Good bye favas, hello summer bounty

We recently harvested the last of our favas. I blanched and froze them since the previous bunch was greeted by Mark with "I don't think I can take anymore right now."

To his credit, Mark made a fabulous meal with the second to last bunch - spring inspired risotto.

So, out with the favas, and in with soil amendments and seeds for the the summer garden.

This year, the troughs are planted with squash, tomatillo, egg plant, basil, yellow beans, carrots, radish, lettuce, cilantro and beets.

The great thing about interplanting is that you can plant things close together, and with a little practice or planning you will know what to plant next to one another. That way you can capitalize on the space that you have, which when limited, takes on a level of importance in your garden's design. For example, I have radish and lettuce interplanted among the tomatoes and squash. By the time either are big enough to take over, the radish and lettuce will be ready to harvest.

I am also planting pickling cucumbers on a tomato cage trellis this year instead of a chicken wire one. I think, at three to a cage, the will take less room. We shall see.

In the west side bed we have a variety of tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, Chinese yard long beans, radish, water cress and summer squash. We've had success with smaller peppers in the past, so that is what we've selected to grow again.

I used small sticks to mark out the one foot rows of beans, basil and carrots.

We are also growing blueberries, nectarines, and cherries in pots. The latter are an experiment, so time will tell their success. At $14 a pop at Lowes they just had to come home with me earlier this spring.

Blueberries - both bushes are full of berries this year.

Festival of flowers

As a Portlander, I am not much of a Rose Festival fan. But, one aspect of the festival that I am totally behind is the Festival of Flowers (FoF).

Basically the FoF consists of temporary installations of potted plants. The largest arrangement is in Portland's living room, or Pioneer Courthouse Square, but if you look around over the next 2 weeks you will find them in other spots around downtown.

Beautiful!