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Watch My Benicia Vegetable Garden Grow

April 18th, 2010 categories: Benicia, Fun Stuff

TomatoesOne of the real pleasures of owning your own home is having your own garden.

Every year, we plant a variety of herbs and veggies in our backyard garden. I just planted this year’s crop of tomatoes and bell peppers.

As usual, I went way overboard in my plant selection. Last year I had 8 varieties of tomatoes and harvested far more than we could consume. I swore that I’d plant less this year, but then I came across Sunset Magazine’s guide to the best tomatoes and figured I’d pick a half dozen varieties from their list. IMG_1470

Well, when I went the nursery last week, they didn’t have everything on Sunset’s list. But in the process of looking for them, I came across a few other interesting varieties, which I, of course, just had to have. So I left the nursery with not six, but 10 tomato plants.

So in a few months, I’m sure we’ll have more tomatoes than we know what to do with. Every week, I’ll snap a few photos and you can watch my garden grow.

I ended up with the following tomato varieties: Sweet 100, Sungold Red, Early Girl, San Marzano, Juliet Hybrid, Currant, Black Prince, Brandywine, Costoluto Genovese and Mortgage Lifter (when I saw that name, being a real estate agent, I just had to get it).

And I’m growing six bell pepper plants: 2 each of California Wonder (green), Red Bell and Golden Bell.

I hope to finish planting the rest of the garden later today: pickling cucumbers, green beans, beets, dill, basil, Italian parsley, cilantro, tarragon, and thyme. A few perennial herbs are still around from last year: sage, mint and rosemary.

I’m growing my tomatoes and peppers in green EarthBoxes. I’ve been using them for several years and swear by them. They’re self-watering with a large reservoir below the dirt. You fertilize only one-time (when you plant). They’re designed so you can’t over-water. And as long as you fill the reservoir regularly, the plants never go dry either.

The plants really seem to thrive by having just the right amount of water on a constant basis. By early summer last year, this part of our backyard looked like a tomato forest.

Those white pipes sticking up from each box in the photo are actually my own contraption — they’re extensions of the short fill tube that EarthBox provides.  I got tired of hunching over for a minute or so each time I had to fill each EarthBox with water. So I came up with this decidedly unattractive (but functional) “enhancement.”

Part of the EarthBox system is covering the dirt with a plastic cover to keep weeds out and moisture in.

I bet you’re wondering why some of them are red.

Well before this year, I always used their standard black covers. But now they’re offering a red variety, which, according to studies by several universities, reflects a certain band of light back to the plants and increases the yield by up to 20%. So I’m trying 8 tomato plants with red covers and 2 with the traditional black covers.

We’ll see if they really make a difference. If nothing else, those bright red covers will be a conversation starter when people come to visit.

Be sure to check back regularly and watch our garden grow.

MY BENICIA VEGETABLE GARDEN

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This entry was posted on Sunday, April 18th, 2010 at 9:41 am and is filed under Benicia, Fun Stuff. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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