Space and how you use it

Following up on queries about just how big my garden is and how I fit so much in there, here are some pics, and some points to help shed some light. This is my balcony from each end:

So you can see it is quite long, not so wide, and shaded in 1/3rd of it by some slats. It is about using whatever space I can to plant the things that I want, and throwing out all sage gardening advice about planting spacings. Here are some more pointers:

• I once saw this amazing lady on Gardening Australia who has a 'proper in the ground' garden, i.e. a plot with ample space, and she used every square centimetre. Traditional plant spacings went out the window as beans heaped upon more beans and lettuces sidled right up to herbs. And you know what - despite the fears of gardening gurus - her garden was magnificent. Things grew and fruited and flowered and all was well. So, in honour of her, I say to hell with the garden advice, do what you like and plant as closely as you darn well feel like it (just remember which plants are good and bad neighbours.) I mean, what's the worst that can happen? They might die? Well I hate to break it to you but plant death is just a part of gardening. But so is experimenting and finding out what varieties work at what spacings and in what part of the balcony. And really, if they don't work out, then don't plant so much  next season. Don't believe me? See the lettuce below - they should have a good 25-30 cms between them according to normal logic - but that's only a 40cm long pot and that's at least 6 plants in there. Sure they didn't grow massive, but they have lasted several weeks worth of meals, and when they're done, I can grow two more crops in their place before the summer is out (new soil, new or cleaned pot of course.)

• Or you could grow corn and beans in a medium sized pot. Two of the three sisters in action right here:

• Better yet, grow 6 types of tomatoes, basil, lettuce and celery in the same pot, I dare ya! (to get an idea of size, this is two large polystyrene containers placed together. We call in megapot here in the balcony garden.

• It is all about having a mixture, of plant types (vegetable, fruit, tree, flower, native, succulent, etc) of plant heights and planting spaces. Big pots, little pots, vertical pots, hanging pots, fit them in however you can.

• Don't scrimp on potting mix, if you want lovely flowers and ample veg in small spaces you have to have or make the best. It isn't cheap, and on a student budget I find it tough, but it is something I wont budge on.

• Vermiculite is also your really, really good friend.

• Grow things that you like to eat and look at. If you don't like tomatoes, or are allergic to strawberries then don't waste space on them. Can't stand lobelias, then don't plant them. And don't get stressed about free range planting and letting the garden wander where it wants. Worried that those tomatoes could grow to be over 2 metres high and simply wont fit the trellis - awesome! Let's see where they do once they outgrow the trellis. Let the garden amaze and inspire you and lead you to where it wants/can go.

• Always check the amount of weight your balcony can carry - we don't want it crumbling under the weight of soil and pots and taking you down with it. Plastic pots are a balcony gardeners best friend.

So really just have fun with it and keep experimenting. You'll fill your space and just when you think you can't fit any more plants in you will find more places and ways of getting them in there.

Up with the old and in with the new

 

The saying is usually out with the old and in with the new. I definitely got the last part right this week in the balcony garden, but the first bit was a little different. Instead of removing plants, I potted some up into bigger surroundings, leaving their pots vacant for newcomers. Oh and I guess I threw out the dead plants from megapot and a few others but who's being pedantic anyway?


Out - Winter greens such as broccoli, kale, snowpeas.

Up - Lime tree and Mr Fig twig into the biggest possible pots
        Hibiscus into the Lime tree's pot
       
In - Lots of Basil
      Mini White Cucumbers x 2
      Jerusalem Artichokes x 2
      Mixed Lettuce
      Corn x 2 lots of 5
      Purple Bush Beans with the Corn x 2 or 3 per pot
and ...

MORE TOMATOES!!! So many tomatoes. I might be dooming myself to failure, but fingers crossed    the varieties take off. Including the earlier planting discussed in this post, the varieties thus far are:

Red: Mortgage Lifter x 4
        Cherry Red x 2 (plus one more seedling but I might give that away)
        Red Tumblers x 3
        Oxheart (plus again I have a spare seedling which I might give away)

Green: Green Zebra x 2
           (seedling procured but yet to be planted) Aunt Ruby's German Green x 2
   
Yellow:  Golden Cherry Tomatoes x 3 (two in a large pot with the two red cherries and one on its own)
             Yellow tumbler (I wanted more of these but alas their hardly ever in the shop)
             Wapsipinicon Peach Tomato

Black: Black Krim x 2
           I had a black russian planted but it was very sickly so it got pulled early.

I have my eye on this dwarf heirloom mix from diggers, which would bring the tally, once all planted up to over 20 plants. That's a lot of tomato plants to die off if things go wrong, which they tend to do in this precarious little environment. Fingers crossed we have success this year.  

