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intro
So, hi! I signed up for this group when I was still just a little lost openID, wandering in the aether without an icon to my name.
And then I forgot about it. So I remembered, and I'm back, and I'm excited to talk about the vagaries of gardening, because, lo, I need the help, y'all.
I'm in the high desert of Arizona. That puts me mostly in zone 6, because while we do get the hot weather, we're mountainous. I'm at about 6000 feet, and that's the lowest I've been in recent history. It was about 7000 when we were in NM. So we get very dramatic swings of day/night temperature. And of course, no water. We get about 17 inches average over the year, mostly concentrated in the monsoon months of late summer.
And we just built a new house. It's in a new development, piñon and juniper. Our lot was cleared for the septic tank, so we're fighting off tumbleweeds (which are nasty sharp when mature, I'm just tellin' ya.) and other seriously brutal weeds. There are natural grasses and wildflowers in the neighboring lots, but we're picking & choosing because of fire danger.
The house is passive solar, with a sunroom that has a solar floor (thicker than usual slab to serve as thermal mass) and is the most comfortable room in the house all year round. The large windows with overhangs mean we get winter but not summer sun. So the room works as a fabulous winter greenhouse, but the sun completely does not enter it during summer so we need to figure out something else for those plants then.
So! All that is to say, I have two interests. One is landscaping and the other is food gardening. We had a great winter salad garden in the sunroom, but our outdoor forays have been less successful due to various critters who deeply appreciate our provision of provisions for them. The greens are still growing in the sunroom with indirect light, though. They seem unkillable.
Outside we have the grapevine on its second year; looks like it's going to bear this year. And then there's plans for the raised bed: we intend to do tomatoes and potatoes and a Native American traditional Three Sisters garden, which is corn, beans & squash. We were told we couldn't start until June because of frost danger, so we've got an extremely short growing season. And we'll be gone for part of it.
As far as the decoratives go, we have two flowerbeds containing Russian sage and assorted bulbs. Oh, and we planted organic garlic in the flowerbeds. Hee. It's a bulb. They're doing great; rabbits ate the rest of the bulbs, pretty much.
And I've got a sack of wild bird trees from the Arbor Day Foundation that need to go in the ground.
And then I forgot about it. So I remembered, and I'm back, and I'm excited to talk about the vagaries of gardening, because, lo, I need the help, y'all.
I'm in the high desert of Arizona. That puts me mostly in zone 6, because while we do get the hot weather, we're mountainous. I'm at about 6000 feet, and that's the lowest I've been in recent history. It was about 7000 when we were in NM. So we get very dramatic swings of day/night temperature. And of course, no water. We get about 17 inches average over the year, mostly concentrated in the monsoon months of late summer.
And we just built a new house. It's in a new development, piñon and juniper. Our lot was cleared for the septic tank, so we're fighting off tumbleweeds (which are nasty sharp when mature, I'm just tellin' ya.) and other seriously brutal weeds. There are natural grasses and wildflowers in the neighboring lots, but we're picking & choosing because of fire danger.
The house is passive solar, with a sunroom that has a solar floor (thicker than usual slab to serve as thermal mass) and is the most comfortable room in the house all year round. The large windows with overhangs mean we get winter but not summer sun. So the room works as a fabulous winter greenhouse, but the sun completely does not enter it during summer so we need to figure out something else for those plants then.
So! All that is to say, I have two interests. One is landscaping and the other is food gardening. We had a great winter salad garden in the sunroom, but our outdoor forays have been less successful due to various critters who deeply appreciate our provision of provisions for them. The greens are still growing in the sunroom with indirect light, though. They seem unkillable.
Outside we have the grapevine on its second year; looks like it's going to bear this year. And then there's plans for the raised bed: we intend to do tomatoes and potatoes and a Native American traditional Three Sisters garden, which is corn, beans & squash. We were told we couldn't start until June because of frost danger, so we've got an extremely short growing season. And we'll be gone for part of it.
As far as the decoratives go, we have two flowerbeds containing Russian sage and assorted bulbs. Oh, and we planted organic garlic in the flowerbeds. Hee. It's a bulb. They're doing great; rabbits ate the rest of the bulbs, pretty much.
And I've got a sack of wild bird trees from the Arbor Day Foundation that need to go in the ground.
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Our intent to xeriscape has met with mixed success. The bed in front of the sunroom will likely be all drought resistant. But there is much more need for water consumption for some of the other things we'd like to try. We'll see how it goes.
Welcome!
A quick piece of advice about your grapevine: don't let it over-bear this year. Its root system isn't too strong yet and you can over-tax it with a large crop. Instead, prune the vine back to just 2 or 3 clusters. Next year, keep just 4 - 6 clusters. After that, you can let it bear fully.
Re: Welcome!
Thanks for the advice about the grapevine! Good to know. When should I prune, now?
Oh, and we got the raised bed complete with chicken wire done yesterday. This morning there was a big ol' jackrabbit sitting outside it looking in. Hee! I'll try and see if I can get some photos to post.
Re: Welcome!
I've got a raccoon that's been sampling my strawberries the last few days. Arggh! I built a temporary enclosure that I hope will get me through, but in the next few weeks when the berries come on really strong, I'm betting they tear it apart. Maybe one of my winter projects will have to be a sturdy, framed, hardware cloth enclosure around the strawberry patch?
Re: Welcome!
Oh, raccoon, no! We have 'coons, too, but so far they've only investigated for leftovers in the bird tray and haven't caused any problems. Hardware cloth seems like a good solution. I've got some lying around that would be about the right size for that type of enclosure should I need to build one later on.
Re: Welcome!
LOL - I know far more about fencing out critters than I really want to know!
Re: Welcome!