This location went to weeds this year. It's a bed on the south side of the house. Closest to the house, I've been trying for many years to get a row of asparagus growing. This year, there actually are multiple, fairly tall (3 to 4 feet) asparagus fronds, and even more smaller ones. I think they will finally be growing. Unfortunately, the bed was let go this year, and full of weeds. I pulled the weeds, added some compost and eggshells, and turned it over with a shovel. This will be the onion and garlic bed for this winter.
Here is the layout. I managed to salvage about 25 medium and large white multiplier onions (also called white potato onions). Planted in the fall, a large one will split into numerous small bulbs. A small one will grow to produce a single large onion the following early summer. They are great for scallions, but I always try to save enough to keep the cycle going.
Not realizing that I actually did manage to salvage some garlic, and had saved the bulbs along with the multiplier onions, I bought 2 garlic bulbs at a local nursery. These were German garlic. This is a great variety, large very strongly flavored cloves. I like it a lot.
The other multiplier is known as "Egyptian Walking Onion". They seem to tolerate any care or neglect. They grow a cluster of small bulbs at the top, where other onions have flowers. That cluster can be planted in the fall or spring. Planted in the fall, they give scallions even before other crops can even be planted. This is the main charm, although the onion bulbs are quite pungent. These were pulled out of the bed that now contains beans, and left to dry out of the sun on the North side of the house, sitting there since mid July. They are starting to shrivel a bit, but still look quite viable. I also have some that are starting to sprout while on the tops of the still-planted bulbs. I separated all of the small starts, and planted about 4 inches apart. They will make great scallions, and I'll save enough for a continuing crop to perpetuate the cycle.
While digging the onion bed I discovered that we had planted some fingerling potatoes there, and forgot about them. Nice crop. 
The Hollywood plum tree is branching nicely. I pruned it back a couple of weeks ago to maintain shape and compact "backyard orchard" size.
The ONLY fruit on the Hollywood plum tree. That's OK - this is just the 2nd season. Given favorable weather, this and the Shiro could potentially give more next year. That's a big if. Still, a taste in the 2nd season - great! It's still hard as a rock, but should ripen in August.
Trilite peach-plum. Lots of red fruits. All are small and hard, but I expect them to ripen in a few weeks. This is great! I thought I couldn't grow peaches here due to leaf-curl.
Now to the annuals. The zucchini and yellow summer squash are catching up. Again, in one or two weeks, we should be getting some great meals from these plants.
I made the first ties of the cucumbers to their trellis today. They are blooming as well.
The 5 hens are producing 4 eggs daily. Someone is shirking. If I could figure out who it is, I would put her on a "Work Improvement Plan". As it is, the others seem to be covering for whoever it is. At least absenteeism is not an issue. They don't have a choice on tht. A good leader will reward them. Today I've been doing homework all day, so could not pull weeds for them, but I did put a watermelon rind through the shredder on the food processor - in seconds, a big batch of tasty morsels.
Potato barrel. My largest concern now is that I planted too many. As always, "we'll see"
Seeds planted 7 days ago, zucchini, squash, and cucumbers. I'm leaving them on the deck in the sun. It's overcast. When one set of leaves is developed, I'll plant them.
Peppers. They are sulking. Probably too cool, but with warmer weather now, maybe they'll start up again. The purple plant is basil. There are some little radish seedlings, I'm not sure how they will do. In the back, seedlings of bunching onions. I'll let them get bigger then pull them.
Kind of a mix now. Purchased eggplants, bigger. The lettudce and mesclun will be done in a week, leaving a lot more room. The heliotrope isn't planted yet, this may not be the right spot. Very fragrant. These onions will be allowed to develop tops, unless Ning pulls them. By tops, I mean these (Egyptian walking onions) develop clusters of baby onions on the top of the stalk, instead of a flower. Those are used to plant the next crop, for indefinite perpetuation of the variety. If these do get pulled, I have others in the borders that will make plenty of new sets.
The soil temp in the barrle has remained about 60 degrees for a week. I planted the last "Cayenne", from the January seed plantings. They are kept overnight. The radishes are soon to be done. The Daikon is too big, I've been thinning them and feeding to chickens, the roots stay too skinny to use. It will probably wind up with one or two of those. More peppers, probably, this weekend although the plants are quite small.
Potatoes. The screening wire is there for the cat's pleasure. Well, displeasure - she doesn't like this on her "litter box" so has given up.
The spinach grew nicely! The radish leaves are too big. These are icecycle radishes, still not big enough to eat, but the leaves are very big.
