CarolineC's Blog

When will my garden grow?
Jul 7, 2008 | 2:31 PM PST
Tags: veggies , blueberries , strawberries , peach tree

I'm growing increasingly frustrated as I thought I would have an overabundance of everything daily by now.  So far though, I've only gotten a trickling of various things here and there every day or every other day.  A little bit of lettuce, a handful of sugar snap peas, a few zucchinis and yellow squashes, a bit of spinach and swiss chard, 7 cherry tomatoes (not all at once), a pinch of cilantro, and a lot of parsley.  Parsley is just about the most useless edible that I planted.  And when you cut it, it grows back bigger and better.  Why can't everything else grow like that?  I was seriously hoping to have enough that I might have to freeze and can things, after giving much away.  But most of it so far hasn't even made it to the fridge. ;)  My pepper plants are just beginning to flower NOW.  I'm thinking that if I had something that more truly resembled full sun, the gardens would be much further along by now.  As it is, my gardens probably really only get about 4 hours of direct sunlight during the day and a bit of dappled light throughout other parts of the day.  I guess I should be grateful to get the growth that I do.  Those darn trees!  Oh well.  Maybe in a few weeks I'll have the giant harvest that I was hoping for, but I hate waiting.  I've already picked 3 carrots way too soon, because I thought for sure they should be ready by now.  And I hope onions re-plant well.  I know they're supposed to pop out of the ground when they're ready, but the stem seemed so big and it had been so long that I figured I'd just better check.  Now, if only my scallions were so slow to bulb! ;)  It isn't all bad, I'm just waiting for that BIG harvest where I have more than I know what to do with and all of my ornamentals are flowering like crazy.  

 

My blueberry bushes have put on a little growth-- about 6-12 inches.  So that's one step closer to becoming the big beautiful hedge that I envision.  

 

I've been working on digging out a hole for the peach tree and replacing/amending the soil.  About 6 ft. in diameter and 1- 1 1/2 ft. deep.  There's a couple of inches of topsoil and all rocks and clay underneath that, so as arduous as it seems, it really is necessary so that the tree won't drown and somewhere to spread its roots.  

 

My strawberries are blooming here and there and I'm not pinching them off anymore.  I'm not expecting too much this year since I just planted them this spring, so at least I won't be disappointed. ;)  

 

My fig twig is beginning to put out a few leaves.  I had planted it directly in the ground so it could grow well, but now I'm thinking that unless it makes some miraculous growth between now and frost, it might be best to pot it up and bring it in for the winter.  

 

My Hansen's cherry bushes are leafing out and growing AMAZINGLY well.  I just planted them 3 weeks ago and they've already put on several inches of new growth.  I got those and the fig twig from Direct Gardening, believe it or not.  I guess they can manage to do a few things right.  

 

So, that's all for now.  I'll post pics later.