Wordless Wednesday

Herbs, vegetables, and glorious sunshine

Yesterday was green, blue & bright yellow from dawn to dusk. (And if there were a few clouds, I didn't notice them.)  A perfect summer Sunday for crops to grow & gardeners to weed, water, inspect, repot and of course, view brilliant colour & light through the camera's lens.

Though most of the excitement & growth is in my community garden plot, I'll begin with the balcony's stars, all highly recommended for culinary, olfactory & aesthetic reasons:

Left pot: four varieties of thyme: 'Doone Valley', 'Golden Lemon', Tabor', Thymus fastinoi
Centre pot: 'Alma Paprika' Pepper
Right pot: Basil ('Red Rubin', 'Genovese' ), French Tarragon, Italian Oregano

Rosemary officinalis 'Blue Spire'

'Sea of Red' Lettuce - for those of us who eat with our eyes as well as our mouths

Now, on to Plot 6A, which totally astounds me when I visit it daily. I did not know plants could grow this quickly. Because light is limited on my balcony, I'm used to a much, much slower growth rate.

Front row, left to right: chard, spinach, cucumber, eggplant, tomato
Middle row, left to right: chard, tomato, beets, eggplant, pepper, tomato
Back row, left to right: peas, beans, carrots, beets, eggplant, tomato

In a future post, I'll describe the specific vegetable varieties as well as my planting strategy & design. I've held off because my approach has been evolving to what is now a "mash-up" of square-foot gardening & crop rotation following Mark Diacono’s sequence outlined in Veg Patch: River Cottage Handbook No. 4 (i.e., legumes -> brassicas -> roots & onions -> potatoes/Solanaceae).

Community garden update

Even though spring skipped it's turn and so far, the summer sun has been a shy friend if not a cool stranger, the crops are growing. Last Saturday evening, a few were glowing:

Tomato, 'Glacier'

Pepper, 'Alma Paprika'

Eggplant, 'Rosa Bianca'

Beet, 'Golden'

Beets, 'Jewel-Toned Blend'

Chard, 'Italian Silver Rib' & Spinach, 'Catalina'

I'm dying to share stories with you, but I must spend today's limited after-work time IN the garden. When I've more time to write, I'll tell you about kite string and square foot gardening, green pea risotto dreams, and wireworm woes.

Pea, 'Little Marvel'

Blooming in the park

"The lovely flowers
embarrass me.
They make me regret
I am not a bee..."
— Emily Dickinson

Wordless Wednesday