There is one megapot of tomatoes yet to be planted. The peach tomato, aunt ruby's german green and most of the heirloom mix are earmarked for it. Also, possibly, my lovely other half's mother may have a couple more seedlings for me which we will squeeze in somewhere.

Apart from putting cucumbers into the garlic pots once the garlic is harvested there isn't much more planting to do for the next few months. Time to sit back and  nurture this rather massive and diverse crop.

How to grow corn on a balcony

I never thought it was anything out of the ordinary, put seedlings in a pot and voila - corn! Though from everyone's encounraging and heartwarming reactions to last Monday's harvest post I guess it isn't the oft done thing. I do recall, when first deciding to 'corn-pot' that I googled around and only found a little info on the subject. One person grew it in a converted bathtub, and another in a big container, so I knew size mattered. Other than that I just stumbled in and hope for the best. After two seasons and a few good crops a few failed crops I am beginning to get a handle on this corn growing thingo. So here are a few tips, pointers and other things I've worked out about growing corn on your balcony. (I do note I blogged about this ages ago, but the post wasn't very informative, though it does contain a tonne of great pics and shows just how far I have come.)

1. Size does matter

Corn needs good soil, and lots of it, so you need something large enough to grow it in. The bigger the better, but given this is a balcony you also need to consider weight. The bathtub idea, while romantic when considering the claw footed beauties I'd seen in home magazine pictures of million dollar bathrooms weren't going to cut it here. Not even your standard bath, simply because of the weight. The solution ... polystyrene boxes. And the best thing was they were free! Lots of people grow in these things, and a regular one could fit about 5-6 corn stalks. That wasn't big enough for me, and I found they dried out pretty quickly so I put two and two together, and when I say that I mean I put two polystyrne boxes together (with their middles cut out) and made myself a megapot. Now this held even more corn and gave it enough nutrients to survive.

This is megapot above, when filled with this winter season's crops -broccoli, kale, lettuce and carrots.

2. Potting Mix

Same as I say for tomatoes, and for any vegetables, use the best potting mix you can afford/make. Corn seems to like to be fed, so do it.

3. Hand pollinate

Not with a toothbrush like you do tomatoes, (wierded out by that statement, then visit this blog post to get an understanding) but with the wind. The pollen from the tassels or corn flower (the bit that comes out of the top and has flowering sorts of things on it) needs to rendezvous with the silks (the lady bits) on the top of the little itty bitty corn (and yes the corn inside there pretty much is baby corn, give or take a few days.) Still confused, see below, the bits in exhibit A (left, flowers/tassels) need to meet the bits of exhibit B (right, silks).

 You need to do two things to help this along, and one is not to play Barry White on the balcony and leave glasses of wine lying around to set the mood. What you do need to do is to plant the corn in clumps so it has buddies nearby (another reason why megapot is the best) and then shake it a little when the flowers and silks are visible. Sometimes the tassels/flowers appear a lot earlier than the silks, just hang tight, and usually things work out. If not (which has happened) it could be because the temperatures are wrong for corn and unfortunately there isn't much you can do short of hoping someone else has a corn crop on the balcony next to you.

Each silk that is pollinated is a kernel so you want to make sure you  get that pollen where it is needed. If not you might end up with a sad looking corn like this:

or worse, you might end up with no corn at all. (the pot pictured well below with the 3 sisters technique is an example of weather causing odd growth, it sometimes happens, and you just have to go with it.)

4. When do I pick it?

Once they're pollinated they'll grow and fill out. You will see this happened over the next week or two until they look pretty big and juicy. The silks will brown off and you may even see kernels sticking out the top of it. That's when you know they are ripe. They'll also stick out at a greater angle than before, even up to 90 degrees, (see maths does come in handy in real life, thanks Mrs Fleet and Mr Kennelly for giving me the mathemetastical grounding to work out the ripeness of corn!) The corn below is almost right, it is starting to move away from the stalkm but needs to get a little fatter.

Once ripe just rip it off the stalk, or twist if you feel like being delicate. You can eat it without cooking if it is this fresh. It is great in salads or just as is. If it is a little old or mealy then cook it, just remember to remove the husk before serving.

5. Other little tidbits.

Try the 3 sisters technique ina really large pot (I did.) It is corn and beans and squash/pumpkin. In the first three sisters pot the corn went really well, the beans were tasty but the pumpkin died. I might try this experiment again next summer. Below is the only picture I have of of the second 3 sisters pot. The corn in this pot struggled as the weather was too hot and it got too straggly. I got a few ears of corn from this one, but not many. However, in this case, at least the zucchini thrived.

