My Dollar Store Garden Tower

 Last year I bought a bunch of the 3 sided garden stackers that the Dollar Tree was selling.  My idea was to use them for the Micro Dwarf Tomatoes.  I grew a bunch and made a small stack for JR/Ashley/Max and for Jeff/Colleen/KT/Joss. Sadly they just aren't right for those tomatoes - they dried out quickly and I don't think the depth if enough for them.

So -- what to do with these stackers???  I had 5 left over and went and bought another 3, so my stack could be 8 total.  I thought I'd try greens and see if they'd grow better in the root space.

I transplanted a few Chinese cabbages, two types of spigariello, a collard, spinach and Novatina. I have it standing in between two peach trees in the potted garden and so far it's performed magnificently! I really could not have guessed how well all of these would do, some sun during the day and some shade in the late afternoon. 

I've cut greens twice now and we're using most of these for salads, except for the collards, which we'll eat with a meal. I'm continuing to fertilize it every two weeks and fully expect it to last until the real heat begins. 

Very pleased and I might add another stack in the fall!

After I wash these greens well in cold water, I use my salad spinner and then lay them out on paper towels, roll them up and store in a plastic bag in the fridge. They last a really long time this way.

Spring and Summer Garden, 2022 - Bed D3

 Cucumbers and onions in this bed, and yes! These are good garden companions. 

The onions are all purchased starts - there are yellow in the front, red and white in the back.  I've never learned the knack of growing onions - cannot seem to get it right. But, thankfully, I can buy starts locally and that works for me!

The cucumbers are:

Dragon Egg - cream colored round cucumber from Croatia

National Pickling - small cucumber used for pickling for decades

Monika - Polish slicer or can be used for pickles.

I need to thin these cucumbers some, but waiting to see which will be the hardiest.

Spring and Summer Garden, 2022 - Bed D2

 Another bed of peppers and green beans. Once the beans are done for the season, I'm planning on putting in squash to replace them. 

Masai Beans - another beautiful slim and straight green bean

Brown Jalapeno - a milder, brown colored jalapeno. Supposed to be larger then a normal green one.

Manzano Peppers - I think these are the yellow version but I can't find the packet they came in. We'll find out. These are from central and South America and the name means apple. These are supposed to be around 30-50K on the Scoville scale. One characteristic of the manzano is that it has black seeds.

Spring and Summer Garden, 2022 - Bed D1

 Peppers and beans in this bed. I know that these two are not usually planted together and are considered bad companion plants, but I've never had any problem with bush beans near peppers. These bean plants will be gone before the peppers start to produce, in any case.

Serengeti Beans - a beautiful slim French filet bean - I grew these last year and they are truly gorgeous.

Numex Pumpkin Spice Jalapeno - developed by New Mexico State, a beautiful orange jalapeno. This is my first year to try these.

Spring and Summer Garden, 2022 - Bed B2

This smaller bed was planted in all bush type beans. I had several packages of only 10-15 beans in them, so I just put them all here together.  

Bush Beans:

Blue Jay - green snap bean

Earlie Serve - green snap bean

Red Swan - somewhat flat red snap bean that turns green when cooked

Brittle Wax - golden yellow snap bean

Triomphe de Farcy - slender green snap bean

Royal Burgandy - purple bush bean, turns green when cooked

Big Kahuna - green snap bean

Golden Wax - yellow snap bean

Cantare - green French snap bean

Strike - slim green snap bean

Galopka - slightly flattened yellow snap bean (only one plant came up of this variety out of 11 seeds)

Derby - green snap bean

Spring and Summer Garden, 2022 - Squash House Tomatoes

 I had so many tomato seedlings this year, I decided to use the Squash House to grow some of them, especially some of the cherry tomatoes.  The beds around the Squash House are raised, so these will need to be fertilized on a regular basis.

  

I've already documented the hanging baskets, so I won't repeat those that are hanging from here, two on the front and four on the back. The four big buckets on each end are:

Yamal Dwarf - Gets about a foot tall, early producer, red fruit.

Azoychka - see description on earlier post re: tomato row

Orange Pixie Dwarf - see description on earlier post re: Bed A1

Orange Cream Dwarf - orange flattened tomato

On the outside row of each side I have:

Pocket Star - green golden cherry tomato

Summer Temptation - an oval cherry, orange w/dark shoulders

Tsungshigo - see description on earlier post re: tomato row

Red Star - a ruffled red cherry tomato. Unique!

Amethyst Jewel - pink cherry with purple shoulder

Egg Yolk - just like the name implies, yellow cherry

Pearly Pink - pink oval cherry 

Gobstopper - de-hybridized version of Sungold, it's a yellow cherry

And inside rows are:

Pinocchio Orange Micro Dwarf - orange cherry

Marco Italiano Micro Dwarf - a new variety, will have to wait to see what comes up!

