Total garden update

Out front I've been picking one or two strawberries from time to time. I only have six plants and four of them I pinched back the flowers on so the roots could get more established. The other main crops out there are basil and dill. Below is this spring and summer's basil compared with the much yellower and smaller basil that I've had going inside all winter.

Also pictured: fig tree, flowering lemon basil, strawberry.

There's also been some poppies flowering and a lone cosmos (not pictured) although the plants themselves are huge. Too much nitrogen? I have to admit I don't pay much attention to that pot, even though I'd love to have more flowers. And there are ground cherries forming! This plant has been pretty chewed up by, I think, flea beetles, you can see a lot of holes in the leaves below.

On the back deck the baby lettuces and arugula are chugging along, big enough to munch on. I also moved the flooded drawer and put my winter parsley and some burnt up pansies in it. The pansies have flowered but the got really damaged by the sun and heat when they were out front so I doubt they're long for this world.

Lettuce on left, arugula to the right. 

Parsley and pansies.

The winter arugula I moved from inside has flowered, which I've never had happen before. Maybe I'll be able to collect seed?

Hard to see with all that green in the background.

Then downstairs things are really happening. First I ended up throwing all my leftover starts into one of the landlords' beds (after clearing it with them first) since they never got around to planting anything in them.

It's also pretty shady so I don't have high hopes but there's a ton more tomatoes (sun gold cherries and black krim), eggplants, cucumbers, potato, and sweet potato. Then in my beds there's finally some fruits!

Baby tomatoes, sun gold cherries.

In the center of the photo, shaded, a baby cucumber.

And along the right side the clover and wildflowers I seeded have germinated.

There's a piece of metal fencing laid over the smaller seedlings to prevent animals digging. I've already found that the dog loves messing around with my branch/twig mulch, but not so much after rotting leaves are laid over.

The non-edibles

I haven't talked much about the back garden outside of the beds but I've been playing around with few areas. Around the beds there isn't much more than 12" of space along the shorter sides and between the two, so everything gets walked on without having enough sun to get any grass established. I did try growing some crimson clover at the sides but there's not even enough sun at this point for that, so I've ended up using some piles of branches that have been sitting back there for at least a couple of years as mulch, topped with pulled weeds.

In front of the sunnier bed, to the right of the bed is a sedum that blooms in September.

I recently extended the mulch to the right of that bed where there's more space. This is where there's a ton of tulips planted, some of which I dug up and plan to replant a little further away from the bed. I love the tulips but while they're in bloom they come right up to the bed and I can't reach that side of it without stepping all over them. I wish I had a good picture of them in bloom but sadly I never took one.

March 19th

March 29th

April 17th

The final picture gives some idea of how they grow right up to the bed. Below is how it looks now.

Most of the dried tulip leaves and stems have been broken off by either myself or the dog, and sedum has gotten huge, at least 2' in diameter. I'm still hoping to grow some clover and maybe shade tolerant wildflowers back there, but we'll see how the animal traffic and sunlight situation plays out.