Our current place is 100% livestock fenced, so no, no deer here At previous places, yes, and you need to buy plants they’re less likely to bother. In my experience lilies and tulips are right out, but daffodils, hollyhocks, chrysanthemums, peonies, coneflower, and bee balm do fine. Geranium and iris is marginal. They don’t like anything in the mint family, either, which produces a lot of lovely flowers.
News from my garden: my Juliet tomato seeds are sprouting, and my oriental poppy seeds. I’m going to have scads of nearly-free perennial poppies!
And this weekend, my mom reminded me that an old family friend who lives only a mile or two away from the new place is a Master Gardener. He has offered to give me advice, and pretty much whatever I want from his garden. Because he’s awesome like that.
No idea what he might know about fruit trees. And I haven’t been to his place in a long time, but I remember the huge, waist-high bushes of rosemary and lavender that were there the last time!
Now I jus need to figure out what to cook for him as a thank you.
The odds of harvesting figs from in-ground plants in zones 5-6 are not great. The plants (assuming the variety is “Chicago Hardy”) are likely to die back to the ground each winter and then resprout in spring, which makes for decorative foliage but not much chance of fruit.
I just hauled about a dozen potted/tubbed figs out of the unheated garage where they spent the winter. Some varieties (especially “Petite Negra”) will produce substantial amounts of fruit over the growing season when kept in a sunny location.
In a protected spot and with careful tree wrapping (like the Italians did where I grew up), you might get in-ground figs to survive well in the ground and fruit regularly.
Got my big order of bare-root plants yesterday. The Siberian iris and aquilegia roots were FABULOUS. The hardy geranium and astrantia not so much. Both are so small that I can’t even tell which end is up–and the geraniums look like root or stem cuttings, not even whole plants. I put them all on their sides under a couple inches of soil until I can figure out what to do.
Any advice, about the geraniums especially? There’s really, really no identifiable root system or crown.
When we aren’t being drowned with incessant rain, I’ve been laboring to get the garden ready for this year.
I used to have 10 raised beds that were 6’ wide and 17’ long, but I’ve been tearing them out and rebuilding this spring because they were too wide. It’s too hard to take care of anything in the middle of a 6’ bed.
When I’m done rebuilding, I’ll have 14 raised beds that are 4’ wide and 17’ long.
I won’t list all of the vegetables I’m growing, because it’s over 60. Pretty much name it and I’m growing some cultivar of it.
Excellent! What a great resource. In our area, the MGs also have sales in spring and fall where you can buy seedlings of their top pick varieties.
The cool continues. Soil temp is only around 55dg. I’ll wait for 65 before my tomatoes go in, just to avoid the sulking. Costco had some enormous Celebrity plants, couldn’t even call them seedlings. I’m thinking watermelons again, although the squirrels were bad last year. I wish the community garden manager would just adopt another garden cat already!
We have a 4 gardening beds. Right now, pretty much just some green onions and starting some lettuce. have some feral potato plants that have been in over winter. My wife hasn’t started to get busy yet.
We also have southern exposure in the front of the house with reflective brick. Going to put in tomatoes there. Small or medium sized as its hard to mature anything else in Seattle. Probably try a couple of pumpkins.
My personal crown jewels are hops. I got some free end of season rhizomes last year, and managed to get an end of season harvest out of my Cascades (only to discover I think Cascade hops taste like ass), and the Northern Brewer that only grew about 6’. Well, the Northern Brewer has started to sprout (and the casade I gave to a friend and those are sprouting).
I bought some crowns off of a nice lady on Craig’s list. Perfect for the decorative trellis we have on the front of the house.
The small Goldings hop crown are shooting up.
The big Tettnanger crown hasn’t shown any sign of life. It was a really big crown so something should be coming up.
The Willamette rhizome has two big shoots coming out. Hopefully I can train that to go up the ugly telephone pole in the SW corner of the yard.
Anyhoo, expecting a good harvest this year that will go into my beer.
