Garden One

The chives originate from ones I got from a friend of mine, who was/is a master gardener in Mason County. They have a darker red flower, and grow more robust leaves than chives commonly do. The salad burnet is coming back, just a thread of it, but the white alpine strawberry has one flower on it! The white-flowered rose campion is doing fine. The elephant garlic got crunched over, but will probably come back. I've planted more small ones near it. My preference is to simply cut the elephant garlic stalk off at the ground, and use it like a leek. That leaves the bulb to regrow (hopefully). I think that the Jostaberry is going to do fine. My parent Jostaberry fruited two years ago, for the first time, and I really like the complex flavor. I am not watering the garden very much, as I want the plants to send their roots VERY DEEP, to keep themselves watered. I also planted comfrey in the hole next to the nearby telephone pole, to bring up deep nutrients, and provide mulch for Garden One. Or chicken food for urban chickens. Or poultices for people. Just don't eat or brew the comfrey for yourself! One swiss chard, and one kale plant are doing ok. When they get bigger, people can harvest them, for eating raw (please wash in the artisan well) or taking home and cooking.

Garden One

May 2010 Started a plot in the hole in the sidewalk, e side of street. Dug it up, removed trash (not much). Did find that there was a layer of potting soil a few inches deep, and tried to mix it much deeper. The rest of the soil is very sandy/gravelly. I planted a P-22 apple rootstock, Jostaberry cutting, elephant garlic, chives, salad burnet, forget-me-nots, rose campion (probably the white variety), and alpine strawberry. I left a bit of chickweed, to reseed as a rainy-season annual. There is room for a Stella de Oro re-blooming daylily, a sorrel, and some kale and swiss chard.



May 2010 Someone dug up the chives and stole them. And the P-22 didn’t make it. Even though I planted it in the middle of a rainy day, I must not have checked the forecast, and we got lots of sun for a bit. The salad burnet is just barely making it. The elephant garlic looks forlorn, but will survive.


May 26, 2010 The jostaberry feels very firmly anchored, and is sending up a new sprout. Happiness! There is a lush crop of weeds, which I shall pull. I also have a kale start, and a swiss chard start to transplant there. As well as more chives. I’m going to wait a bit to replace the P-22, as I want to make sure that the replacement is firmly rooted. It may possibly have to wait until fall rains. :-(

Tuesday food thoughts

When I got home, I made the most wonderful salad! Lettuce from a local organic farm, kale leaves from volunteers in my garden, Indian Plum growing tip leaves, dandelion greens. Added chive blossoms, curly marjoram tips, lemon balm tips, and sweet cicely seeds.  Vinagrette from the store. Lettuce was grown 15 miles away, harvested by me about 12 hours ago. Other bits grown on my property, harvested by me about 10 minutes ago. Dressing was the only thing to travel. I am definitley going to manage the Indian Plum in the orchard more, to provide more tasty tips. This was from one that I had simply cut to ground level about 6 weeks ago. I may cut more of them down, while the rains are still here. Indian Plum and dandelions are bitter flavors, which I like. The Indian Plum has undertones of cucumber. The Sweet Cicely seeds are at the green and chewy stage, and taste like licorice.

Guerilla Gardening

May 2010 Why am I guerilla gardening? What is my aim? I really can’t bear to see bits of land in an urban setting growing nothing but weeds. I want to see something attractive/useful growing in those settings. Urban areas need more plant life, to mitigate rain, pollution, provide wildlife habitat, and encourage the spirit. I also love the idea of having food available to all who want to harvest it. I first thought about this years ago, when being aggravated about all the double-flowering plums/cherries planted in town for their flowers. If they were the single-flowering varieties, they would be producing massive amounts of FOOD. Why can’t public spaces be planted to food-bearing plants, and volunteer gleaning groups founded to harvest the fruit for the food bank? Why can’t churches grow fruit trees, berry bushes, strawberries for ground-cover, fruiting vines on trellises, and have the congregation help harvest it? The food could go first to anyone in the congregation who wants it, and then to the food bank. And if anybody else wants to harvest some for their own use-offer it freely. Why is there not an article in guidelines to urban forestry, that encourages nut and fruit bearing trees, fruit-bearing shrubs, food-bearing groundcovers? I want to establish plant guilds that provide food, and that produce seed for annuals, that can be then dropped into the next hole over. By the next telephone pole. In the next abandoned street planter. At the base of the next chain-link security fence. There are many plants that will establish themselves, be harvestable, and produce seed at the appropriate time for replanting, if given the chance. I have noticed flowers in several places in town, that are second-year salsify plants going to seed. Knowing that it is established in several locations, a person could look for the first year plants in the same locations, and harvest them to cook.