I grow my vegetables in pots because our house was fully landscaped when we bought it and my hubby would not let me dig any thing up! So I usually grow a few different kinds of peppers and cherry tomatoes in pots. I have tried regular tomatoes, roma, grape, patio; none of them grow well for me. I have also tried watermelon, green beans, radishes, carrots, and Thai eggplants. The only one that did well was the radishes. We are having a deck built and the landscaping redone so maybe I'll add a small garden for vegetables. In contrast to my inability to grow vegetables, my flower gardens are overflowing (well, not right now!). Flowers grow really well for me both in the garden and in pots. Go figure! I guess I'd have to choose flowers over vegetables if I actually wanted to grow something!

In my flowers I have roses (climbing, shrub, and creeping), day lilies, Asian lilies, hyacinth, tulips (several hundred), daffodils, miniature orchids, Siberian orchids, creeping phlox, moonbeam coreopsis, balloon flowers, coral bells, salvia, lilacs (which will be removed to build the deck), hydrogena (also will be removed), hosta, yucca, gladiola, shasta daisy, and dogwood. I grow pansy, petunia, geranium, and monkey flowers in pots.

Joanne

I am down to growing a few herbs, unfortunately. I've always had a veggie garden until we moved to Mystic. During the growing season we have a rather continual marine layer that prevents me from being successful with sun-loving summer veggies. Everything rots in rather quick order. Even shade perennials need to be planted in full sunlight here or they won't bloom & gradually weaken until they suscumb to disease. I battle fungal diseases continuously due to high humidity. I miss home grown 'maters. I've got a beautiful ornamental garden though with my favorite being the moss garden. When I did my training to become a master gardener in NH...one of our professors said that everybody could grow at least a few veggies in amongst the flowers...he lied or had never been to the shore. I lived in Laguna Beach, CA & didn't have the problem so it's just a difference in seasonal weather patterns from one coast to another.

/tricia

Don't give up on tomatoes in a limited space until you see what GW member korney19, Mark does with container growing in his Buffalo, NY driveway. Look for him on the Tomato forum.

Jim

I grow a few herbs and 3 or 4 tomatoes....and about 1/2 an acre of flowers!
I find that by the time stuff that I grow is ready, other people are piling it on my doorstep...besided trees have grown to mostly shade my little hidden space for veggies.
In times past I grew cos lettuce and broccoli...never had any luck with peppers, and pole beans...but it's mostly too shady for than now and I am jealously guarding the sunny spot with the roses!
Linda C

My little courtyard garden, all-up about the size of the average lounge-room, is absolutely chockas with herbs. Every plant in it is a herb, and before I became too ill to manage any gardening at all, it also contained a few veges - mainly tomatoes, lettuce and that sort of thing. One or two plants of each.

Included amongst the plants are a lemon tree and an orange tree and an elder tree, all kept to manageable size.

Never be daunted by limited space when it comes to herb or vege gardening!

As for flowers versus veges - haven't you heard that most herbs have the most beautiful flowers?

See some pix of my little garden at the link below.

Here is a link that might be useful: my garden

Daisy, Your garden is magnificent!

I grow three earth boxes of tomatoes in the spring and fall. I have about 7 herbs in containers. Got to have fresh basil and rosemary.

I have black 25 to 35 gallon containers running along a narrow deck on the south side of the house. They mostly contain tomatoes (about 15 to 20 plants) It's the only place that gets enough sun to even hope for a decent crop. I put a rather small herb bed close to the door closest to the kitchen. I sneak hot pepper plants in every semi sunny spot I can. I have to admit that I so enjoy doing that that I would probably do it even if I got no crop at all.

I would feel very bereft if I couldn't have edible plants but I couldn't stand not haveing a flower garden. Our town has gotten so built up that we don't have as many large furry visitors as we used to so I envy Lou his wildlife.

We are lucky because we have a large yard and garden. We have put in 3 types of onions and spinach. There is a rhubarb coming up and I have 6 blueberry bushes. Part of our garden has flowers. We are starting most of our vegetable/flowers inside. We will eventually have eggplant, beans, leeks, cabbage, peppers, brussel sprouts, tomatoes, cucumbers, rutabaga, and other vegetables. I can and freeze. I feel very lucky to be able to grow and harvest a garden.

