I’ve been too lazy to photograph and too lazy to garden so no pics, just status for future reference.  Garden is basically all planted and about 10 days later than the latest I have ever been but it should be OK.

Front parkway seeded and reseeded.  Cleome growing wild on street side.  Catnip is very strong with seedlings in multiple areas all over front.  A 3 cu ft. container of catnip growing wild on veranda.  The objective for this garden is to have it reseed itself with little to no human intervention other than the occasional watering and weeding.

Planted 5 dahlias purchased at Aldis and all 5 have sprouted and are starting to get big.  I didn’t know how big these plants get but they’re taking up a sizable area.   Added two new boxes in front and in back side parkway.  Moved container of chives from main roof into new front side parkway which should be easy to maintain and have some utility.  That container was falling apart up there anyway and it reduces watering on the main roof.  Yay.

All hot peppers planted in containers as well as 4 tomatoes.  I had to buy tomato singles for $2 per because that’s all they seem to sell around here nowadays.

Lots of new garden construction.  Tore down all caged positions from previous years and rebuilt them in a much simpler fashion.  Only 8 positions this year, 4 of which are tomatoes, one Cleome.  SE corner planters got a 6 pack of peppers and a 3 pack of peppers and 2 Cleome for bees and appearance.

Shouldn’t have left so much hose stuff outside but didn’t lose too much compared to previous years.

Used 20 cu. ft. of pine bark and 6 cu ft. mushroom compost and even with the reduction I’m somehow running out of potting mix with only 5 cu ft. of decent old stuff available that was pulled from main roof.  Main roof has all new potting mix so that should last a couple of years.  Not sure if I’ll downsize main roof again next year.  Watering seems to be easy so maybe this is now at a good level.

Lots of new debris clumps with native plants but I’m considering cheating and seeding them this week and I might water them this year since there is so much less other plants to water up there now.

That is all for now …  I hope to get pics up next time if I get motivated and the light is right.  It’s kind of hard to photograph seeds sprouting however.

PS.  Forgot.  The raspberries are 6 feet high and have been on a timelapse since the beginning of march.  I will timelapse them until they’re done in fall.

No pics.  I’m a bit behind updating this log book so this is a text update.  Pics will be coming soon when I get motivated.  Added 2 3’x2’x1.5′ = 9 cu.ft planters on main roof  which each take two tomatoes around Memorial Day and got all tomatoes, eggplants, habeneros, and even basil planted in time.   Because of the new arrangement somehow ended up with 15 caged positions instead of 14 per previous two years.  Found Cleome in four packs at the Menards parking lot guy.  Those have been successful companion plants for tomatoes.   I couldn’t find them anywhere last season.  I’ve been derelict on veranda level so everything is just growing as if it were maintenance free.  It will be interesting to see how the vines turn out growing wild.

Front parkway doing well.  Have good raspberries and two areas where the catnip returned but it took awhile for it to come up.  Usually that blooms at the end of June and right now it’s nowhere near close to blooming.  Like me and my gardening projects, Catnip is over a month behind schedule in my estimation.

I have given up this year.  I’m sick of watering — again.  This has become a common theme from year to year.  The alley vines were the worst ever this year even with my soaker hose solution.  The drought conditions we’re still under since July has been devastating without some sort of drip irrigation.  The tomatoes produced but the habeneros failed miserably for the first time.  Sunflowers turned out to be a terrible companion plant.  Eggplants did not produce much because of them.  Will need to come up with a plan for next year.  My main goal is to replace half the tomato containers with 7.5 cu. ft. ones.  This will be a 150% increase so I’ll be able to see how container size affects growth and productivity.  I did learn some things this summer so it wasn’t a total loss.  Will contemplate and post a list of what to do next year and what I learned this year.  Until then …

Still no pics.  Sunflowers are blooming so maybe I’ll go up there in good light and get some current pics.  Picked two BER throwaways on Celebrity in caged position 2.  Those were the only red ones so far.  All tomatoes look very green and some are growing in rather large bunches without BER so far.  This could possibly be one of the latest tomato harvests I’ve had.  So far no mites.  Some browned leaves on lower branches but that could be from lack of light and the plant rejecting them.  All 8 tomato plants look healthy.  Picked 4 good eggplants, 2 fat ones, 2 skinny ones.  The fat one in caged position 1 is almost as large as a tomato plant.  I have 2 habs shared in that container and they’re doing well too.  These fat eggplants might need their own large caged position.  They’re also producing some beautiful eggplants.  Should have taken a pic but already gave them away.  I’ll shoot a pic of the next harvest — probably in a couple days.

No pics for awhile.  I’ve been lazy plus nothing looks much different on main roof.  Veranda vines look healthy.  Have been using bucket method to water — filling buckets with water and then dumping water from the buckets.  This makes it easier to know exactly how much I’m watering.  The vines look much better than last year on veranda level but that could be due to weather and not my more accurate watering regime.  The alley vines look like they’re struggling to grow.  They look healthy — not like the constant on death’s doorstep they looked like at this time last year.  They haven’t grown as fast as previous years.  Usually the first level trellis is full by now but they look more like mid July growth.  Still two good months to this season so we’ll see.  Maybe they’ll grow later instead of simply giving up the ghost usually around the end of September.

Sunflowers are starting to bloom.  This seems late as well.  Habeneros still small.  I predict a small crop this year.  Ichiban eggplants (the skinny ones) look thinner this year.  The big fat eggplants look like they’ll produce some good ones however.  Tomatoes haven’t died yet and lots of greens.  Looks like that harvest will come in late too even though they produced a throwaway pretty early last July.  Need to do some roof work.  There might be a couple of leaks that need addressing.  Nothing to worry about though and possibly can be put off until next Spring.  That is all for now…

No photos for awhile. Everything got planted by 6/1, both seed and seedlings. Caged positions 1-14 are the same as last year. Tomatoes are 4 Celebrity, 2 Big Boys, and 2 Brandywines. Now that I’m on the lookout for spider mites hopefully that won’t be a problem this year. The buffer plants are different this year. No Cleome. I couldn’t find it in seedlings. May have to start my own seedlings next year — I don’t know. No cucumbers this year — only eggplant and habeneros. Analysis of my companion plant matching will be unraveled throughout the season.

Main roof NE corner will not be planted this year as a major reduction. That planter had around 25 cu. ft. of potting mix. I will slowly dismantle it and clean up that corner for maybe more (and better built) caged positions next year. SE corner loses one 3 cu. ft. container. Habs go into that corner this year with sunflower companions. We’ll see how well that works.

Added new levels and containers to veranda level and retired some old containers from the original year #1 in 2002. They finally fell apart. Alley vine containers receive a soaker hose for a poor man’s version of drip irrigation. The goal this season will be to get automatic drip irrigation working to some level of reliability. Once in place it will be possible to stop the yearly garden reduction and perhaps expand next year.

Weather has been cold and dreary. Photos forthcoming once things start growing.