divaqs's Blog
divaqs's posts about: landscaping
Apr 24, 2007 | 10:12 PM PST
Tags: strawberry , alpine strawberry , musk strawberries , Strawberries , landscaping , groundcover , edging , alpine strawberries
There is hardly anything to me that can beat the incredibly wonderful flavor of a sweet ripe strawberry that has been ripened fresh on the plant. While store bought strawberries are good, they just can’t match the sweetness and flavor of a strawberry grown and ripened right on the plant. Strawberries are definitely one of my most favorite of berries. So, I knew I needed to include them in my edible landscaping. The problem is that most of the strawberry plants you find are June bearing or everbearing varieties that require full sun and quickly spread in a seasons time via runners to consume all the space they can. That isn’t exactly something you would use in your typical yard landscape.
However, there are a couple of other options, namely musk (Fragaria moschata) or alpine (Fragaria vesca) strawberries . Both types can still produce incredibly flavored berries in partial sun settings, meaning they can be grown as ground covers under larger plants. While the berries are smaller in size, they have an even stronger strawberry flavor. It is as if all that flavor and sweetness of a larger berry was compacted into a smaller size. Some alpine strawberries are grown commercially for gourmet cooking. Musk strawberries spread by runners, just like their cousins you find at most nurseries, but the alpine strawberries spread by slow expansion of roots or by seeds. I’ve tried both musk and alpine and by far prefer the alpine strawberries for landscaping.
Since Alpine strawberries don’t send out runners, you can use them as edging plants, groundcovers, and so on, without worrying about them taking over and spreading into unwanted areas.
My alpine strawberries plants have been able to grow lots and lots of berries in almost full shade, with their berry producing season starting as early as May and ending as late as December. They've even been nicknamed by some as the "perpetual strawberry". Out of the 5 different kinds of strawberries I grow, my alpines beat all the others in overall berry production. I’ve found myself growing tired of picking strawberries every few days for months of time. Though, be warned, the berries are smaller, so it will take more if considering volume.
I prefer using my alpine strawberries as flavoring in things like strawberry shakes, strawberry-rhubarb pie or cobbler, or part of a berry jam. Since the flavor is stronger it takes less berries to have a good strawberry flavor. I've found that I like to wait until the berries are soft to the touch and at their maximum sweetness before picking them and either using them in some fruity wonder, or freezing them for later use.
I am really excited; since it looks like I will start getting alpine strawberries in something like a couple of weeks. My plants are loaded with blossoms and I can see berries already forming.
I’m growing both the red and white/yellow variety of alpine strawberries. I prefer the red, since I’ve found it more difficult to tell when the white/yellow variety is ripe. The white/yellow variety has a slightly sweeter almost pineapple-ish flavor to it. If you have a problem with birds eating your strawberries, you might find better luck with the white/yellow variety, since I’ve heard that birds tend to leave it alone.
Alpine strawberry plants are very hardy. The plants like humus-rich, acid soil in a sheltered site in sun or partial shade. They are hardy to zone 4. If you want more, simply divide one of the plants and plant the divisions in the locations you would like them. You will find that if you miss picking some berries that little strawberry seedlings will grow where the berries fell the following spring. It is not difficult to grow alpine strawberries from seed if you remember to freeze the seed for 3 to 4 weeks before sowing.
The alpine strawberry plant is sometimes used as an herbal medicine, via an herbal tea made from the leaves, stems, and/or flowers, which is believed to aid in the treatment of diarrhea. I haven't tried this myself, but might try experimenting with it in the future.
Apr 14, 2007 | 10:32 PM PST
Tags: blueberries , hedge , blueberry , evergreen , landscaping
It always surprises me when people assume edibles can't be attractively organized.
Oftentimes making edibles attractive is simply a matter of using the same principles in design with them as is done with ornamentals. An example of this are my evergreen blueberry hedges that line my drive way.
One of my very first projects after moving into my house a little more then three years ago was to rip out the horribly overgrown Junipers and replace them with about 20 evergreen blueberry bushes.
Here is a picture of the "ornamental" juniper bushes that used to line my driveway three years ago.
Personally, I thought they were anything but ornamental.
Today I took a photo of one of the hedge rows that now line my driveway.
The blueberry bushes haven't reached full size yet, but are getting close to forming a hedge. The trick to getting them to form a hedge is planting them a little closer together then is recommended. The recommendations are based on optimizing space for maximum berry production, but my experience has been that even with them spaced closer together I get way more blueberries than my family can keep up with.
This time of year the blueberry bushes have a nice splash of extra color while covered with a large amount of pinkish ribbed bell shaped flowers.