I just couldn't. No, I couldn't choose one or the other. That's why my garden is a big jumble of a mess. It's a wildlife garden, perennial garden, herb garden and veggie garden, and I stick things where I can possibly squeeze them, plus I've resorted to using containers for a lot of my veggies and annual flowers. I've got 6 tomato plants started, 4 different pepper plants, 1 eggplant, plus I'm trying to make a new space for all the squash, both summer and winter, and cucumbers that I want to grow but haven't planted yet. I have lettuces of various kinds, spinach, chard, beets, sorrel, kale broccoli (gone to flower) etc., .,, I'm boring y'all with the list. (I hate lists) I am lucky enough to live where we can garden pretty much year round. The hardest time is July and August, when everything pretty much shuts down. Well, there's always black-eyed peas and okra to grow then.

The best way to have a successful veggie garden is to grow flowers right along with them. The flowers attract beneficial insects which help somewhat with the pest problems, and of course the bees are an absolute must. So, I just couldn't choose between the 2. You have to have one to have the other.

Sally

Coincidently -- and this is NOT a shameless plug because I know there's no one in this forum that could participate -- I start my "Epicurean Kitchen Garden" class this coming Thursday morning for Cuesta College.

It's my way of combining my two loves -- cooking and gardening. It's six weeks of discussion of growing fruits and vetebalkes for the real cook's kitchen and table. The first week is an introduction to our culinary hereitage here on the Central Coast and each of the ensuing weeks looks at a different "cuisine" (what grows in a French garden, an Italian garden, a Mexican garden, etc.).

Growing up in an Italian family showed me that it's "okay" to grow flowers but "unless you can eat it", as my grandfather Ambrogio would say, "what good does it do?".

Joe

We are so very fortunate also to be able to have a nice size veggie garden, but some how daylily seedlings are starting to move in.

Our gardens include some things we couldnt do without....Yukon Gold potatoes, lots of garlic, snow peas-later cantalope will grow up the fence, parsley, onions, tomatoes, new this year-mini bell peppers, and Heritage red raspberry's. We have grown green beans, but the deer kept eating them, so we now buy them at the farmers market.

Lots of hostas in the shade, not sure if we could do with out these either. The question is to chose...guess we would have to flip a coin, but you could buy the veggies....I dont know.

"vetebalkes"?????????????

Joe

I don't really have time for both..so I've chosen flowers.
I figure I can always buy good produce at the stands and it's usually better than what I would grow. Mainly because I would have to grow organically ...but I can purchase in blissful ignorance from the back of a truck! And tomato hornworms are just gross!

And the dogs water everything which adds to the ick factor.
I do grow herbs that I'll use though and wash well.

Gardenguru, shameless plug indeed! I work at the same place you do! Indeed, if I wasn't teaching thursday mornings I would be interested. Especially since I grew up back east and can't get anything to grow successfully out here. Small world, isn't it?

i pride myself on my vegetable gardening. i'm a farmer at heart :-)

i grow every conceivable herb and they used to be designated to an herb garden, but i have them interspersed in the flower beds because some just flower so beautifully. i love going to a dinner party and wrapping up a bouquet of fresh herbs to bring to the host.

i had 62 tomato plants last season, so that has to tell you something. i grow various types of beans, lettuce and every year i try corn, but some critter gets to it, so i usually let it continue until it gets close to halloween and then i can use the stalks decoratively. many variety of peppers and i'm always adding something new to the mix. a few varieties of zucchini (for the veggie and the flowers - excellent stuffed, battered and fried), squash, eggplant, garlic, potatoes and asparagus, which is always my first crop, rhubarb, spinach and cabbage . broccoli and cauliflower. i've had no luck with carrots or onions, but it doesn't stop me from trying. i also grow cucumbers for slicing and a variety or two for pickling, watermelon and one or two varieties of pumpkins. if there's a patch of dirt or a container, it isn't wasted space. every year the dogs' space gets smaller.

i had a plum tree that died and i've never had luck with my grape vines. every year my uncle would graft new ones for me from his vines and every year i would loose them. he died a few years back and as strange as it sounds, his vines didn't come back either. last year i hired a neighbor boy to do some weeding. unfortunately, he took out my blueberries, blackberries and strawberries and an entire row of all mums that i had been collecting and growing for years and some recently purchased and planted hosta, and luckily i got out there just in time as he was pulling out the asparagus. (in the off season it certainly looks like a weed). i only lost 3 plants.

then there are the flower beds and i grow some edible flowers, which always look nice in a salad.

i have developed an absolute love of flowers and have a phenomenal plant/flower collection but if i had to choose just one, no question - it would definitely be an edible garden.

maryanne

Joe, I am extremely jealous that you get to take that class.

