It's been a while since I've done a Garden Update! Here's a new bed being prepped, still lots of garden trimmings being thrown in, and layered with soil and compost. The corn and bean bed is doing ok, the corn didn't get as tall as I had hoped, and they have already flowered.
Another angle on the same area, in the foreground are strawberry planted in pots, on the right of it are the corn and bean bed, behind the strawberries are the Kabocha pumpkins all sprawled out. Behind the pumpkins are the tomato bed with Amish Paste and Peacevine Red Cherry toms. To the right of the tomatoes are the cucumber/zuke bed that has been mostly turned over and I planted some more tomatoes.
Here are some Amish Paste tomatoes still green
Valencia oranges are ripening
A view of some of the rear raised beds
Okra blossoms
Chard is still happy because the Mikan (mandarin) tree gives them shade in the hottest times of the day.
The sweet potato and okra bed
Alma Paprikas
Cute little fiery orange flowers on the edible canna (canna edulis)
The "Salada Musume" gobo (burdock) had a rough start having their leaves constantly eaten by snails and night time caterpillars (don't know what those pests are called) Notice that the shady side of the bed has larger healthier leaves. Since they are Japanese plants in origin, I'm guessing that they don't like our SoCal scorching sun.
Mangoes, YES! I picked on small one off. It was about 4" long since it wasn't growing as fast as the others, brought it indoors and placed it on a ripening banana and lo and behold it ripened up enough for us to eat it! It was a bit tart, but my son and I loved it! Can't wait for the regular sized fruit when they are ready to pick!
Blackberry bramble. There's a small Sapote tree we grew from seed, on the bottom left side of the pic by the blue basil. Can you spot it? It's been growing really well this year with the extra nitrogen rich compost.
Blackberries ripening
Herb Garden
Tree Collard/Kale
This bed had kabocha pumpkin, black radish going to seed, cilantro going to seed and Komatsuna greens. It's all done now, so I chopped up the dead dry branches from the black radish and cilantro and currently drying the remaining leaves from the komatsuna.
Taro root has established itself and is really taking off. Before it takes over the garden, my Mom wanted to plant the Bitter melon vine(the pale green plant). on the right of that are the Chinese Yams (dioscorea batatas)
