August garden update
It’s finally gotten warm and sunny here in Vancouver, BC. That means good times are coming for my garden, right? Well let’s see…!
First, the balcony plants!
The Beans – … Seriously?
After the toxic mushroom incident, I changed out much of the soil in the bean planter. As a result, the beans have gotten taller and more bean-like. A few flowers bloomed. And then… one bean. Yep. One lousy bean. “Fruitful and high-yielding varietal” my ass.
The Tomatoes – Success! *happy dance*
In July, I reported the growth of one lovely baby tomato. A month later? We have over 30 little tumbler tomatoes growing on our two plants! In fact, not only do we have little fruits, we have HARVESTED little fruits. Indeed, we have harvested… TWO tomatoes! I’m super excited (can you tell?). I’ve never had this many tomatoes grow, EVER. I am a little concerned about the lack of foliage on the plants. They don’t seem to be as leafy as I would expect and many buds withered without fruiting, but perhaps that is due to the lack of direct sunlight.
The Oregano and Thyme – Still an epic success!
Both herbs are still growing happily and beautifully together. I’ve had to harvest in quite a bit actually, and I’m not sure what to do with it all. I’ve never attempted to dry herbs, but this year might be the first. My oregano has even started flowering. Any ideas? Hit me up for fresh herbs!
The Watercress – Hmmmmm….
The watercress seems to have died down a bit. I am not sure if it has caught a disease or if the earlier growth used up too many nutrients. It’s still producing, but not nearly as much as before. The leaves are not growing as large and many turn brown before maturing. It is a bit puzzling.
And, readers might remember that Brian and I started a community garden plot back in July. Well, so far, no one has stolen any of our veggies (as far as I know…) and, overall, the garden is growing quite well.
More tomatoes! – Success!
Yes, we have three more tomato plants growing. They were gifts from the UBC Farm, given out to all the community gardeners. I was a bit skeptical when we received them. The plants were scraggly and wilting. But a bit of dirt, some string and some wooden stakes, a bit of sun and voila! Beautiful, bushy tomato plants. These varietals produce a larger fruit than tumblers, so I’m excited to see what we get. There are already 4 tomatoes growing!
Lettuce, Butter Lettuce, and … Greens
We got 2 lettuce plants, 2 butter lettuce plants and 2 plants of unknown type. Some kind of Asian choy. Anyhow, they’re all doing GREAT. The leaves are getting big and they should be ready for a first harvest in a few weeks. We scattered some egg shells around them to try to prevent slug attacks, but judging from the holes being made in my greens, something is still eating my plants. I may have to bring out CF’s Bug and Cat Spray. We’ve harvested a small bundle of leaves from the lettuces and have already made two salads. Yum!
Zucchinis – Growing, growing, growing…
Our garden plot has FOUR zucchini plants, which in retrospect may be too many for this size of planter. They are growing well, with lots of leaves and new shoots coming up but no sign of squash yet. I’m a little concerned for one of the plants – I dug it out and moved it a bit further away from the other plant the other week and it’s looked a bit wilted since then. Hopefully I didn’t mangle the roots while shifting it over.
Green onion and ginger – Meh!
We’re also growing ginger and some green onion. Plants like garlic, ginger and green onion are good at keeping away certain bugs, so it’s nice to grow them here and there. Green onion is interesting, as it will seem to die off before sprouting new shoots. My parents grow green onion every year, and without fail, you will lose all the shoots that originally came with the plant before the plants starts to mature to a point where it can be harvested. So I’m being patient. Plus I hate onions. Bleh! I love ginger though, so I’m excited to plant it. However, it’s unlikely that we would be able to harvest any rhizomes until next year. The rhizome that I planted has sprouted, so with any luck, the ginger will have some time to grow before the end of the season.
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So that’s that! Brian and I have already saved a lot of money with our garden and it looks like we will save a lot more before the season is over. Things are going well and I suspect that when the end of August rolls around, I’ll have a lot more news to report!
The garden is looking great CF! I can’t wait to be able to do a balcony garden next year.
Thanks!! I’m really happy with how it turned out. Good luck with your balcony garden
It looks like you have a pretty awesome garden – I wish we could have one like that! We planted tomatoes on our deck and they didn’t do so well. we got maybe 2 tomatoes, and some cherry tomatoes.
I’ve had bad luck with tomatoes before as well. Maybe experiment with the fertilizer and soil that you use? We use coffee grounds and some general purpose plant food in a potting soil mix.
Wow looks great! This is something that we plan on starting next year.
Thanks! Good luck! What are you planning on growing?
Congrats – love to see stories like this (any bit helps on the grocery bill).
We love basil but have been unsuccessful yielding a large amount this summer. May have to forage at my nonna’s house in Ontario (her garden is double the size of our condo!
I have been a royal failure at growing basil. It’s always wilted almost instantly.
No homemeade pesto for me…
I guess a garden really is a learning process. Each plant would probably like different conditions and then some need a season to really develop. The savings and fresh produce would be pretty awesome though.
For the beans they probably just need more direct sunlight. I know my mom got a ton of beans from her brand new garden this year, but it gets a lot of sunlight.
That’s true. I started a new bean plant from seed and I have it sitting in a raised pot. It seems healthier than the other plants so far, though it’s hard to tell if it’s due to the sun or the lack of competition from mushrooms and sweet pea plants.
Looks awesome – as for the herbs, you can also purée them in a blender with some water and freeze them in little ice cubes to use later instead of drying them. It’s pretty close to having fresh herbs out of season. I’ve new done it with oregano or thyme, but it definitely works with basil and mint.
That’s a great idea! I have done that before with spinach but I hadn’t thought of doing it for herbs. Do you blanch the herbs or just freeze them fresh?
I had a tomato plant similar to yours, mine grew to about 7 feet high and produced so many tomatoes that I had to give them away by the pounds. I’m not sure how that all happened, but I did plant it in the dirt vs. a pot. I think that makes a huge difference.
Wow! That’s incredible. I hope we get a yield like that. I went to see it this weekend and it’s looking pretty good. Not quite 7ft tall though
That is one amazing looking garden. I applaud you as I try to keep my one house plant alive unsuccessfully.
You can do it!!!!
That is a really nice return, actually.. Congrats. Our garden has been a total fail this summer, as it just couldn’t handle the relentless heat.
Oooo that’s tough. It’s been a good summer in Vancouver so far. We’ve had a good amount of sun and heat, but it hasn’t been scorching or overly wet.