Scallions and mesclun. The carrots remain miniscule. The scallions are Egyptian Walking Onions, and much milder than I remembered. They are great in salads or on new potatoes! I will continue growing them by saving starts each year, they have worked out great! This barrel will likely have peppers and eggplants in another month.
"Tropicals" like tomatoes, chili peppers, eggplants, and basil, can't go into the ground until May, due to the risk for frost and the cool ground. I do need to measure the ground temperature. Cool-weather plants, some of which can even be winter-sown, are another matter, I think.
I've been wanting to do this project for a long time. Ning found a couple of "free-for-the-taking" wine barrels, and scarfed them up for use as planters. They've been sitting for a year or two. Today I got out the Skill-saw and cut them in halves, then drilled multiple 1-inch holes in the bottoms of each. Ning wanted to be able to move them around, so we added casters.
This is the 5th batch of beans. Not bad. Cukes are producing nicely as well. 4 this week - that's all we can keep up with. About 4 feet square of garden 'footprint' due to the wire tower. Cuke started from seed produced BEFORE the purchased plants.
This is a mixture of German Red (smaller heads), Inchelium (larger) and miscellaneous garlics that I pulled up around the yard. Some of those are from grocery store garlic that was planted years ago. I think that the German Red has the most flavor, but the heads are about 1/2 as large as the Inchelium.
Inchelium Red Garlic. This was very productive. Most is hanging in a dry basement room.
White Potato Onion = heirloom multiplier onion. I manage to save enough each year for a small crop. I would like to have a much larger crop but space is an issue. I've been saving starts and 'recycling' them into next years' onions for 6 years.
All of the multiplier onions have fallen over and are drying. So I pulled them up. I'll dry them in the shade - one year I dried shallots in the sun and they all cooked. These are the "white potato onion". I like the flaver - it's different from modern varieties. Maybe more like a shallot, but milder. Plan: save about 6 larger bulbs, and most of the smaller bulbs, since there isnt much to eat on the small ones. Plant thme in september. The rest can be eaten.
Multiplier onions. Here they are drying in the shade.
The first garlic plants are drying out and falling over. These were levtovers from the year before - I did not know they were still in the ground.
Inchelium Red garlic. Not brown yet - I'll wait until they are. Given the size of the plants, I'm hoping for BIG garlic bulbs. This variety is the one that I think I'll keep growing. To the side, potatoes almost ready to bloom. At the rear, Ning's Chinese Beans are climbing their strings.
We have been eating lots of cilantro. This was sown by crushing old flower heads from last year's cilantro, letting the seeds scatter on the mulch. The flower heads were saved by leaving them in the garden shed over the winter, unprotected. The cilantro is flavorful and tender. This method fits into the "cheap+lazy" gardening philosophy. I putter around far too much to be considered lazy, but "virtually no effort" takes up too much room in the labels.
The strawberries hold a lot of promise. The most blooms, ever.
The Inchelium garlic looks like corn plants. No scapes yet.
Several of the tomatoes have flower buds, even though they are only about 9 inches to a foot tall. I've started pinching out the lower branches, to maintain a cordon shape. One grouping had pale leaves - uncelar why, but this area did not get as much chicken compost. I added fish emulsion and added some epson salts for good measure (Mg and sulfur) and the leaves ARE greener today.
We've been eating lots of scallions, both of the 'potato onion' type (my favorite) and the "Egyptian walking onion' type. And some of the 'I don't know what they are' type, that just happened to be left in the ground from previous years. These are perfect for the "cheap+lazy" gardener, since each onion produces sets for next year, at the top of the plant. These can be planted in the fall for early scallions, at zero cost and little effort. If you ignore them, they'll fall over and plant themselves, which is esentially zero effort for the gardener.
VIctoria Rhubarb. This has been fertilized with generous helping of Chicken Compost, after earlier servings of Starbucks Coffee Grounds. The mulch is chopped yard waste, mostly trimmings from lavendar and grasses. Can rhubarb pie be far behind?
Chinese chives. Similar supplements as the rhubarb, but the mulch is bark mulch. This is more weed prone than the rhubarb, so I wanted something less likely to allow seeds to sprout. Chive dumplings ahead, in about one month....
Success at last! At least, in so far as getting purchased asparagus starts to sprout. So far 7 of the 10 planted have come up. On from of the asparagus, potato onions, about 5th generation of saving starts. This time I want to settle on this one heirloom variety only.
Planted some left-over multiplier onions at the edges. They were left in a cool room over winter. I forgot to eat them.
Dormancy update. Some geraniums are alive, but some look dead. Not ready to go out yet. The brugmansia looks OK. This method of overwintering might be "Darwinian" - those that don't survive - don't survive. Those that do, do.
