Winter Garden Produce

The array of colours, forms and textures created by companion gardening is evident in this photograph of beet leafs emerging from carrot fronds, neighboured by leeks.

Fennel and... companions

Companion gardening wisdom is that fennel is a no no for growing along with other plants. As luck had it, some carrots appeared in the midst of my recently planted fennel bed. The fennels are mature enough to be approaching their second harvesting. The image to the left shows a carrot harvested on Saturday that was growing cheek by jowl with a couple of fennel plants, there are others still sitting there. The coin next to it for scale purposes is a 5 yen, which is 2.2 cm in diameter, sorry I forgot to measure the carrot and it was eaten on the day of harvest, delicious. The only problem was, as can be seen, some splitting, which is the result of uneven watering, i.e., a dry spell followed by lots of rain. I will harvest more carrots soon...

5 yen coin:
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Three Sisters bed

Here is an image of the three sisters companion planting bed. This seems to have been a practice of native American, and is very effective indeed; the plants grow in harmony, and the weeds are having a real tough time growing; a win - win situation in my book. The French beans here are a purple variety, unfortunately they revert to green on cooking, but fortunately the taste simply delicious.

Sunflowers

Here is a photograph of one of the varieties of sunflower I planted, Earthwalker which grows to Triffid dimension, over 2 metres tall with multiple large heads, ring of fire, which I think is this one here, and Little Dorritt, which is a yellow dwarf variety. The large ones grow in among the other plants, e.g., tomatoes, peppers, beans, apple trees, etc., to attract beneficial insects and to divert the unwanted bugs. They add a lot to the garden, towering above everything else, and with lower heads in the midst of the lush green backdrop.

Courgette Flower

Here is a photo taken of the courgette flowers. We have three varieties of courgette growing; lungo bianco, genovese and rugosa friulana; they vary in appearance, and texture and flavour. Bianco is white, and with small seeds but large fruits, genovese is a standard courgette, light green and striped. The latter is a rather rugged shaped courgette, which retains more of its texture after cooking. The plants are growing vigorously around the garden and in pots. in one bed there are three courgette plants, four or so sweetcorn, and a bunch of french bean plants growing together, harmoniously, if densely. These and the other courgettes are fed weekly with a liquid manure made from chicken manure, but with the rainy season finishing this feeding will be doubled.

Zinnia

Well today it is raining down in waterfall proportions with occasional lightning bolts variably near and far. So, the blog will be updated with some photos. Here is a one of the zinnia's growing in the garden. I don't know, but the amount of seeds that I sowed and the number of flowers that have grown are out of proportion; 10 to 1 at least! I sowed and I watered regularly, I sowed into pots and many did not survive the transplanting. I have more in pots, and they are growing well, marigolds in particular.
I like this zinnia, and think it is called whirligig. Closer inspections will reveal that it has been eaten, and that is probably why many of the others did not survive. But, I am of the view this is my first year growing flowers, so I am taking this as a learning process and will keep trying, this year and next.

Compagnion Gardening Savoy Cabbage, etc.

Here is a picture of one of our savoy cabbages growing in a companion plot, which still is mostly of brassicas as this was one of first steps towards companion gardening. There are savoys in stages of development, this is one of the bigger ones, there are far less mature ones further along the row. But as you can see there is a good sized cabbage, not great, and there are companions growing alongside. Will harvest and cook some of these this weekend; it is quite a pleasure to pick and eat vegetable so fresh, and also to see Hannah and Aya enjoy eating what we have produced together.