Eating from the garden

So far today... raw shelling peas, a strawberry (they are tailing off now), and snap peas and spring onions with rice as part of dinner. The raspberries are coming along nicely, beans are galloping up the fence, soup peas need tying up again, winter squash and cucumbers are starting to run, tomatoes have lots of flowers and a few small green fruit showing, carrots are nearly to the point of pulling babies.

Non-successes this year so far: corn (only about 5 came up and they are looking very sad), chickpeas (three came up, though they are looking OK and will make seed) and one lot of sunflowers which just aren't getting enough sun.

Introducing my raised bed vegetable garden

My garden is located in a small town on the West Coast of Canada. Climate is very similar to that of Vancouver, Seattle, or the southern UK: long cool springs, a couple of dry months in the summer, long cool fall/autumns, and a wet soggy winter that's mostly above freezing but gives us a few days or weeks of front, ice or snow each year. My last frost date is about Apr 30th, first frost date in fall in November sometime.


My lot is long and skinny - 40ft x 215ft - and the house is set a long way back from the road, so much of my garden area is in the front. Out front by the road is a herb garden, then moving towards the house comes an area which is currently under cardboard mulch to turn it into more veggie beds, a 26 ft x 12 ft plastic tunnel greenhouse (hoophouse, high tunnel, polytunnel, whatever you want to call it!), a gravel parking area, then the house. Out back there's an area behind the house which used to have a deck over it and will become a patio, then the main raised bed vegetable garden.



Growing at the moment are peas (three kinds, 6 batches), potatoes, garlic, raspberries, broccoli, rhubarb, walking onions, brussels sprouts, blueberries, storage onions, green onions, carrots, parsnips, chickpeas, strawberries, tomatoes, radishes, and lettuce. I'm still waiting for the squash, corn, cukes, watermelons, cantaloupes, edamame and pole beans to come up!