Summer Starts Out Just Right!

Can't wait to see some red!

This Summer has started off drastically different than last year. 2 1/2 weeks of rain in May - so much it caused a tropical storm and a 2nd one before June first (the official start to "hurricane season")! But the garden has been loving it. Enough heat, enough sun and plenty of rain. The tomatoes are popping like popcorn. We have at least 50 on 4 plants!
....Really need to get the rest in the ground!

The herbs are flourishing. Lemon basil in your salad —a must try! Fresh cilantro in your homemade Guacamole —yum!

Spearmint — light sugar, BEST mojito! Oh we need a lime tree!! I was just told peppermint make s great mojito. Haven't tried it yet but we will.

Lemon Basil

What have we eaten 2 tomatoes and Swiss chard. It was my first experience with Swiss chard. Just saute in olive oil and it's a bold and flavorful green.

A huge pepper, growing outside - a first for us! We're building a fabulous, homegrown salad! The cucumbers are flowering too. The beans are starting to climb. We're all in!

4 small blueberry bushes are growing. They are too small for a large yield and the birds are beating us to them. Next year nets on all the fruit trees!

2 Peppers being held up by a beer bottle!
Also tricks slugs, they get drunk and die!

What do you need to know so you can keep your garden organic. Well, you're gonna need nets and cages to keep birds and critters out. Not such a major inconvenience for the knowledge that your garden remains organic. Here, in the south we have tobacco horn worms (see last years posts for more info). Here's the organic scoop! BT is Bacillus thuringiensis. It is a bacteria that is harmless to us and all little critters EXCEPT caterpillars. Hurrah! You sprinkle the white powder over the plants, the caterpillars eat the it, die...so no eggs. If you see tiny bright green spheres those are the eggs. Paul like to crush them. Not sure I can keep the squeamishness away but hey I'll get rid of them!

Next problem the south has developed. The horrid kudzu plant has brought it's beetles from China. They are devouring soy (yuck, bad protein anyway) and peanuts (uh-oh). They are moving north and have made their first appearance in NC. They are attracted to fig trees! So we're not happy. Organic solution a mixture of different mint oils sprayed on the tree has made the beetles disappear. Hopefully this will be al we need to do but it is too son to tell. I'll keep you posted.

So I mentioned the Edible Forest we are growing. Here's what you need to know. Everything is edible. ....but you could figure that out. Plant the tallest trees in the back, moving forward by lessening height, of course. This way no tree gets caught in the shade, limiting growth and production. Eventually our mulberries will be the tallest trees and the base will be the vertical climb for beans. Each tree will be surrounded by a fruit or vegetable that needs some vertical help so it doesn't crawl every which way in your yard. It is the best use of space and sun. It will look pretty too! The mulberries have grown a foot since last year so we are well on our way. Patience is needed as we've just begun but it has already been worth it!  How does your organic garden grow? Have questions? Let us know!

Beautiful Heirloom Tomatoes on the year old plant from the indoor experiment!
(more in previous posts)

Organic Gardening Re-boot!

LAST SUMMERS BUST!

Paul and I made a commitment to blog last year and boy did we drop the ball!! Let's start over. Last year I was going to share our organic gardening experience— It was a BUST!! Record temperatures starting in May and lasting through October. Usually it is just July and August that are upper 90ties but not 2011– Tough summer! Even with watering our plants and keeping them lush we only had a dozen or so cucumbers and that was it! (we did have plenty of figs). Did you know tomatoes self-pollinate?  If it is too hot the male parts are too sticky and don't fertilize the female parts so no baby tomatoes.

Out SUCCESSFUL Indoor Experiment!

Then fall came and we saw a flower on out pepper plant in October. Crazy! I also had an indoor experiment going on in our sun porch. We had a heirloom tomato plant and a bell pepper plant. IN October the indoor pepper plant started flowering too. As slow as they grew, we ended up with FIVE delicious, organic, homegrown peppers in March. A year after the plant was started from seed! The tomato plant kept growing and flowering and growing an flowering. I had it all rigged up with strings across the room. I cut back non-flowering sections of plant. We ran a heater to keep it just warm enough on cold nights —again for sake of our experiment. It only produced ity-bity tomatoes. Tasted perfect but it's not a cherry tomato plant! I want that giant slicing tomato! Paul kept telling me the windows have UV coating and the proper sunlight isn't getting through. I told him to leave my experiment alone. It would warm up son enough. And it did!! Last month Paul dragged the container outside. Slowly but surely the yellow leaves started turning green. In the glorious sunlight the leaves ALL turned to a dark rich green, flowering and a few baby tomatoes!

We also made some drastic changes to our backyard this winter. We cut down three 15 yr old trees so we could plant our edible forest (more to come on this). The weather has been beautiful. So much so that we are getting in a crop of Swiss chard, spinach and arugula before the temperatures rise. We can plant another crop come fall. We've been enjoying our own strawberries while waiting for the blueberries and mulberries to ripen. The Figs are starting and the raspberry plants are multiplying. We have loquat trees, pomegranate, plum and apple too. We even have kiwis! We shall see how everything does. Our veggies are growing too. Bell peppers and tomatoes, of several varieties, are growing strong. Carrots, green beans, cucumbers, zucchini and herbs are growing strong. We're hoping for great things this summer. Follow along!

Last years yard with Fig Tree

This years yard. Same Fig Tree...filling itself in!