New Plantings
- Ginger – Beginning of July
Our store-bought ginger began to sprout, and so I planted it to see what would happen. After about two weeks, we have four healthy sprouts!
To plant this ambitions little ginger root, I cut it into segments with one sprout per segment and let them sit for a few days until the cut ends dried up and calloused. Once the root segments had cured, I selected and prepared their container.
Ginger needs a wide, flat shaped container. These wash tubs fit the bill, shape-wise, but they are badly rusted out on the bottom. I decided to use them anyway, and lined both tubs with burlap and then nested them to increase the tubs’ structural integrity, retain water while maintaining good drainage, and to help keep the containers cool.
I used Happy Frog Potting Soil for my medium, buried the root segments about 1 inch deep, and then covered everything generously with pine straw (my favorite mulch). It was easy and didn’t cost much in the way of supplies. I did have to purchase potting soil, though, as I did not have enough on had to fill such a large container.
Harvested in July –
Harvested: 28.63 pounds
Market Value of July Harvests: $130.54
Food We Harvested from our Yard
Food We Foraged
Note: Market values are determined on current produce rates at Costco, HEB and/or Central Market, when possible, as those are the places that are where we usually purchase produce. If a price was unavailable at those venues, prices may be referenced from other Austin-area grocery stores or farmers’ markets.
Growing in the Ground
- Tatume Squash – Healthy. New plantings from July are beginning to thrive since the shade cloth nursery was built.
- Waltham Butternut Squash – Looks terrible. It’s been struggling against borers and heat and has not produced for several weeks. So, we have stopped watering it.
- Corno di Toro Pepper – Stressed. Not producing, but has new blossoms! We have added shade and continue to irrigate.
- Little Mama Roma Tomato – Healthy. No production, but Mister added shade and so there are new blossoms!
- Purslane – Healthy.
- Garlic chives – Healthy.
- Thyme – Healthy.
- Attention needed: Trim/feed.
- Oregano – Healthy.
- Sage – Healthy/stressed. Trimmed and shaped plant and have begun to irrigate.
- Lavender – Healthy. Have noticed a few dead branches and have begun to irrigate minimally.
- Fennel – Seed is ready for harvest.
- Beets, Chiogga and Detroit Red – Stressed. Harvest immediately. Last of season
- Lemon grass – Healthy
- Kale, curly – Healthy/Stressed. We are irrigating only minimally and not harvesting for the kitchen due to bitter taste and tough texture.
- Lambs quarter – Healthy. Still standing, but leaves are too small to harvest.
- Jujube – Healthy. One tree fruiting with jujube’s beginning to turn red! The second tree looks healthy but offered no fruit this year. I think both trees are two years in the ground.
- Fig – Healthy/stressed. Have been irrigating with water from the air conditioner.
Growing in Containers
- Thai (Kaffir) Lime – healthy
- Meyer Lemon – The leaves are yellowing. I have moved to a cooler and more sheltered location.
- Mandarin – I might just plant this in the ground, since it hasn’t done much in a container. This is at least it’s 3rd year and it only produced 5 oranges.
- Bay Laurel – Healthy
- Key Lime – Healthy. Producing many limes. The tree shape displeases me. Looking for resources to learn pruning and shaping techniques.
- Ghost Pepper – Healthy
- Lemon grass – Healthy
- Garlic Chives – Healthy
- Basils: Thai, Holy and Italian Sweet, all healthy and producing nicely!
- Locoto Pepper – Looks pretty terrible. It might be time to give up on this Bolivian specialty pepper.
- Chocolate Habanero pepper – Healthy and flowering, no fruit yet.
- Tangerine Dream sweet pepper – Stressed/stunted/not producing.
Water Usage from 6/13 to 7/14
Notes about our water usage: We collect and use water from the air conditioner and rain events to reduce the need for metered water in the garden. We account for metered water usage using a hose-end water meter, like this one. We account for the amount of collected water by estimating 3 gallons per day for the air conditioner and manually counting buckets after a rain event (all estimates are based on our Super Technical 5-gallon Bucket Measurement Method) .
- Metered water: 225 gallons
- Collected water: 78 gallons
- Percentage of our total water consumption used for garden: 5.48%
- Compared to our neighbors: We used 16 fewer gallons of metered water than the average resident in our area.
July Expenses
- Water: $1.55 (5.48% of total water bill)
- Dirt for ginger container: $21.64 (If you are in the Austin area, you can find Happy Frog at Shoal Creek Nursery.)
Are you interested in logistic details related to growing a kitchen garden that aren’t included in the monthly garden summary? Leave your suggestion in a comments below.