Another week of erratic weather, another week of spasmodic plant growth, another week of harvests.
I have 3 blueberry plants which I bought about 18 months ago. They are growing in pots. Two are fruiting at the moment. Both are evergreen varieties, one of them is a Nelly Kelly, the other is unknown as I lost the label. Any fruit they bore last year was taken by the birds but this year the birds seem to be leaving them alone (touchwood). Whilst the crop isn’t large it is nice to be able to pick a few each time I go out to water.
Other than the blueberries my crops this week are all veggies.
The occasional warmer day is a good excuse to start eating a lot more salad.
A forage around the potato bed yielded these:
A few remaining overlooked broad beans:
I also harvested a couple of womboks this week. Two of which had some usable leaves but the third was so infested with caterpillars that it has to go to the chooks.
Finally a couple of perennial favourites. I don’t think there is a week that goes by when I don’t harvest spring onions and silver beet at least once (if not more often). This week was no exception.
One day soon I hope I will start getting some more summery crops but in the meantime I will have to content myself with looking at other people’s over at Daphne’s.
Glad to see you are having better luck with the blueberries this year. Your potatoes always look so good!
I can only envy people who manage a usable blueberry harvest. Our only gives trickles too – it wouldn’t be bad if all the berries ripened at once.
I wonder if you have to net your Blueberries. Their fruit is irresistible to blackbirds, who will seemingly stop at nothing in their eagerness to steal it. I’m considering buying a proper fruit-cage for mine.
I’m too scared to net in case I catch a bird but a fruit cage sounds great. I will do a bit of googling…
Lovely berries even if the harvest is small right now. And too bad about the cabbage, but I bet the chickens loved it and the caterpillars.
Those fresh salad leaves look good… and the blueberries… and the potatoes. Not so sure about the caterpillar-nibbled wombok though – but until a few minutes ago I’d never heard of a wombok, so I’ve learned something new in reading your post!
After 3 Blueberry plants that just refused to do anything, I have given up on them and stuck with the raspberries and blackberries! Your potatoes look excellent, we didn’t have a very good year with the potatoes, think they were starved of water whilst we were were away for a month and didn’t get their daily drink from the garden carer (daughter!)
However we have been picking spinach from plants that went in well over a year ago, they just keep reshooting. Lettuces going fine, this time around, now that we have ensured the chooks can’t escape and eat the whole crop like they did a couple of months ago. Plenty of Spring Onions from the cut off root ends I just keep replanting. Always a joy to pick anything edible from the garden.
I need to improve my chook fortifications – they demolished one of my kale plants yesterday before sitting on the bush beans and squashing the lot.
Very nice. I had blueberries in pots for 5 years and used to get a couple of handfuls of berries. They’ve been in the ground now for about 3 years and I’ve only had about 10 berries at best. I almost want to take them out and put them back in pots. Ah well.
Likewise I have had broadbeans and potatoes, but am between lettuces (they’ve either bolted or are too small for picking) so envy your luscious lettuce basket.
I wonder if the acid content of the soil/potting mix affects their fruiting?
This weather is doing my head (and veggies) in! I’ve just covered the kitchen table with seedlings from the Bunning’s special in an attempt to stop them from frazzling in the next two days of predicted high 30s temperatures.
I also had three blueberry bushes in tubs. One died, one was severely pruned by the chooks and the other has oh, maybe 3 blueberries looking decidedly green. Sigh.
Oh lord I never thought of chooks eating my blueberry plants – another reason to protect them I guess. Hopefully your 3 remaining berries ripen soon.
Have a great Happy New Year. And, if you celebrate Christmas, then a very Happy Merry Christmas 🙂
I never had luck with wongbok, although I tried growing them each year in spring or summer.
Ohhhh love those fresh harvested potatoes. Not easy to grow in our garden now. But Jerusalem artichoke can do well here as substitute.
Many interesting varieties you are harvesting this month.
Keep Cool.
Happy New Year!
I only have 2 blueberry bushes, bought them in June. One is Brigitta and the other is blue rose. I harvested a small handful from blue rose and it seems to be finished fruiting for this year. Brigitta still has green berries.. I was keeping an eye on two very large blue ones, but it appears a few mornings ago someone/something stole them! Not happy! =o(
I have lost a few too – I considered netting but we have a lot of immature birds in our garden and I really don’t want to catch one so I don’t net. I am considering a more rigid structure than a net that the birds can’t get caught in though.