Cardiff Garden Blog

So I am hoping I see a lot more of these purple balls. This is a purple variety of tomatillo I have growing. I have had success in the past with the green variety but never to many purple ones. All that I had never really produced fruit until this year. Plant still looks healthy too.  Here is another tomatillo variety the green type. It's grows very wildly and stretches well beyond its roots. This one is in a pot that you can barely see in this photo.  Another angle  The fruit grow into what looks like Chinese lanterns hanging on the branches. They start small and eventually outgrow their paper wrapping. They often have a sticky sap on the outside of the fruit as well. It tastes a bit between a cross of pepper and tomato. Great for salsa. I even have some growing from seeds deposited from tiny fruit from last season. Always cool when nature does the work for ya!

Lots of pepper variety in the garden this summer. From left to right: jalapeño red and green, rainbow bell, Hungarian Cheese, Santaka, Bulgarian Carrot, Dancing Spirit, and Cayenne. I have others growing as well just not pictured here including Lantern Habanero, Cubanelle, and Joe's Long Peppers.  Who doesn't like a little variety. Not all are spicy but I would say over half are. Always want a good variety of colors as well. 

These pink beauties are Indigo Rose tomatoes. They were some seeds I saw in a catalog and just had to have because I had never heard of them.  Also have other types of tomatoes growing this year too The yellow small tomatoes are super Snow White. You can see some peppers in the background as well. It's been another good year for spicy and non spicy peppers.  Looking forward to tomatillos coming in by the end of the summer. 

I planted pumpkins and squash not long ago in the raised mounds. The mounds are made up of compost and soil. The seeds do better in mounds because of the drainage and loose soil. It's good to structure them with a bit of a indent in the center like a volcano. That way when you water it the water can sit and then drain.  Two weeks later. And still growing 

It was a good year for carrots. I pulled about 5lbs from the ground. Those purple carrots are dragon carrots. All pretty tasty.  Looking forward to planting more in the fall maybe. 

This year I'm growing a wide variety of tomatoes and peppers. This variety is red zebra and you can tell by the stripes why it's called that. I tried growing these last year but started too late in the season to get viable fruit. This year I started in April and we had an incredibly warm spring.  Here's hoping for lots of sauces and salsa

Trying to make more of an effort to grow lettuce.  I've had minimal success in the past with lettuce mainly due to slugs and moisture levels. This year I've taken the potted approach to help alleviate the moisture problems (and hopefully the slugs too). In this pic you can see some butter crunch and freckled lettuce. I've got these on my deck where they'll get lots of light. The lettuce I've already tasted was delicious (from larger plants) and so fresh. Looking forward to that first salad.

I know it doesn't look like much in winter.  Pretty scarce but this vine growing on the steps is the same one that produces bowlfuls of Boysenberries in the summer. But now it's winter and it was time for a haircut. This past weekend I went about trimming off the dead stuff from the vine and trying to remove dead leaves as well. I've found that leaves aren't very helpful to the soil because they create a barrier level blocking the healthy plants from growth. I've weaved the vines themselves in and out of the spindels of the staircase to both support and give them some direction. My hope is the healthy haircut will help inspire healthy new chutes and vines. Also in this box you can see my Elephant Garlic already looking huge and no where near ready to pick.  In the pots are strawberries I've transplanted from a garden box.

So this is the year I said I was going to be more organized in my gardening efforts.  And by that I mean both planting and documenting my crops.   In past years I've planted in a very unorganized and probably unhealthy patterns. Usually based in what areas were growing hot spots.  My yard has about 8 raised beds and all get different amounts of sun and moisture due to their location in relation to the yard and exposure.  Some were built with better soil preparation than others.  Some were built early on in my gardening endeavors and suffered from a lack of experience and knowledge on how to set a proper garden box. I set out this winter to rectify my garden boxes in a way that I hadn't done intially. I removed or transplanted all my existing plants to either new locations or pots to facilitate a soil change.  I went about digging down a few feet in each box to ensure good root growth but also to turn the soil in a way so that I wasn't just pulling nutrients f

I am always looking for new vegetables to grow and eat, and this year is no exception. What you see are juvenile Kohlrabi plants.  I've never eaten or grown Kohlrabi so here's hoping I like it. Kohlrabi is supposed to be similar in taste to cabbage heart or broccoli stem but sweeter.  Sounds interesting.  I love the vibrant purple and green colors.  It's supposed to grow into a round root I'd say the size of a cantelope.  Its in the same family as cabbage and broccoli with its leaves looking very similar. I will definately have to update the blog later with the fully mature vegetable when I pick.  I think I have about 20 or so planted both in the ground and some in pots. As with most of my plants I've started these from seed.  I have some in beds outside that were started and some that I've started indoors with my indoor setup.  Both seem to be doing fairly well considering our mild winters here in San Diego. (Zone 10)