The variety of blueberries I planted for hedges were the Evergreen Sunshine Blueberries, described by my favorite nursery, Raintree Nursery, as:
"A unique evergreen selection with attractive year round foliage and hot pink spring flowers. The bush grows 3-4 feet tall and wide, and produces up to ten pounds of delicious, light blue, medium sized berries. They ripen over a very long season, from early August through early September. Hardiness to 0 degrees F, a very low chilling requirement of only 150 chilling hours and a tolerance for higher pH soils makes this a perfect choice for gardeners in the Pacific Northwest, the South or in California."
I like having a good selection of evergreen plants in the front yard, for year round affect. My blueberry hedges are a big part of that. In the fall there is a time that they shed a lot of their leaves, which shocked me the first time I saw it, since I thought they might have a disease, but after two years of observing this, have come to accept it as normal. Even when shedding leaves in the fall they have new leaves growing, so they are never completely bare.
Apr 13, 2007 | 7:56 AM PST
Tags: beans , arbor , edible , landscaping
Sometimes edible landscaping experiments don't work out, and sometimes they do. The fun is in trying something new, which adds an extra layer of excitement to gardening.
A couple of years ago, I tried something new. Something which I was so pleased with, I am planning on trying it again this year. To be specific, I planted runner beans on an arbor in my front yard.
In the picture you will notice that one side of the arbor the beans vines are much more full, while the other side, the vines are a bit more sparse. The difference was in the soil. I tried planting the left side in a rich mixture of compost and the right side in unamended, rocky, and compacted dirt. I was surprised by how well the vines on the right side did, figuring in the bad soil they were planted in.
Runner beans are described in this manner at the seed company, Territorial Seeds, that I purchase my seeds from:
"Phaseolus coccineus: Native to Mexico, runner beans tolerate cool, partially shaded areas better than other beans and make a gorgeous annual landscaping ornamental. For fresh eating pick when the beans are just starting to form in the pod. "
From another source, I learned that runner beans are not self-pollinating and that you need more then one variety for them to produce beans. So, I planted the "Scarlet Emperor" on one side of the arbor and the "Painted Lady" on the other side. 
Both produced a lovely display of flowers, which were followed by a real bounty of beans.
I found the beans to be really tasty and often enjoyed them as a daily snack when I got home from work. My dog and kids had a real fondness for them as well.
The plants are heavy producers. From this single arbor, in spite of everyone snacking on them every day straight off the vines, I still got so many beans that I froze probably half a dozen large freezer bags of them in the pods, cut to about 1 inch lengths, and canned another 20 quarts. It was a challenge to try to keep up with the amount of beans being produced every few days. I discovered that you do not want to let the bean pods get to full development, which can be a foot long in pod size, since the pods get tough and stringy, unless you are planning on shelling the beans and drying them. I think this is definitely an option, since the beans once dried look a lot like a showy dried bean with swirls of red or pink on them. I am planning on exploring this option more this year.
If you are in to edible flowers, like me, you will find that the runner bean flowers have a nice sweet bean taste to them.
Apr 11, 2007 | 10:42 AM PST
Tags: Kiwi , pergola , arbor , arctic beauty kiwi , hardy kiwi , landscaping , edible
When I set out on a landscaping project I have 3 objectives:
- It must incorporate edible plants
- It must be attractive
- It needs to be low maintenance
An example of this is when I turned an ugly side yard filled with scrubby patches of grass and weeds, and nasty Juniper bushes, into a nice gravel pathway through a series of arbors hooked together to make a pergola. I then planted Hardy Kiwi and Arctic Beauty Kiwi at the base of the arbors.
I planted Kiwi of these varieties due to their lower light requirements, which is perfect for my side yard. I put the arctic beauty kiwi to the front, where it will be visible from the road with its nice variagated foliage, and where it will be in the area of less light, which it prefers. When planting kiwi, be sure to get at least one male vine, for up to 8 female (fruit baring) vines. In this project I did 1 male to 2 female vines.
I used gravel on top of a weed barrier for ground cover since it will be a lot lower maintenance then the previous scrubby grass and weeds. I used two different kinds of gravel to give a more visually pleasing affect. And I rooted the arbors in concrete footings, since Kiwi can put a lot of stress on structures. I also connected the arbors together with metal fittings, to increase their combined strength.
As the Kiwi vines grow, they will cover the arbors, to create a green tunnel of foliage, which I expect to have something of a mysterious look to it.
I am expecting a lot of tasty kiwi fruit in the coming years.
Kiwi can also be used to cover ugly chain link fences, just like I have seen done with grape vines.
