This butterfly iris began to bloom. It has been struggling in front of the fence, but hopefully with more attention to it, the iris will flourish again, all summer long. When I keep removing the spent flowers it keeps on blooming. This is currently a very popular plant for coastal landscapes. We used to have a long row of them in front of the fence, but they were plagued with uneven growth, apparently due to soil quality and light differentials. This is why we switched to a mixed garden in front of the fence.
Southwest Kitchen Garden Bed Planted on February 21, 2014
All the weeds are pulled from this bed. We had landscape fabric under some mulch, which had been overtaken with weeds and grass. Then I dug it up in most places, amended the soil with a bag of garden soil, raked it, and planted it with the vegetables okra, cucumbers, and eggplant. These plants, which “fruit” in the botanical sense, should be quite safe to eat from the lead point of view, because of the triple barriers to any lead from soil to the “fruit”.
- The soil to root barrier
- The root to stem barrier
- The stem to fruit barrier
Besides that the soil had been replaced after we had painted our house the first time.
Additionally, because there was a lot of space between the vegetable plantings, I sowed some flowers, blue bonnets, lavender, and some nasturtiums among vegetables and each other. I hope I will be able to distinguish most of the seedlings as they emerge, because there were a lot of weed roots that I could not completely remove. After the sowing was done, I applied some of the plantain and stick mulch, as much as I could, and watered it well.
Glorious January Sunset
We were on our way out, but I just had to stop and get these photos!
It was totally gone two minutes later!