Out with the old, in with the new

We continue to work on clearing out the raised beds and putting in fall plantings. Of our summer crops, the only ones still producing are eggplant and basil. I've mostly been planting broccoli transplants in these beds, with petunias planted around the perimeter.

The okra plants have stopped producing, so I dug them out this week and collected the dried pods. If you like okra and are looking for something that will thrive in the summer heat, it's a good choice. Personally, I don't care for okra unless it is unhealthily fried. I don't like either the taste or its slimy texture. This may have something to do with one summer in grad school when I survived on a diet of okra and tomatoes raided from my mother's freezer. I think the plants, which are in the hibiscus family, are pretty, so I planted a few this year anyway. We gave away some, and I thought I might use the dried pods in a Thanksgiving arrangement, but I don't think that will work. They lose their beautiful red color when dried, and the pods split open, scattering the tiny black seeds everywhere. As I collected the pods, I couldn't help but think of the story of the prodigal son who wound up living in a pigpen and was so hungry he longed to eat the husks fed to the pigs. I wondered if those husks were okra.

I've been trying to take the garden overview picture at the top of each blog post from the same location and angle each time, in order to show how the garden changes through the year. The shadows are lengthening now, so it's hard to get a clear picture, but I think I'll stick with that plan. If you want to see some better pictures, Facebook reminded me that one year ago, the Phoenix Home and Garden article on our Arizona Backyard Eden came out,  Here's a link to my Facebook album containing screen shots of the article, along with additional pictures that were only available in the digital edition.

Fall planting

October marks the height of one of our main planting seasons in the low desert. You can plant almost any cool-season crop now, but I tend to stick to the things I like best- broccoli, edible-pod peas, and salad greens. I was in Alabama visiting family the past couple of weeks, and came back to find squash and melon vines on their way out. This year's monsoon planting results were disappointing: we got about four unremarkable honeydew, no squash, and only one rather pathetic-looking bean plant survived. There's lots of okra, but I don't  particularly like okra unless it is fried, so I'm letting a lot of the pods dry up and go to seed. I think it's an attractive plant.

I spent some time this weekend clearing out declining plants and attempting to remove as many Bermuda grass roots and stolons as possible from the small bed off our side patio. Then I went in search of petunia and broccoli transplants. I didn't find any regular broccoli, but got an eight-pack of Romanesco broccoli, which is very interesting-looking and tastes more like cauliflower than broccoli.
Here's a look at part of the finished bed:

The salad greens and sugar snap peas I planted in the bed by the lemon tree a couple of weeks ago are coming up thinly. I'll need to replant, but that will probably be helpful in terms of staggering the harvest. This year, I'll also try to be more aggressive about pulling up nasturtiums and hollyhocks which seem to particularly love this area, and self-seed prolifically.

Edible-pod peas

Lettuce

Monsoon plantings

I haven't posted for a while because in general I consider summer gardening in Arizona to be roughly equivalent to winter gardening in more temperate locations: the weather is not conducive to growing much of anything, and it's unpleasant to be outside for long. However, although it still regularly tops 100 degrees in September, the month marks the beginning of fall planting season.

We actually have three planting seasons here: spring, monsoon, and fall. I planted melons, beans, squash, and okra in midsummer. The beans never came up and the squash is struggling, but the melons and okra are doing very well. The basil that I planted this spring, along with some volunteers I didn't plant, is thriving. I only planted one Japanese eggplant this year because I still have eggplant from last year's bumper crop in the freezer, and I have several volunteer Black Beauty plants as well. They haven't produced much yet, but I expect them to take off later this month.

I actually began my fall planting about a week ago with a row of bush beans, and saw the first plant emerge from the soil today. I'll begin planting peas soon. My plan this year for the peas and beans is to space out the plantings a week or so apart. That works well to space out the harvests, and is also easier on me because it's still very hot, and I don't tolerate heat very well. About fifteen minutes at a time in the summer is about all I can handle!

Here's a link to the vegetable planting calendar for the low desert, and here's a link to a basil pesto recipe I made in our Vitamix. I used pecans instead of pine nuts, and it turned out pretty tasty.

Honeydew melon

Bush beans- planted about a week ago

Basil

Armenian cucumber (really a melon, but tastes like cucumber)

Red okra

Ten o'clock and 102 degrees

June 4, 2016

We knew our unusually long and cool spring was too good to last. Summer's here, and with a vengeance. Yesterday our backyard thermometer sensor, which is in the shade in a protected area on our back porch, hit 109 degrees. I spent the afternoon moving around the hose to provide additional water to our newest trees. Other than trying to keep things alive and harvest what's already set fruit, I mostly abandon gardening in summer and let zinnias take over. They are pretty and don't mind the heat.

Protecting peaches

Our Mid-Pride tree is full of nearly-ripe peaches. We neglected to thin this one as much as we did for the Desert Gold tree, but the peaches are actually larger. Go figure. This year, we're trying something new:using tulle bags (the kind used for wedding favors)  in an attempt to protect the ripening peaches from the birds. This was a suggestion from someone in a gardening Facebook group.which I've found to be very helpful.

Plumeria

There are still a few blooms on this yellow plumeria, which lives in a large pot on our side patio and is partially shaded by a pergola. The other one hasn't bloomed yet, and may not. These two are the only survivors of an unexpected early frost a few years ago that arrived while we were out of town and unable to move them into the garage as we usually do when there are frost warnings.

