We are still playing catch up here in Wilton with getting moved in. We have more stuff than space sometimes. But it is going slowly but steadily as we find better organization and space for our detritus of life. Dave and Matt have been trying to get my garden set up and it is looking really nice. I have six 8 x 4’ Birdie beds in the front for seasonal veggies, and one 2 x 10’ bed right in front of the craft room for herbs. I have a second tub on the back porch for those herbs that don’t relish blazing sun. Dave has been filling them shovel by shovel with the dirt excavated for the septic tank (we have clean dirt on the property) and Matt has been working on the berries in the permanent garden in the back. Feels like spring is coming! Now I need to find time to start planting the tomato and pepper seeds!
Many of the plants in the permanent garden, that we started last summer, are going to town. The blueberries are flowering like mad. I don’t see a lot set yet but I am starting to see the native bees around so that should happen soon. The huckleberries look very good with a lot of new growth and starting to grow buds. Matt got the raspberries up on the trellis so I (and Dave if I’m honest) can start pulling out any rooters trying to escape. The blackberry bushes are so different from each other. One is flowering and growing like mad, one is barely hanging on and two are there but growing slowly. Matt started working on a trellis for them also. He got the lowest wires up today. The boysenberry is so incredibly flat but with 10’+ long branches! Up on the trellis for it also! One artichoke is big and bushy while the smaller one is producing more fruit. They picked the first two last week. The three kiwi are showing leaves and should grow some long vines this year. Right now they are less than one foot tall; however I have read they can grow 20’ vines every year! They change every day. We also cut back the grapes but we may have been late for that since those vines had started to leaf out. We shall see.I may try to get a small amount of strawberries going still but the ground needs a lot of work to level the ground out again this year. Maybe just enough that I can hand water them??
The citrus in the orchard are still producing but the mandarins are almost all picked. The lemons are still quite firm but I might pick one just to see. It is still producing buds. The trees that produced last year didn’t do much this year so it looks like maybe half produce each year. That will work. Looks like we aren’t planting any more fruit trees this year since everyone is so overbooked with getting what we have under control. I really lost control of the weeds when my knee went bust last summer.
The bins on the front of the driveway are just about done with the “winter” crops I attempted this year. The bugs truly enjoyed my plants (Boo). But the onions and garlic are doing great and the greens that survived are looking good. But we are hitting 80F degrees everyday this week so they will probably bolt. I’m looking forward to winter crops in the bins in front of the house next winter!
So mic looking forward to having a better garden than last year. That was a learning year and got sooo out of control. We had good production though. Less craziness this year. The planning has begun!