Late Summer Garden
Summer Garden is what he have a lot to write about, yet I will post mostly pictures . A lot has happened since my last blog post on our garden.
Europe underwent a strong heat wave for weeks on end. We had hardly any rainfall that all the lawns were completely dry and our summer garden looked also parched for water. There was even a ban on fireworks for our Swiss National day for fear of random fires.
Following that we decided to take a week off to France towards Paris area. Had a great holiday of sightseeing and adventure. The garden suffered a lot in our absence, due to neglect and the dry weather which accompanied the heat wave.
We tried to water our plants as much as we could. We could harvest a variety of vegetables, just the yield was not so much.
Making foot paths and vegetable beds
Making clear areas for vegetable beds and a proper foot path to access the vegetable patches were now of utmost importance.
We made the mistake of not clearly allocating the areas. The result was the weeds overgrew making it difficult for us to harvest or work in the garden.
We had a lot of tree trunks stored from last year after we fell all those pine trees. We used them to make borders for the paths. What was not enough we could collect from the forest. Luckily we needed only a few extra pieces. We have started laying the paths and covered these walking areas with wood chips. This will also enable us to pluck out the weeds easily. We made proper beds which will enable us to harvest on time.
The wood chips were purchased from http://www.landi.ch
These chips are the most ecological and the cheapest option.
Highlights of Summer Garden vegetable harvest
We harvested a variety in our late summer garden. Some of them were Eggplants, Bell peppers, some chilies, Okras and Bitter melons.
The smaller variety of the chillies were very hot, but it gave us a good yield. I could freeze a few to last till winter. While clearing the weeds we discovered a Nostrano cucumber plant. We thought it was lost and wouldn’t pick up. Now harvested more ever since beginning of August.
This is one cucumber which I really like and can digest easily. We had some of the string beans. The yield was not very high due to lack of rain fall. From the compost of last year we could even get one Mexican cucumber plant. It started flowering a little late, but I think it will yield enough for our needs. We had too many of it last year. I am still left with one bottle which was pickled last year.
If are interested to see the changes in our garden, have a look at my previous blog post of our Organic Vegetable harvest .
