Going to try to buy my starts this year, instead of seed-starting. I don't know if the failures of the last two years were because my self-grown plants weren't ready, because the weather was reliably wacky, or both.
Yeah, it's more expensive to buy young plants to set out, but if I have to start seeds and then buy half the amount anyway, it's not less expensive to do it myself.
Gotta say, climate chaos isn't making #desertGardening any easier.
I love those articles about "vegetables that will grow all winter."
Those are for places that don't get cold. #desertGardening
Frost finally came, so I'm down to hardy plants: peas, chard, sunchokes, raspberries. Peppers and squash are done, unless my last few pepper plants managed to survive the night under fabrics.
The cold made the sunchokes stop blooming, so I was wondering where the bees were getting their last winter pollen. I found out when I put the water on the raspberries and they rose up in a humming cloud to see what the disturbance was. Hello, bees.
I'm actually a few weeks behind on sharing some updated garden pictures, and I need to take new ones. We've had more rain and all of this is much greener now! But just for reference, this is one of our mixed infiltration basins: chicken litter mulch, yellow sweet clover around the greywater inlet (this basin gets much less and usually no greywater due to a slope issue caused by a previous WWOOFer - eventually we'll rectify that but for right now we're using this deep spot to grow food we can't grow in the proper greywater-fed basins), onions, smyrna melons, mustard greens (out of shot), cowpeas (second image) and butternut squash. As all of this grows, it will be a party of overlapping green, the squash entangling with the clover and the melon leaves flowing over the underground onion bulbs. It's already happening! I'll post some updated pictures soon.
#gardening #permaculture #avantgardening #RegenerativeAg #Desert #DesertGardening #FoodSovereignty #FoodProduction
A few chilly nights took the pumpkin vines and the squash. The peas and leafy greens are in full autumnal bounty, and will be until we get a killing frost, several degrees below freezing.
Light frosts make the greens sweeter, anyway.
It's almost time for winter cleanup and transplanting dormant trees and vines. I definitely need to weed the test patch of buffalo grass, too.
September flowers: monarda and sunchokes.
Look close for a hidden hyssop.
Dinner the other day came from the garden. I had a whole row of turnips out there, growing under chard. Despite the heat, they're still good and not woody.
The red green beans make me laugh. They turn green immediately when steamed.
The peas started setting fruit again the moment it was below 90F/32C. Thank goodness for heat tolerant vines. Some of them are yellowing, but most just quit blooming for a bit.
Blooming in the garden: beans, pumpkins, and a plant whose seeds were labeled "penstemon" at the seed swap. I was baffled at its slow growth and ruffled leaf edges until it bloomed. It's a viola.
Today in transplants: the yarrow is doing well. Its wild cousins are already in bloom, but this one spent a few weeks getting established first.
If you look closely, you can see the difference between denser, newer leaves and the leggy ones it grew at the nursery.
Some kind of a varmint (probably 
) came into my garden last night, dug up one(1) turnip, didn't like it, and left it next to its row.
They're almost ready. Give it one more week.
hexamander
Rancho de la Libertad