Petunias and sweet potatoes

Portulaca and sweet potatoes

I put together a second stacked-pot planter on the other side of the patio doors, this time using heat-loving portulaca rather than petunias. Sweet potatoes also love the heat, and are easy to propagate. I just use cuttings taken from vines, strip off the bottom couple of leaves, and stick the stem in the soil. As long as the soil is kept moist, they have no trouble rooting and taking off on their own. Mike created a drip irrigation system for them by drilling holes in each pot, and putting a circle of drip tubing in the planting area of each one.

Yard long beans and a volunteer tomato

Zinnias

Transitioning from spring into summer

We've been away for a little more than a week, and came back to find the roses beginning their second round of blooms, larkspur and bachelor's button almost completely finished blooming, a few more hollyhocks showing off, and a couple of giant zucchinis. One of my newest projects, a tiered planter made by stacking progressively smaller pots inside each other, has really filled out. We're also beginning to get tomatoes in earnest and a few yellow squash. There were actually a few peaches left on the earliest-fruiting tree that hadn't been eaten by birds, too. Santa Rosa plums are beginning to turn color, along with blackberries, and peaches on our later-fruiting tree should ripen within a couple of weeks.

Zucchini, yellow squash, peaches, and tomatoes

Tiered planter with petunias and sweet potato vines

We have enjoyed an unusually long and cool spring this year. I am not looking forward to 100+ degree days for the next several months!

Surprise, surprise, surprise!

One of the many benefits of chop-and-drop gardening is being surprised by volunteers I didn't plant. There are tomatoes, larkspur, nasturtiums, and hollyhocks everywhere, but here are some of our most recent gardening surprises:

Oregano

Broccoli that came up after I cut it to the ground

I planted the basil, not the squash.

Eggplant that came up between pavestones

Carrot in its second year, I think.

Chop, drop, and grow

April 27, 2016

One of my favorite permaculture gardening techniques is "chop and drop". Instead of digging spent plants out by the roots, cut them off at ground level. Leave the roots to compost in place, and chop up the leaves and stems and drop them wherever you like.

This has several advantages, not the least of which is I am a rather lazy gardener and it doesn't take a lot of time or effort. It doesn't disturb the layers of beneficial microbes, bugs, and worms; you're less likely to damage the roots of desirable plants; it recycles nutrients back into the soil so that less fertilizer is needed; and it provides a cooling, moisture-conserving barrier that is very helpful in our summer heat.

Sometimes I chop-and-drop in place, but often I take plants I've allowed to go to seed from one place, and chop and drop them somewhere else in the garden. For example, here is some assorted lettuces that I allowed to go to seed...

Lettuce and larkspur

 ....and here is one of the places I decided to chop-and-drop them, at the edge of the side patio. I think that would be a nice place to find lettuce growing once it cools off in the fall.

Chopped-and-dropped lettuce

Part of the fun of gardening for me is finding surprises, and letting things go to seed, followed by chopping, dropping, and scattering usually creates the conditions for many future surprises. Rather like the proverbial box of chocolates, you never know what you're going to get.

Today's harvest: tomatoes, zucchini, beans

Protecting blackberries, protecting ourselves

We originally planted one blackberry bush in a raised bed next to our side patio, but realized later that wasn't the right place for it. It was too small a spot for both fully grown rose and blackberry bushes. In addition, it necessitated running a bloody gauntlet first through rose bushes to get to the blackberries, and then through the blackberry bush to pick asparagus. Blackberries spread like crazy, and we found ourselves transplanting not one, but several plants to different locations in the yard. It particularly seems to like this spot next to the block wall in the northwest corner, near a drainage swale. It usually flowers in April and starts setting fruit, which ought to mature in May and early June. However, we were disappointed to find that the fruit dried up before fully ripening. Last year, we learned from gardeners in a Facebook group that blackberries do best when shaded from direct sun, so Mike engineered a shadescreen on a PVS pipe frame and we were rewarded with several dozen tasty berries. This bush has outgrown that particular design, so this year we used the frame from one of our pop-up canopies and put shade screen over the top instead of its cloth cover. This is 30% shade screen from Arizona Bag Company, instead of the denser Home Depot shade screen we used last year, so we will observe carefully and put a second layer on if it appears to be needed. I like the look of this shadescreen better as it's less noticeable.

We're also tying bits of colored yard around the fruiting canes (another great suggestion from Facebook group members!) in order to more easily identify the fruiting canes which should be removed after they've finished their job.

It's a lot less dangerous to pick them here, and hopefully we will be able to enjoy lots of blackberries this year!

And the race is on...

April 19, 2016

Apricots and peaches are getting close to ripening. Who will get them first, us or the birds?

Apricots

Peaches

Looks like the birds beat us to this one. We picked the remaining apricots today and will let them finish ripening indoors, away from bird beaks!

We may have eaten a few while they were ripening on the counter.

New beginnings

April 12, 2016

It's always fun to wander around the garden and look to see what I notice today that I didn't notice yesterday. Sometimes it's something new, and sometimes it's seeing the changes in things that were already growing. Here are some of today's observations:

First artichoke of the season

First zucchini of the season

Baby green beans

Figs are beginning to ripen

Blackberries are setting fruit

Tomatoes are everywhere!

Apricots

Almonds

Peaches

Plums