Also, corn isn't just yellow. I grew the most amazing yellow and white version last season and there are also fully white versions.

 If you want to go exotic you could grow other kinds of corn, red, black, blue, multicoloured. These versions aren't sweet and are often used dried, popped, ground or decoratively. Still they can look amazing and I am sure you could have all kinds of kitchen fun with these veggies. If anything this post proves that with the right knowledge and plannig you can grow just about anything on a balcony! Ever grown corn? Got any more suggestions? 

Harvest Monday (a.k.a. Harvest Porn for those in the Northern Hemisphere)

Not only do I keep forgetting to blog (I blame the fact my thesis came back, and yet I passed, I'm almost a Dr now!) but I keep forgetting to take picturess of all the harvessa but here are the bits I did remember. There have been more tomatoes, cucumbers and a barrage of apples (ok there were about 7 apples, but that's a barrage if ever I saw one) And this is a picture of but one ...

Tomatoes galore, though I've culled the broken down vines now (the usual wilt attacked them again) The black russian tomatoes were my absolute favourites. Here is some gratuitious tomato porn for those in the snowy, cold Northern Hemisphere. See, tomato bottom!

Three of the four of these delightful tomatoes were shared with the boyfriend in our dinner. In summer, dinner for me is usually a salad plate, and I just nibble away at it. The cucumber and tomatoes came in very handy for this task.

On Australia Day (26th of Jan, a very difficult day to reconcile in Australia's past) I used up a significant portion of the basil and garlic to make a pesto pasta salad. The cucumbers and tomatoes went in too, and it was a big hit at our picnic, along with my lemon curd and kiwi fruit pavlova.

Back to the harvest ... and there is a constrant stream of chillis.

The only miss was the corn. I got a few cobs fromt he first lot, which were delicious and shared with my parents on Christmas Eve. None of the second lot pollinated properly and this was the only cob I salvaged. Isn't it the saddest looking cob of corn you have ever seen?

I culled a significant postion of the summer plant from the balcony garden yesterday, no more cucumbers, only one tomato so harvest will be down for a while. But in their place are some broccoli seedlings and some kale, so harvests shouldn't be too far away.

For more harvest funtimes head on over the Daphne's Dandelions.

Harvest Monday (the first for 2012)

It's been a while since I managed one of these - so here are some pics of what I've harvested over Christmas.

Corn (about ten ears all up from this first batch)

Tomatoes (a few green zebras and lots of lemon drops and red tumblers), Cucumber (just one so far, but more to come), Basil (lots of basil)

I've also picked lots of mint of various kinds.

Ands nectarines, three of them, all tasting slightly different.

Gotta love a good harvest.

Harvest Monday

Well wont you just look at my lovely harvest. The corn, the pumpkins, the apples, the potatoes.

Ok so that's just the latest jigsaw. It took me 3 days, not bad for 1000 pieces.

But wouldn't that be just a wonderful harvest. No balcony garden harvest this week, only because I am not there!!! Good old Mr M is looking after my place while I am off in Adelaide visiting the parents. But just because I am away doesn't mean there was no harvest. From this garden we have had all sorts of goodies from eggplants

to rockmelon

and chillis

I cooked the eggplant and chilli in a pasta sauce for the family the other day which was yummy. The rockmelon you see here actually fell off the vine so I am not sure it is ripe which is a shame. I will be checking later today to see if it is salvagable. How was your harvest this week? Head on over to Daphne's Dandelions for more harvest posts.

Harvest Monday Extravaganza

I finally found my camera cord and uploaded the goodies so here is a parade of recent harvests and this week's harvest. It even has some golden globes! These harvests date back to just before Christmas, even so this little balcony garden has produced a lot.

Here was the pre-Christmas harvest and it saw the last of the snow peas. I actually picked a lot more tomatoes than that, several punnets worth, all from 2 little tumbler bushes. They died once I got back from Adelaide, as happens each year from some disease, but not before producing one large crop. I will certainly keep growing these.

And the New Years harvest which was massive (a.k.a. bye bye tomatoes) Most of this went into various salad dishes for a little new years eve shindig I had at my place. It was 42 degrees that day, so salads were all we needed. I was just glad that the garden survived my 10 days away, but with the wonderful garden sitter I have it was no wonder it was bursting with goodies when I returned.

And the most recent harvest which included 3 pumpkins, who were too infested with white fly to reach complete maturation. If only I could find more seedlings I could do a second crop :( I also thought I planted leeks, to my utter surprise turns out they were white onions!.

If you would like to see more harvests from around the world head on over to Daphne's Dandelions. A lot of these plants got ripped out of the garden yesterday in a big white fly control clean up, so harvests may be a little lean for the next few weeks, but we will see.