Monday 26 October 2015

Late October / balcony update

The nice weather has returned and it's lovely to be out in the garden. It's going to rain this weekened but that's great, as we'll be out of town.


I started this spearmint from a garnish and it's growing strong, no runner shoots yet though.


My common mint looking kind of ratty, small leaves. Root bound already? Cut it back?


These buk choy will be ready to start harvesting in a few weeks. The cages are working well as protection. I might be able to remove the cages soon as the rats seem to only go after young plants. I have started some more varieties in seed trays.


Keeping my celery covered for now. Will take them off if we get a really hot day, don't want them to cook. Will take the last of the radishes soon and plant out my new chinese cabbage/buk choy here along with the celery.


Macro photo, bee feeding on lemon blossom.


Lime blossom.


Sweet banana, blossoms haven't opened yet.


Spider in my pea plant. I'm learning not to be bothered by spiders. They should eat a few whitefly/aphids after all.



I tried planting some rocket and asian greens here. But they are just too leggy. So far only the sorrel is really doing well here. I wonder what else I can try. Shade tolerant flowers?



Shallots are reaching a good size. Just waiting for the tops to start to die off.


Caps and eggplants.


Eggplant looking good but no flowers yet. I might remove the cage forward thinking, as I won't be able to fit the greenhouse cover over late autumn with it on.


Opal basil.


A few more marigolds to plant out. Normally I start from seeds but I can get seeds from the spent heads later. I really like these varieties.


Zucchini, black.


Squash. It's looking a bit sickly, deformed leaves and pale. I have a new one just breaking the surface now. So I might remove this one, but I'll give it a bit longer to see if it spruces up.


Marketmore cucumbers.


White cucumbers.


Even the spinach area is getting a tiny bit of direct sun in the middle of the day.


Rainbow chard are doing great. I have 4 colours, only 2 the same.



I'll probably succession plant some more corn. It's getting full sun from about 1 PM - 6 PM now, and a little more each day. The ones in the back are an inferior quality and also receive the sun a bit later, so are smaller but I think they'll be okay.


Lemon blossoms, soon to be lemons.


The lemon tree. A bird landed on it and broke some of the branches but it has plenty of other new growth.


Lime bush. Lots of blossoms.



Blueberry is looking good. Not the huge fruit it's meant to get but we've had a few berries and they've tasted like blueberries - just a tad under ripe. After I prune it and repot it and give it some adequate protection next winter I think it'll be much better next season.


My chillis putting on some good growth.


Sunflower.




Won't be long until we have our first raspberries! I'll have to net these I guess, although we don't get a lot of parrots here.


Kohlrabi almost ready.



The rat(s) had taken to pinching broad beans. Climbing up on this fence ledge. So I put some bait on them. Despite not touching the other baits for the most part and avoiding all the traps, it looks like he made a fatal mistake last night. Hopefully my bean seedlings will be safe now when they come up in a week or two.


I've harvested most of the mature broad beans. They probably won't last much longer. Not many new beans forming and some seem bad. It's been a fun thing to grow for the first time.





First tomato flowers. They may or may not produce fruit, I'm told. Plants are doing quite well, look dark green and strong.



On the balcony, my potatoes appear to be dying down. I think they're almost ready to harvest. Or could it be by tying them, I damaged the stems somehow? The angle of the sun is reducing how much sun they get, although they don't get shaded by the big oak. I might bring them downstairs to give them a bit more sun in final weeks, and because I probably won't want to harvest them upstairs. Then again if it is something like late blight, then I don't want them anywhere near my tomatoes.




The strawberries look good, no flowers yet though. Runnerless? Not quite.


Basil. I'm trying to get this one nice and big and overwinter it.


Habanero still very small. Must be very slow growing.


Razzmatazz on the other hand growing nicely and bushing out already. 

 

Aerial shots of my garden including my sad looking hedge.


Although I have so many already I am trying to germinate some seeds from my prolific, bushy little birdseye chilli plant from last season. Unfortunately the only seeds I saved were inside frozen chillis. I've sown maybe 50 seeds so I only need one or two to be viable. We'll see!


My neighbour is growing different varieties of dwarf lemon and lime to mine. 

I'm heading off to Melbourne for the weekend. I'll give everything a spray down with Natrasoap before I go. Happy gardening!