.
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I stopped journaling at this point, so don't have the germination date or even direct sowing dates for a lot of the plants. Here are some pictures from the rest of the month.
Winter Sowing... can see sprouting Pak Choi, Broccoli, and Sunflowers
Shallots were brought inside when it started hailing
Perennial bed doesn't seem to be quite as upset by the freezing temperatures as the vegetables
A few veggies are standing their ground
I don't know what it is about this plant, but I am starting to wonder if I will see any of my starts mature into a plant this summer! I have sown it every way: indoors, winter sown, and direct sown.
Direct sowing is out the window for next year. It took close to a month for the amaranth to germinate (the first two weeks of which were great weather), then when it did come up, the germination rate was very low. About a week and a half later all but two shrivled up in some hot weather (even with a healthy watering that morning).
Winter sowing went okay, again they were slow to germinate, popping up a few weeks after the direct sown ones. Now they are staying small. We will have to see how they compare to the indoor sown ones later in the season.
So far my indoor sown ones look the best. They are by far the largest with one set of true leaves fully open and a second set peaking out. Both other methods of sowing are yet to show even a hint of true leaves. I just planted out one of my indoor sown seedlings after hardening it off for several days. So far it looks pretty good, other than being a little leggy.
As of yesterday there were two direct sown (the smallest), two winter sown (sturdy but small), and one indoor sown (much further along growth wise) in a row in the garden. This morning I went out to check on all the plants and water where needed. When I arrived at the amaranth I only saw two seedlings left. Both of the direct sown and one of the winter sown had been hewn off at the stem base! Thankfully I have a few more winter sown still sitting in their plastic conatiner and I have one more indoor still in its peet pot. I have not had any cutworms and did not find one when I dug down underneath the plants. Who knows what did it, but if it keeps up I will soon be calling it quits for the amaranth.