We planted 1/4 acre for years, but once I stopped working at home it dwindled down to a pathetic asparagus patch. Even the horseradish almost lost to the quackgrass. Two years ago I threw in a few squash, beans and carrots, and last year we dragged out the hoop greenhouse and planted about half of the garden. I decided my health issues were caused, at least in part, by stress and diet and we realized how much we missed good fresh vegies. Gardening is good for the plate and good for the soul, lol.

We have a really short season. I'm experimenting this year...half old standbys and half things I've never tried. I started peppers (hot and sweet -most excited about the sweet frying peppers) and onions last weekend.Next weekend I'll start some early eggplant and tomatoes - old reliable Early Girls and several short season heirlooms, though I've yet to find one that tastes good. Mid-April I'll start a few broccoli, cauliflower and cabbage. The peppers, tomatoes, and probably some basil will go into pvc pipe greenhouses. Outside: Peas, snap peas, carrots, spinach, chard, lettuce, radishes, basil, cilantro, green beans - bush, wax and flat Italian, assorted summer and winter squashes. And a little extra early corn. And I planted a long wide row of garlic last fall...yum. My flowers are marigolds and nasturtiums planted in the rows (supposed to repel bugs).

DH swears he will be around enough to keep up on weeding. I think he will also be learning to freeze and can.

At the house I have a little herb garden...a few kinds of thyme, marjoram, sage, pineapple sage (if it lives through winter), oregano, chives. There are some flower beds, but they suffer from the same lack of attention as the garden and the forest is taking them back over.

"Joe, I am extremely jealous that you get to take that class."

Hmm. I assumed Joe is giving the class.

Joe, your class sounds wonderful! Now that's a class I'd love to take!

I used to be have a veggie garden..when my oldest was about 2..he's nearly 16 and I've not gardened for a few years. (veggies that is).

But this year..with my turning over a new desire for healthy eating and such..I decided to reclaim my garden space. So I've been clearing it out. The soil looks great! Way back when I had ammended it with compost and peat..and then for atleast 3 or 4 years it's been buried under grass and other junk..I took some kitchen scraps and stirred them into the areas I de grassed and weeded..covered that with cardboard..came back a week later and WOW..total worm activity! I noticed as I was de grassing that the worms were healthy and fat..so wasn't totally suprised at the fact that they'd surfaced..

I've since planted just a few things I picked up a few weeks ago. A 6 pack of early cabbage, 4 strawberries and a pack of gourmet lettuce I seperated and planted.
Friday I'll hit the co op again and pick up some more things and also plant some seeds too.
I have herb pots that have 2 kinds of chives, 3 different thymes, peppermint and oregano (2 varieties that I let flower in the bird/bug garden (honey bees love oregano flowers!) and a huge HUGE rosemary shrub. There are also 2 apple trees and one pear.

oh and I also have a rose garden and a few flower beds.

I grow roses in the regular beds in my front garden, plus some in containers in the back yard.

The front porch has pots where I grow cherry tomatoes and sometimes chili peppers and zucchini. I grow a few herbs too; basil, parsley and rosemary, so I can just walk out, snip what I need with my shears and bring it back into the kitchen for cooking.

I'm glad you brought this up because it reminds me I need to put in my tomatoes and basil for the spring.

Janene, the garden stand on Hayvenhurst and the 101 is hosting Tomatomania the weekend of the 4th, 5th and 6th! Come buy your tomato plants out here!

I went crazy over rose growing for a few years, (some of them shown here) and at the same time, with the help of our gardener, grew lettuce, green beans, onion, tomatoes, bananas, grapefruit, potatoes, lemons, peaches and many herbs, and one year we managed to grow rutabaga from seeds brought from Canada. However we dropped the lettuce and tomatoes when we started having cats, as they would dig around the plants... another reason why I have preferred to grow my herbs in large pots rather than in beds. So we reduced all to a more manageable size, since we have a city garden. Everything grows so quickly here it really needs daily work to keep up the weeding and pruning, so now I just grow flowers, herbs and some tropical shrubs, as well as grapefruit and Persian lime. The markets here are always full of beautiful, ripe tomatoes. A home garden has so many pests and diseases to contend with in this warm climate that I'd rather buy tomatoes now.

Still have my wheelbarrow, knee-high garden boots and tools stored in the garden shed, but I prefer now to spend more garden time taking photos than planting and weeding lol. I do keep some of my favourite roses though.