I think I’d be game for trying that. But it seems like one of the bare root trees didn’t make it, so back to Costco this week to see if they have more. Apparently one gets better yields with at least 2 trees.
The company is Bulbs Direct, which on Dave’s Garden has 46 pos/2 neutral/16 negative. I was prepared for the bulbs and roots to be smallish, but I honestly don’t know what to do with the geraniums. I did dig them up to have another look, and I’m still baffled. Some have what might be a plant crown, except what would be the “roots” are then branching in an upward direction.
I will email them to ask for instructions. Given the distance (I’m in America) and language barriers I don’t expect much, but hope springs eternal.
New house with a shit-ton of gardening space, but I am going slow and just doing containers this year. That gives me a year to dig up the beds, till in a bunch of compost and manure and get them set for next season. About the only thing that will be planted in the main bed this year will be sunflowers.
As for the pots, so far I’ve transplanted tomato plants (Black Krim, Early Girl, Roma, Celebration and Sugar Snack), peppers (Serrano, Cayenne, Anaheim, Pimento Elite, Padron and Chile de Arbol), chives and Italian Large Leaf Basil. From seed I’ve got Jalapeno & Habanero peppers and Black Price tomatoes.
Various succulents are in pots in various places, and I’ve decided that the previous owner was an idiot, so the roses in front of the bay window will all get dug up this winter and planted in an orderly fashion. I mean really, who mixes climbing and bush roses and puts the climbing ones up front where they get not support. Next year they get transplanted to the back and side along the fence, where they can grow up the trellis.
That’s basically all you need to know. He’ll know what will do well in your microclimate, and will give you more free stock than you need - and will introduce you to other gardeners who will share.
I stick with the bulletproof. I recommend massing fewer species, instead of going with 1 of whatever strikes your fancy each time you hit the garden center. Lately been going with a lot of sedges, hosta, and sedums.
Lots of low shade ground covers. Pachysandra and vinca. Avoid English Ivy.
I also suggest avoiding fruit trees - at least if your goal is edible fruit. More work and chemicals than they are worth. JMO. In fact, we may plant no produce other than herbs this year.
First thing to do is trees, shrubs, hardscape. Smaller plants can wait. Enlarge your plat of survey, get some tracing paper to lay over it, and plan out beds, walks, eaiting/gathering areas, etc. View them as outdoor rooms.
And if something doesn’t do well where you stick it - dig it up and try something different!
Sheesh, the yard isn’t all that big! It’s an extra wide city lot, but it’s still a city lot. And there’s a garage taking up a chunk of it.
Yesterday we bought a couple of kits for 3’ x 6’ raised beds, which will go next to the garage, because that’s the sunniest spot (and out of the way). I’m thinking of putting the fig tree by the alley fence, and then the raised beds. Once they arrive, the raspberry and blueberry bushes will go along the garage wall that faces the house. And I think there may be an additional narrow bed along the south garage wall, so we can build a trellis for cucumbers and melons. In the raised beds, there will be herbs, strawberries, tomatoes, eggplants, peppers. One of my co-workers, as well as Tom Scud’s cousin’s wife (who grew up on a farm and planted something like 87 varieties of tomatoes this year) have offered spare seedlings. If we don’t feel like we have enough room in the raised beds, we can build another one or two.
So far I have a bunch of gladiolus bulbs coming, too, and those can go along the south fence. And some poppy seeds, but haven’t decided where to put those yet. I have some calendula seeds left from last year, but haven’t decided where to put them yet, either - maybe along the south side of the house? but it might not make sense to plant anything there yet because we are doing a bunch of HVAC work before we move in, including adding central AC, and it’s not yet decided where the compressor will go. And I want to plant some irises, also maybe along the south fence in the back?
