Date Night at Ogden Botanical Center

I told you I was behind on things and by golly I was not lying. Waaay back in mid-June, A~ and I had a nice little date night out together at a local garden park. The Ogden Botanical Center is the sister site to the Davis Botanical Center which is our local Botanical center, the place where A~ and I did our Master Gardener training.

Of course, as with any time I get around a bunch of flowers, I took a bunch of pictures... Enjoy.

Two things A~ and I love are Gardens and Art. So of course, we had a great time.

The walking paths through the gardens were lined with booths set up by local artists. We walked through and enjoyed and thought about some time in the future when we could maybe buy the art we love... one day.

Looking out from the bridge in the "Japanese Garden" section of the center, we see the raised garden beds of the centers vegetable gardens. We walked through the garden and sat on the wide edging of the beds and determined then and there that in our next homes garden we will invest the money necessary to build this type of raised gardens. Bending was limited, the height was just right and the beds were narrow enough (I would guess 3 feet) to easily allow for reaching across them.

Just a very nice little river feature, oh and I love any kind of garden structures!

One of the local farms was out selling their local made ice creams. I think the tractor was just there for looks. It was a nice one though, old but perfectly restored.

Over in the evening shade near the rose garden was a very nice little Pavilion with a local String Ensemble playing classical music. We sat and listened for a time and just enjoyed each other.

Then, of course, we had to take time to smell the roses...



Is that not a beautiful rose?

We weren't the only ones out enjoying the garden.


As we were leaving, I noticed a little feature that I would suspect probably escapes a lot of the visitors to the Center; it was a Swale. A swale is a garden landscape feature that works in conjunction with the terrain's natural drainage tendency to help slow rain runoff and to allow the ground to receive more water.

In the Arid areas of the western United States like the one where we live, this is a great technique for capturing water that would otherwise find it's way to our rivers via the fastest way possible and the faster the water runs off the more sediment it takes and erosion that is caused. Bad all the way around.
Above you can see the way a berm was built along the contour of the lawn area. The area to the right of the lawn is a hillside that would naturally runoff a lot of rain water in our stormy seasons.
The berm make a shallow area between the hillside and the lower area that allows the water to slow and pool. During a large storm, this area will no doubt fill quite a bit and become a temporary pond area. As the pond sits, the water has a chance to percolate into the ground hyper saturating it and allowing a water plume to flow under ground where it can be used for months by the plants and trees around the gardens.

All in all we had a great time together that night. After walking through the gardens we headed down town to try out a new restaurant that we've thought of trying for some time. The food was good, deserts were great (Creme Brule for A~ and fried peaches and ice cream for me!) and we needed a walk around the block to let it sit.

Good times... Good Times!
Best to you all.
P~

When life gives you lemons...

Well, maybe it's because you have a new Meyer lemon tree??

Alright, I admit it, I'm cheesy. But I did get a new Improved Meyer Lemon Tree last weekend.

I've been wanting one of these for a couple of years now. Then, last year when I got some of my mom's lemons I was sold. They are soooo good! So Saturday afternoon, my gift for my (gulp) thirty ninth birthday, was a lemon tree.
And here she is. My little limoncello machine! right there in her current home in the greenhouse. We've been having some really off again on again cold spells punctuated by hot days so I think I;'ll keep her in there for another couple of weeks to be safe. Later she'll be in a nice pot that I inherited from my uncle and will be kept outdoors for the summer.

And there's lots going on in that thar greenhouse too. As you can see below. I can hardly move around in there any more.There's lots of tomatoes, a lemon tree, peppers, cantaloupes cucumbers, tomatillos, marigolds, herbs...
Even some pumpkin starts that are doing really well.
And I found this on one of the little heartland tomato clones that I was able to hold over the winter. Guess there's no better testament to a healthy plant than that huh?

But Wait! There's more... There's life outside too!
Our onions are coming along well, and just about ready for a good mulching with some straw. I would love to do it earlier in the season, but our winds here just undo all my hard work.
It may be hard to see, but this bed has one of our first carrot plantings of the year growing up in it. There's five rows with a couple of extra wide spaces in the middle section. On either side of the bamboo stakes that are laying there will be planted beans for this year. The carrots will grow right along with them in the shaded area.
Here's a closer look.

And some peas. These are not doing too well. Late winter storms beat them up. Not the cold mind you but the winds. They broke a lot of them off right at ground level.