SharonCb

I'm always surprised how much food I can get from a small space or container. I have several flower pots and planters that are empty this time of the year. I'll sew them with leaf and Romaine lettuce mid-March. By the time it's too hot for leaf lettuce (usually in May), I pull the lettuce out, renew the planter soil, and add some 1/2-price flowers/plants for the rest of the summer.

At the end of the summer when those plants are getting rather sad-looking from all the heat (mid-August), I take them out, renew the soil, and plant a fall crop of leaf lettuce.

In February I put up my mini "hot house" in the garden. It's constructed from two plastic window well covers (get them at Lowe's) held together with a couple spring clamps and it forms a terrarium-like dome. I keep this from blowing around with 4 tent stakes to secure it (use the round tent stakes, you can swivil them to open and close the "dome"). When the temperature is nice, I just prop it open during the day, and it's easy to open for watering. Clamp it shut at night.

I've got leaf lettuce, spinach and turnip tops all ready to harvest, and it was snowed on 3 times. I put this back up in the fall and have fresh greens and some herbs through January. In a mild winter, I've had greens all winter long.

-Grainlady

I am definitely more into ornamentals, but every year I still have to have a few tomatoes and several herbs. I have resorted to container gardening since my soil is kind of carpy and there is so much effort that goes into improving it. Plus, I have a LOT of shade and I can move containers to maximize the sun.

And I have great farmers markets and farm stands near by so I would MUCH rather support the local farmers and help maintain the open space.

Alexa

Couldn't give it up.....nope, nope, nope ;o) DH dropped off the tiller to get serviced, so we'll be tilling next weekend and the cooler weather crops will go in shortly.

Vegetables...
{{gwi:44591}}

Herbs...

My garden is a mix of flowers and veggies. The main beds are roses but I have been putting my red cabbage plants in the border there. The veggies have been planted in a patch in the alley that we "re-claimed" and contains toms, green beans, cukes, peppers, leeks and anything else I can fit in. It is public there, but I have had very little theft and I like seeing my neighbors as they walk the dogs and have even had others give me plants.

This year the toms are moving to another bed, one that for 20+ years was impatients. We have lost all trees on that side, so it is very sunny now and last year volunteer toms popped up and did wonderfully, so I will take a clue from Mother Nature.

Herbs are in pots on the patio, perfect for outdoor cooking and dining. I have the usual, parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme (are you humming along yet?) plus butter lettuce in large pots to keep the slugs out. They are not a protein option for me!

And to complete the cycle, I also compost all green and brown matter.

I grow some of everything. I have more flowers than veggies space, but that is because some of my flower gardens are in the ditches but there are herbs spread out all through that garden. My girls would be very sad if we didn't have a veggie garden, Rhiannon is already talking about eating spinach in the garden. I have some moving around to do though this summer. I have rhubarb in a couple places and need to move them all to along the fenceline because most other things won't grow there but rhubarb doesn't care. In the area that the rhubarb is I need to put my strawberries, I have lots of plants but they are in the shade and don't produce very well at all. Then where the strawberries are I am going to plant some of my greens, different lettuce, spinach, chard and a few others that don't mind the shade as much.

We are supposed to get rain , spring showers everyday this week so I think that next week would be a good time to get the rototiller fired up lol.

Stacie

My wife handles the flowers. I do the veggies. Mostly heirloom tomatoes. This year 200-300 plants with about 40 varieties, many being dwarf varieties in grow bags. Peppers and herbs too in the greenhouse. They love the hot summer GH and grow great. When somebody says 'Patio tomato' I cringe. Yes, there is a variety of that name, but there are also hundreds of dwarf varieties that can be grown in pots and small spaces. Actually there is a tomato forum with a project going on now (I can't mention the name...banned here) that is growing out several hundred varieties and seeds are being mailed back and forth between USA and New Zealand and Australia to speed the process. Look for some of these varieties (most named after the Disney 7 dwarves LOL) in seed catalogues by 2010.

Veggies all the way!

Duane

I fit what I can into my flower bed. I don't want a veggie garden in my front yard and the only thing I can grow in the backyard are hostas. But I do plan on helping my friend David with his garden. He has gone wild ordering seeds this year and has put up a new fence around his garden. So we'll see how it turns out.
A couple of things he ordered, I'm going to plant in deck planters....currant tomatoes and pearl cucumbers, they sound interesting.