Audrey's Love Dwarf - a plum shaped cherry, chocolate colored with dark shoulders. Plant gets about 12" tall.

Bundaberg Rumball Dwarf - I'm not sure if this is a cherry or small tomato. Chocolate colored fruit.

Juni Dwarf - Small red fruit on an 18" plant. Very early.

Tasty Wine Dwarf - dark pink tomato on a 3 foot plant

Taxi Dwarf - small yellow tomato on a 2 ft. plant. I have three of these growing and they are all branching out from the bottom, a good example of a bush tomato.

Lime Green Salad Dwarf - nice sized green/yellow tomato on a 2-1/2 foot plant.

Spring and Summer Garden, 2022 - Bed A2

 There are garlic and shallots in this smaller bed from last November, so I've left those. On the other side of the bed I planted the few sweet peppers that I was able to get germinated.  I didn't have a good year with the sweet peppers. I think some of my seed stash is getting too old, so next spring I'll buy new stock.

Sweet Peppers:

Apricot Favorite - no link found to this one. It's a bell type and I got the seeds from one of my Facebook group gardeners.

Devil's Horn - a sweet "Juicy Fruit" flavor. Now doesn't that sound wonderful? I managed to get two plants!

Red Bell - Sadly I purchased this Bonnie plant from Home Depot.  I just didn't get enough sweet peppers to germinate this year. 

Sunbright Yellow - a nice sized yellow bell.

Apple Crisp - If you want to get picky, this is really a hot pepper, but it's mostly sweet with the occasional zing - about 400 on the Scoville scale. I'm hoping it's as delicious as it sounds! I have two of these.

Peperone de Senise - a sweet, long red pepper from the town of Senise in the Bascilicata region of Spain. 

Spring and Summer Garden, 2022 - Bed B1

We have hot peppers and bush beans in this bed, along with some bunching onions that continue to come up here every year.  

Hot Peppers:

4 ea. Komodo Dragon - 1.5 million on the Scoville scale. I don't know why I grew this one, except for the cool name. I will never eat anything that hot.

3 ea. Thor's Thunderbolt - 300-500K on the Scoville scale. Supposed to be fruity and with sharp heat. I loved the look of this one and can't wait to see how it does.  I've tried to grow this for 2 years now and didn't have any success last year (seedling froze during our snowpocalype in Feb. 2021.)

1 ea. Aji Guyana - From the Caribbean island of Guyana, this yellow pepper varies in heat from about 2K all the way to 75K, depending on growing conditions. This one will probably make some good pepper flakes!

Bush Green Beans:

Napoleon - a slightly small green bean
Sassy - another beautiful straight green bean
Jade - long, straight jade colored and stringless
Blue Lake - meaty and stringless green bean

Spring and Summer Garden, 2022 - Bed A1

 Bed A1 is where I had planned to put all of the dwarf tomatoes, but it ended up being a bit of a mixture of both dwarf and a few indeterminates.  I guess that's what always ends up happening, you work with what actually grew and survived, and the plan goes a bit awry. It's all good. I'll have to find a way to stake the larger plants, or keep them pruned to a manageable size.

There are 18 tomato plants total.  

Wild Fred has lush potato leaves!

Plants in this bed include:

Dwarf Tomatoes

1. Cherry Fiaschetto - red cherry, Italian heritage 
2. Hrusha Chorna - red saladette sized fruit, 2 ft. tall plants 
3. Yamal - red, full sized
4. Tasmanian Chocolate - brown/red large, 3-4 ft. tall plant
5. Juni - red, medium size, 18" high plant
6. Orange Pixie - 2-1/2 ft tall plants, large orange cherry
7. Taxi (4 plants) - 2 ft. tall plants, yellow slicer
8. Wild Fred - 4 ft tall plants, purple/red large tomatoes. I'm not sure I have true seeds for this one, mine is a potato leaf plant and it's listed online as regular leaf. We'll see what develops. 
9. Blazing Beauty - 3-1/2 ft. tall plants, orange slicer
10. Yellow Warbler - I don't have any info on this one. I got the seeds from Bunny Hop Seeds but it's not listed there anymore, and I don't have the original package. Another one where we'll just have to wait and see.

Indeterminate Tomatoes

1. Sweet Beverly - yellow plum
2. Summer Temptation (2 plants) - orange grape with black shoulders
3. Black Elephant - large purple/black tomato
4. Gobstopper - dehybridized Sun Gold cherry

Basil Plants

1. Ready Freddie Basil
2. Anise Basil
3. Italian Classico Basil
4. Amethyst Basil
5. Opalescence Basil
6. Persian Basil

The Worm Factory - First Compost Yield

 The worm factory I got for Christmas came with 3 levels.  I filled the first level in January, added the second in February and the third in March.  Today I emptied the 1st level from January and it was glorious, dark, beautiful compost - full of rich worm castings! 

