// Summary of the Week //
Sun: present at times
Naked child sessions: one
Seeds planted: peas, chard, lettuces
Seed not planted b/c I forgot to buy them: kale (doh!)
Spotted: raspberry shoots, asparagus tips
Harvested: some thyme and rosemary
Eaten: all the kumquats (for now)
Pruned: big apple tree (branches used for pea trellis)
Broken: orange watering can (note to garden assistant: it is not a "mallet")
Ordered: black currant, honeybush (see last photo!)
// Visuals //
Honey Bush! I've never seen one before, so I had to have it :)
Posts
I have a question about your raised beds. Is there an advantage to having them built so high? Besides not having to bend over? I'm curious because I have this little space out back and I tried a raised bed before (about 1ft.) and it didn't drain very well.
ReplyDeleteI love all the potential in that space. I also love kumquats. I should get another tree. I had one when I lived up north because they weather the frost. The blossoms are my scent of any citrus tree.
Hi Desi, most of our beds are about knee- or mid-thigh-height, which I think is kind of standard. What I think you see in these photos is one very high bed that Toby built last summer after I dug out a huge pile of dirt to make way for our gravel "courtyard" (sounds grand; it's where the picnic table is). Anyway, there was a ton of extra soil, and I wanted a new bed for that corner, so we made it super tall (hip-high, maybe higher) to accommodate all that soil (+ amendments; our soil is rather clay). It was basically to avoid paying to have the dirt hauled away. Also, it's easy to work in while standing. For most of the beds, a knee- or thigh-high bed will give plenty of room for long-rooted veggies (carrots, kale) to make deep roots. A 1-ft-deep bed would be fine for lettuces and other shallow-rooted crops. As for drainage, maybe you just needed more compost or the like dug in?
ReplyDeleteCan't wait to sniff some kumquat blossoms. All the fruit we already ate came on the bush from the store, so we'll have to hope and pray it'll be happy enough to bloom again. I have it in the best possible spot, so there's hope!
Thanks. It would be great if they bloomed again. My Meyer Lemon tree is finally out of a funk that I have been helping it fight over the last couple of years. We get zero sunlight in our back area over the winter because theres a tall condo complex right behind us and as the axis tilts we are in cold darkness. I wish it was that way in the summer and not in the winter, but there it is all the same. Anyway that dark/cold lead to mold. I'm so glad my tree has comeback fighting. I did wipe every leaf for the past two years, but it's worth it;)
Deletei read this the other day and am just now having a minute to comment! (sigh)
ReplyDeletei am SO IMPRESSED by your skills in the soil, friend.
seriously, i aspire to have a garden (along with the know-how you've got) like this. some day!!
xx