I'm lucky in that I live near many fruit and veg farms that are into as much organic as possible. I'll buy most of what I can there. It's still a significant savings over store bought and sooooooo much better.

Nancy

It's fun reading about everyone's gardens. I thought 6 tomato plants were going to be a bit of work once they start producing, but I can't imagine how to cope with the fruits of 62 tomato plants, much less 200 to 300 plants! Wow! Y'all are going to be very, very busy this summer.

Sally

Most of my gardens get too much shade for growing things for my kitchen. One of the gardens could be turned into a veggie garden but we are at the cottage so much in the summer I really need an "I can take care of myself" garden.

I do have a nice sunny spot for herbs and container plants. I grow basil, parsley, thyme, sage, rosemary, chives, oregano and lemon grass in the ground and various hot peppers and cherry tomatoes in containers.

My flower gardens are my passion though. I have a wonderful native plants garden and I would say at least, 70-80 different Hostas, maybe more. I love my Hosta the most, unfortunately so do the slugs!

katiec, jimster:

Yes, I teach the class.

alku05: are you SURE you can't sneak away for six Thursday mornings????

Joe

I wish I could! I teach an 8:30-11:30 class then, so I'm pretty sure they'd miss me. But I will be watching the community programs schedule for a future offering...Any chance that you'll do it again during summer? Or saturday mornings?

alku05:

"The Epicurean Kitchen Garden 2" will start this summer, yes. Exact dates to be determined but it won't be Saturdays.

and now back to our regularly scheduled program. Sorry lpinkmountain for hijacking your thread.

Joe

My greatest garden love is roses (180 of them) but I still love growing vegetables, herbs and perennials. My granddaughters, especially the 7 year old, loves to grow vegetables with me. The raised beds work really well - they're just cinder blocks with boards that snap over the top for seats. We leave the ends of the beds open and plant herbs in them.

What a fun thread! I love gardening, and in fact DH and I moved in part because we wanted more room for both vegetables, flowers, and fruit trees, and buying acreage) in the smallest state in the country (RI where we used to live) just wasn't a viable option! Now we have 5.5 acres and room to play.

We've got a 3500 square foot vegetable garden, where I grow tomatoes, peppers, green beans, kale, onions, potatoes, cauliflower, spinach, lettuce, brussel sprouts, peas, corn, zukes, cukes, winter squash, all kinds of herbs, etc etc. Then we also have 80 asparagus crowns, 100 strawberry plants, 7 rhubarb plants (wow, was that too many!), 50 raspberry bushes, and 12 fruit trees we planted a few years ago (not bearing yet)... And then there are many many beds of perennials as well!

Oooh, I can't wait for gardening season to begin in earnest... Still too early here, but I can see the tips of the rhubarb starting...

Emily

This has been wonderful to read! Thanks for sharing all the great garden stories and pics! I am encouraged and inspired not to give up on the tomatoes in pots. I could perhaps install some of those hanging tomato gizmos, my neighbor did.

I tried growing a "patio tomato" last year, I got two golf ball sized mediocre tomatoes from it. I also grew yellow pear bite sized ones, which were cute but didn't taste all that great and I had gazillions of them. Then Becky/Boo turned me on to making home canned spaghetti sauce, so I'm inspired to try romas this year. I also like them in salads.

I'm like a lot of you, I tuck my culinary herbs in all over the garden, they are the easiest garden treats to grow, and are so wonderful in the summer to use in cooking.

Poor Tricia! Interesting that you seem to be ok with herbs. I know a lot of herbs originated in the wild on the mediterannean coast. Surely there must be something you could grow. Are you familiar with beach plums? I saw some listed in a catalog I get from a nursery out on the west coast called "Forest Farm." I've gathered them in the wild up in the UP of Michigan. Another edible plant that might survive the mist is blueberry.

Definitely veggies!
I have very few flowers or landscaping at all for that matter.

I grow rhubarb, dill, lettuce, spinach, swiss chard, radishes, snow peas, shelling peas, tomatoes, peppers, squash (summer and winter), corn, onions, garlic, chives, strawberries, blueberries, beans, broccoli, cabbage, sage, oregano, mint, lavender, thyme, rosemary. Not necessarily all of them every year, but have done all of them at times.

The only flowers I have are a few daffodils, tulips, day lilies, iris and a lilac tree.

I think there might some italian in my bloodlines somewhere.............."if you can't eat it, what good is it!"
I would rather know what went into my food than a few flowers sitting in the middle of the table!!

Fun thread lpink..!!

Deanna