I was amazed at how beautiful and fine it was - no clumps, no leftover food, and almost no worms. They are supposed to migrate up as you add trays, so the system worked the way it was designed. 

The other two trays had plenty of worms, and they all look really healthy. I harvested about 3 gallons of compost this time, and hopefully will continue to get the same amount every month. What a great way to use kitchen waste!

A baby straggler

Beautiful compost!

Spring and Summer Garden, 2022 - Hanging Basket Tomatoes

 I'm trying seven new hanging basket type tomatoes this year after having such good experience last year with Whippersnapper. I love that these are at eye level, I don't have to bend, stoop, or kneel to take care of them and to harvest. I think I'll be doing many more of these in the future! I've put 3 plants in each large hanging basket, and they're hanging from my squash house. John put a drip waterer in each of them. So easy on me!

Varieties include:

1. Sirja's Love
2. Anmore Dewdrop
3. 100's and 1,000s
4. Cuotomate
5. Mini Parvula
6. Marz Pulcent
7. V'nucenka

Spring and Summer Garden, 2022 - The Micro Dwarf Tomatoes

 I had a scare last night - the temperature dropped to 36 degrees! I woke up so worried about my little plants, but thankfully they seemed to sail right through.  I only lost the top off of one of my hanging basket tomatoes, so I trimmed it and it will recover just fine. 

The many micro dwarf tomatoes have been taken out of the greenhouse now and are in the potting garden on a wire shelf for the summer. They do get shade in some of the afternoon there, and I think they will do just fine where I set them up.  If it proves too hot, I will move them again.

These will give us cherry tomatoes of various sizes and colors. Varieties are: 

Andrina - red

Baby - red 

Birdie Juane - yellow

Christmas Tree - red 

Delice de Neuilly - red

Florida Petite - red

Gold Pearl - yellow

Hahms Gelb - yellow

Hardin's Miniature - red

Jochalas - yellow

Laura #5 - red

Lil' Peeps - yellow

Lille Lisse - red

Linda - red

Marco Italiano - unknown 

Micro Tom - red 

Monetka - yellow 

Orange Hat - orange 

Pinnochio Yellow - yellow

Plumbrella F5 red

Red Robin - red

Rosy Finch - pink

The Moment - red

Tiny Tim - red 

Venus - yellow 

Vilma - red

Yellow Balcony - yellow

These micro dwarfs are a lot of fun to grow and don't take up much room. They do nicely in a one gallon pot and are just the right size for a porch or even a window sill.  I encourage everyone to give them a try!

Spring and Summer Garden, 2022 - The Main Tomato Row

I'll be documenting the garden here this year since I'd like to try to keep track of how each variety I plant does here. It's been a struggle getting the garden in this year, mainly due to cold weather at night. Usually I've got the whole thing in by mid-March. The seedlings suffered a bit with being root bound and leggy, but I think they'll soon be happy again.

John built a complete fence around the tomato row this year to keep that pesky armadillo out!

From front to back: 

1. Black Elephant, a large purple/black tomato 

2. Super Sweet 100 (hybrid), a red cherry tomato 

3. Blaue Kasachstan, large red with dark shoulders

4. Versalkie, a red cocktail sized tomato from Russia

5. Oaxacan Jewel, large red & yellow

6. Wee Tang Shebang, not sure which variety I have here - this tomato comes in red, yellow and orange. To be determined! It's a cherry sized.

7. Copper River, Greens/reds/yellow/purple splashes in a large tomato. This is the ONE I'm looking forward to the most!

8. Pig Nose, I can't find a thing on this one. We will all have to wait and see what develops!

9. Girl Girl's Weird Thing, red & green stripe

10. Tsungshigo, Chinese chocolate colored grape tomato

11. Jelly Bean (Hybrid), red grape sized tomatoes

12. Sart Roloise, large pale yellow with blue shoulders, bred in Belgium

13. Black Strawberry, blue/scarlet/gold cocktail tomato

14. Snowball, pale white/blush large tomato

15. Ei Von Phuket, pink grape tomato from Thailand, "egg from Phuket island" (pronounced "poo ket" - the h is silent in Thai.) 

16. Long Tall Sally, pink striped heart

17. Summer Cider, medium sized yellow

18. Tiffen Mennonite, large pink brandywine from Germany

19. Turkish Monastery, striped red & gold found, you guessed it, in a monastery in Turkey

There are more tomatoes in the main garden (I went tomato crazy this year.) I'll be documenting those in the next few days!