The first Kohlrabi plantings had trouble too. notice the front (windward) side of both beds were hit the hardest?
This bed has my bok Choi Chinese cabbage and is surrounded by carrots. Later in the season I'll fill the bed in with pumpkins and squash.

Not much to say... more peas!
And last but not least, the potato garden. Lots of green popping up here too!

So there you go, all caught up right? well, kind of... still have a couple more posts that I'll try to get up soon. Too much to do, not enough time!

hope all's growing well with you all
P~

Yes..yes...yes I really do have a garden.

Well I was starting to sense a coup, so I figured I had better do what I can to get some darn pictures up here. Call off the dogs Mike...I give!
I'm not going to write a bunch right now, but suffice it to say that A~ and I have been busy busy busy. I've been doing some more writing for GRIT magazine, meeting too many deadlines at work, urban-farming nearly double the space and still trying to make sure that I spend some good quality time with the family. Something had to give. We do have some great ideas brewing for later this summer or maybe this fall though, so don't drop me off the reader just yet OK?

And with that... let's take a walk... I guess that sign about sums it up huh?
You may notice along the way that sunflowers are a recurring theme this year. Let me just say that the bees and insect life have been having a hey day.
This area was one of the last ones in the yard that needed to be finished. It's nearly there...phew!
Remember that new lasagna garden that I tried out this year. It's been kicking some serious butt! My pepper plants and eggplants are a couple feet tall, healthy and I've gotten more peppers already this year than I've gotten any year past.
You can see the ichiban eggplants are getting ready to come on this week too.
This is A~'s favorite part of the garden this year I think. We found this fountain on clearance for over 50% off and had to pick it up. Those are Romas in the background by the way. I have a tone that are getting ready to start turning soon. I got a few this evening. they were nearly as big as my fist.
A new addition to the garden this year.
Artichokes are just coming on. I should get a couple yet this summer, but I'm hoping to over winter them in the forthcoming greenhouse. (more to come on that soon I hope.)
Here's the northside garden. The first five beds you see were the original garden. Beyond that was added this year. (yeah... I told you we've been busy.)
Okra is doing well. I hoped it would come faster but our cold spring didn't help. Oh well, my first year really trying it.
More tomatoes... They're coming on strong now.
Marcello...king of the garden.
The potato patch. The plants are starting to die off so I'll be pulling them soon.
Here's the view from the street. btw - all of those sunflowers are volunteers from last year.
we love these ones... they're called teddy bears.
These are some of my favorites too. they have the big heads like I like, but are only about four feet tall. The bees love em too.
Speaking of bees, check this picture close up. (click to enlarge.) there are at least three different species here I think.
And finally, the fruits of the labors. This was tonights harvest. 17lbs of cukes, zucchini and tomatoes. We're gonna be slicing and drying a bunch of those for sundried tomatoes. Can't wait.
So then, I guess that's a pretty good representation of what's been happening on the farm so far. Some things are behind a bit, others are going like crazy. You know, I guess thats just how it goes though.
Hope all's growing well for you all. Hope to be back soon.
P~

June 21st - 30th (Update II)

The flowers are doing great this year as well. I snapped a couple this week and thought I'd share.These are daisies that we were given by a neighbor. They are VERY prolific!
Honey suckle is going crazy both in the front yard and the back too. I've spotted tons of bees, dragon flies and even a couple of humming birds on this stuff so far.

This is a patch of self sown Sunflowers that we've let have their way, too a point, in this part of the yard. I have tomatoes vining their way around between them as well. It's an experiment in permaculture and poly culture gardening.

We let a bunch of other hybrid sunflower varieties go to seed last year too and this year have an interesting mix of what they decided to come up as this year. They are not type true from last year, but are very fun to watch develop.
This one (above) is already nearly 7 feet tall. The fence that you can barely see stretching off at the bottom of the picture is a 6 foot one! This was from seed that I shook off the heads of our sunflowers from last year.

The picture above and the next two as well show the different phases of what were called "teddy bear" sunflowers last year. They're supposed to be short. 30ish inches. These are 5-6 foot!





And this funky little guy came from the same seed, but is totally different. Short and with a different flower type. Must be the other half of the equation??!

Hope you like. Remember, nature is the best gardener of all. Sometimes we have to step aside just a little and see what she's got in store for us.

All the best.
P~