Hope this works, imagine having to tell her that her little guy was eaten by a deer It’s amazing to live in a place where there’s so much wildlife but I can imagine it’s a challenge when it comes to gardening!
We live in such an urban area that I’ve never even seen a hedgehog or a rabbit in this yard. I grew up on the edge of town and we’d see hedgehogs, foxes, rabbits and the like all the time (no deers here though ). I barely see anything other than snails and slugs and the neighbourhood cats here, unfortunately. We had to take down a large, dead (dangerous) tree a few years ago and now the constant birdsong is also gone. I am consciously trying to attract birds and insects through what I’m planting but some years that works better than others.
Can you/do you have birdhouses or perches? My neighbors have several up on posts (like a small flagpole) that the little birds seem to like. A birdbath can be a nice garden touch as well, and can be made of thrifted dishes/bowls etc. i saw one that had a tall vase as it’s base with a serving bowl glued on top.
I always felt that with all the neighbourhood cats lurking about, a birdhouse or bath would be a bit of a death trap! But I’ll do some googling, maybe there are cat-proof designs available?
We don’t really have hedges or bushes, so that doesn’t really help with the birds and hedgehogs. We’re doing some work on the house, and after that the yard will be next! As you can see from the pictures in the very first post in this thread we’ve already done a lot of work, but that was clearing out the yard. Now we have to slowly fill it up with plants again!
Here’s the strawberry jam! Jars are roughly pint-sized. After cleaning I had about a kilo of strawberries.
There may be more to come, our plants are producing like crazy. We only have about 20 of them in a very small patch.
Early June garden. Early morning. We had a bit of a late start and May was quite cool. Left beds…potatoes, rhubarb, garlic, tomatoes, okra, cilantro, various lettuces and greens, and chives. Right beds…beans, peas, radishes, cucumbers, sweet potatoes, summer squash, peppers, eggplants, kale, swiss chard, kohlrabi, beets, onions and bunch onions, oregano, basil, carrots, asparagus, and maybe one or two things I missed. We don’t plant much of each but our summer salads are fantastic. And we make spaghetti sauce, freeze beans, add summer squash to everything. Summer dinner is often a big salad and… Whatever we feel like adding.
And we have raspberries, blueberries, and pawpaws. All this in a small town backyard. yummy times ahead.
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Lynx
(In a world where you can be anything, be kind.)
371
So glad to see your garden. I was just thinking about you yesterday and wondering about it.
Your gardens are stunning. So professional and established looking.
My daughter and I have scraped out a sunny spot for a pumpkin “patch.” Like, literally scraped aside some grass and hoped for the best. I figure it’s a “year one, will we pay attention from start to finish” project and if we succeed in not wandering off then we’re talking about a lettuce table and/or small raised bed for year 2. Maybe sunflowers if we can stand to see them ravaged by birds.
The big news of the day:
“Little Guy” has minions! (When we planted him I had tossed a few seeds in with him in case the rabbits ate him right out of the gate.)
Our biggest pests in the garden are squash vine borer. The adult lays eggs that drop to the ground and the borer gets into the stem and kills the plan. I lay down ground cover and this year added a foil wrap to the stem. If the eggs can get to the dirt, you are pretty safe. We usually get most of a season of squash before we lose the battle.
And of course, bean beetles, leaf miners, aphids, pepper flies/worms, (I have forgotten all the correct names) and we seem to be rid of the groundhog who loves to eat all the leaves off the sweet potatoes (while we are on vacation) so we have few sweet potatoes. But I’m not sure about the rabbit…is there only one? Or do they take turns just to fool us?
Oh and the slugs, the sneaky eat all the seedlings in one-night slugs. ARGGGG. Off to replant carrots and more kale.
Mr. Lynx’s planting style is a bit overboard in my opinion. Ours squash plant isn’t doing well this year, but I picked almost 15 cucumbers today and there are almost that many that can be picked again.
I pulled the rest of our onions and potatoes. I hooe to attempt to successfully transplant some other veggies into that box and the box the snap peas were in because they are currently in small containers.
The carrots are doing ok, but not as great as last year. I planted the seeds further apart and I aim to put most of the ones I thin out in my mouth so I let them grow before removing excess ones. I had to plant more in some places because and the newbies are coming along nicely.
I have a planter with a kind of very short carrots that’s supposed to be ok to grow in shallow-ish containers. There’s also tatsoi in that planter. We’ve eaten a lot of it, but it wants to grow flowers. I realised I planted it too early or too late, and the light/lack of dark nights makes them flower. I’ve got a few tiny ones I planted later so I’ll see if they behave better.
The lavender is doing great, and the bees and bumblebees love it
Starting to harvest my shallot onions. I’ve lost a few that rotted and/or were eaten by something. The last few bunches look good however.
Picture of our herb boxes from when the chives were blooming. It survived the winter! As did the sage and tarragon in the background. The mint was planted this year. We also planted rosemary and thyme since we’ll use them a lot when cooking.
I always love the look of blooming chives! We don’t even eat them that often but I keep them in the garden just for the pretty looks.
I’m surprised that after a heatwave and both of us struck down with Covid anything survives in our garden, but some did! The basil and a few other things died though.
One courgette is thriving, the other is still hanging on. There’s a pumpkin and a squash plant in between them that are still alive but they’re still quite small and don’t have flowers. Not sure what those are going to do.
Three tomato plants, all alive!! This is actually the first time any tomatoes have survived to this stage so I have no idea how long it will take from here.
Our wee pumpkin is looking worse for the wear after a very hot stretch, minimal attention from the heat-addled humans and perhaps a bit of extra attention from some nibbling friends. I’ll try to get a pic later, if I can bear to admit my neglect. lol
Update: The main pumpkin vine was definitely damaged/wilted but appeared to be growing other roots. There are 2 other younger/smaller vines that survived the heat. They all look really wee though and not flowery or anything.
It’s amazing to live in a place where there’s so much wildlife but I can imagine it’s a challenge when it comes to gardening!
). I barely see anything other than snails and slugs and the neighbourhood cats here, unfortunately. We had to take down a large, dead (dangerous) tree a few years ago and now the constant birdsong is also gone. I am consciously trying to attract birds and insects through what I’m planting but some years that works better than others.
I figure it’s a “year one, will we pay attention from start to finish” project and if we succeed in not wandering off then we’re talking about a lettuce table and/or small raised bed for year 2. Maybe sunflowers if we can stand to see them ravaged by birds.