Someday, when all the dust settles (literally and figuratively), we will make some kind of small patio off the back wall of the house, but for now I think we will just buy a few pavers so there is something reasonably flat to put the grill on, and leave it at that. And it’s not a huge yard, so I think we will just leave grass in the middle. If there are fruit trees later, the most sensible place to put them would probably be along the south fence. (There’s no fence on the north side for most of the yard; there’s another building there, and a sidewalk that goes along the narrow space between them and passes by the back door to the garage. And there’s a small spot of grass with a couple of decrepit benches by the back gate, but that’s a shadier spot, so I will have to think about what to plant there.)
I don’t know what the condo building will do with the front yard after we move. I’m thinking of transplanting the ferns and clematis that I put in to the new place; the front yard here is too shady for the clematis to do much of anything, and our jerk 3rd floor upstairs neighbor never liked the ferns, and I suspect he will just rip them out. Pretty much all the plants in the front yard are ones w put there, and I never asked for reimbursement from the board because I didn’t want to deal with it, so I figure I can do whatever I want. Maybe the clematis would look nice on a trellis along the south wall, and the ferns along the north wall of the garage?
ETA: before we do any of this, we need to do some serious soil amending. It looks pretty unloved. We bought some basic garden tools, and maybe today we will go over to Lowes and buy some peat moss, topsoil, compost, etc. And maybe next weekend we can go to my friend’s house in Wisconsin; she has 4 horses and 15 years’ worth of composted horse manure, and will give us whatever we are willing to haul away.
Yeah, well do you want it to eventually look like a cohesive whole, or just like you did a bunch of things incrementally with no overall plan? Do you mind doing things and then tearing them out - after you install your raised bed and realize - say - “Gee, that would be the perfect place for the grill.” Moreover, after you plant something, do you want somewhere to record what you planted where, so you don’t end up mistakenly dig up your spring blooms when planting in the fall?
Big or small, and whatever style, IMO a garden can benefit from planning and recordkeeping. May be even MORE important the smaller the space.
And if the space is so small, what are you talking about multiple fruit trees?!
Glads would be low on my list. I plant nothing I need to dig up and store every fall. Poppies are beautiful - but very short blooming season, and can be invasive.
Not an expert in condo law, but I wouldn’t be surprised if you lost title to anything you planted in common areas. Of course the law and practice can differ, and if no one cares, go ahead and dig them out.
I repeat - hardscape and woody plants first. Not just my opinion, but just about every landscaper I’ve ever encountered/read/spoken to.
Virtually all figs (including varieties commonly available to consumers) are self-fertile, so it shouldn’t make any difference whether you have more than one fig tree or not (obviously, the more trees the more fruit, but not because of cross-pollination). I have found some varieties like Petite Negra and Chicago Hardy to be productive; on other sorts, I’m still waiting for the first fruit.
We planted a nectarine and two pear trees last year, and they look like they survived the winter. Also, a few of our strawberries survived, which we didn’t expect at all. Only one or two of our rosemarys survived, which is unfortunate.
The rule of thumb here in SLC is that it’s reasonably safe to plant a garden after Mother’s Day, so I’ve got a month or so before I get anything new in the ground. This year we’ll be planting three habaneros, one cherry tomato, one basil, and a couple of nasturtium. Maybe even a sweet bell pepper, as well.
Hah. Condo law would be nice if anyone in this building actually ever followed it. The only person likely to care at all is the 3rd floor neighbor, and he’s the one who consistently parks his huge SUV so that it blocks the back staircase, so I really couldn’t care less what he thinks. And that’s the politest way I can put it.
Besides, we’re talking about half a dozen ferns and a clematis. It’s not worth anyone’s time to fight over, and he’s already said he’s not a fan of the ferns, so he shouldn’t care.
At previous places, yes, and you need to buy plants they’re less likely to bother. In my experience lilies and tulips are right out, but daffodils, hollyhocks, chrysanthemums, peonies, coneflower, and bee balm do fine. Geranium and iris is marginal. They don’t like anything in the mint family, either, which produces a lot of lovely flowers.