It’s been my experience that most home gardeners focus on vegetables, then herbs, then fruit in two stages. First, a strawberry bed and maybe a couple of melons. Second, looking to get a serious amount of produce, perhaps as part of an overall, self-sufficiency scheme, rather than as an add-on. This year, we are moving to this higher level with fruit.
By fruit, I mean the items we traditionally view as fruit in the market, not the botanical definition. Let’s not open that bag of seeds.
Technically, we started last fall by planting two apple trees and a pear tree out front in what will eventually become a mini food forest. Those trees and the berries we’re adding this year are from a nursery that’s been in business almost two centuries and come with a guarantee. The trees were pricey, but our local centers don’t carry dwarf varieties. Beth splurged on those to perk me up when my treatments had me down.
Thanks to a sale and an internet coupon, the raspberries and strawberries worked out to be cheaper than buying them at a garden center while being of equal or better quality. We did have a strawberry bed and a black raspberry, which were doing poorly, at the back of the property. Once I became ill and could no longer tend the area, they were overrun with tall grass, and weeds, birds, and the frustration that came with it. Weeds three to four feet high blanketed the space.
Except for one section, where I had intended to put more raspberries. Not even weeds were doing well there.
For a few years, I had a pile of soil in that place. This soil had come from along the back of the house, when we put in stone as a barrier to weeds. There weren’t many weeds as it was back then because the soil was dry thanks to the eaves keeping most of the rain off of the space. Or so I thought. Wherever I used the soil, the plants suffered. The space under where the pile once sat barely supports weeds. A previous owner must have sprayed the area with a weed killer like Round-up to keep plants from growing against the house.
Maybe that’s what gave me cancer. Who knows?
Plants growing against wooden clapboards are a bad idea. They promote mold and invite insects into your home (and in one instance a frog – the bat was a different story entirely). So, keeping a clear space between your wood exterior and plants is a good idea. The prior owner seems to have taken a chemical route, though. Which, to me, is a bad idea. I think I’ve managed to supplement the beds, where I used the dirt, enough to mitigate the problem. However, I am left with a barely fertile four by ten section at the back of the property.
Solution: Choose another space for the raspberries and relocate the compost bins over the poor dirt. I hope the nutrients and organics will leach downward and rescue the soil over time. Currently, this is the best use of the area.
The wood for the strawberry bed is so far gone I am going to rebuild it – and add another while I’m at it! The prior bed was three by eight. This year I am going to have two mounds, which will each be three by ten. We’re more than doubling our strawberry space and plants. The wood from the old bed and a couple of small beds will be buried under brand new garden mix we’ll have trucked in, similar to a hügelkultur mound. The boards are already falling apart. I pulled most of the old nails out by hand.
I ordered three types of strawberries, two everbearing and one June producer, to go with whatever of the Junebearers survived in our old setup. The strawberry varieties are Tristar (everbearing), Eversweet (everbearing), and Earliglow (Junebearer). These come in 25(ish) packs and, as I mentioned above, were cheaper than the garden center. The actual numbers were 24 Eversweet, 28 Earliglow, and 24 Tristar. Beth rescued 10 Junebearers from the old bed. We never knew what variety these were as the neighbor gifted them to us a few years ago. I asked her the other day. She doesn’t remember. She’s had them for a long time. No worries. Eighty-six strawberries should work nicely for us.
The strawberry roots were no shorter than six inches long and numerous per crown. Unfortunately, for whatever reason (warm warehouse, delayed delivery, etc.) the strawberries began breaking dormancy in the package, requiring that I pot them similar to heeling in a bareroot tree, for two reasons. One, it’s still too chilly. I need to keep them in the greenhouse. Two, I won’t have the beds completed for a few weeks yet, when the budget allows delivery of five more yards of garden mix (top soil plus compost). We’ll mix the Junebearers in with the everbearers, which will each get their own hill. In the meantime, they are doing nicely in small pots.
I bought two types of raspberries; Anne (golden raspberry) and Prelude (red raspberry). Both of these varieties produce on first year and two-year-old canes, meaning we should get some this year. Each was a three pack, giving me six raspberry plants. The raspberries remained dormant during shipping, thankfully, and weather conditions allowed us to put these hardier plants in the ground, (they just look like sticks at the moment). We located them as a hedge along the southern edge of the property, although not so close to the property line that a fence would constrict them.
Whenever I pick the gold ones, I will think of my mother. Our neighbor, Mrs. Peterson (the only name by which I ever knew her), had a bush along our common fence and the agreement was we could have whatever came through to our side. On many a bright, summer morning, mom would take a bowl and go out to harvest. Every time, she would return with an empty bowl.
She ate them as fast as she picked them.
I also purchased three Jersey blueberries from my garden center and one of my Northcountry plants may have survived the wild mini-meadow the back section became. Eventually I expect to have nine or ten blueberries of different types. I only have room for three new ones and the survivor currently, because the rest will go where the temporary greenhouse sits. The Jerseys were already in leaf as they had been kept indoor. I hardened them off and then put them in the ground as well. They may not produce much this year or next, although you really want to let them develop their root systems at first by plucking off the flowers to put the plant’s energy into making roots for a couple of years.
Lastly, I purchased two concord grape vines to replace the ones that failed over the last couple of seasons. My illness interfered with replacing them last year as well as keeping the roman chamomile under them weeded. And removing the tree that decided to grow up along one of the posts. And keeping the wasps from eating the bunches of grapes. Cleaning that area up and repairing a broken wire are on this month’s schedule. Our trellis is four, coated wires running through posts of an incorrectly placed fence (18 inches inside the property line). A dog apparently ran into and broke the bottom line. We know this because it happened when there was almost a foot on snow on the ground and the footprints went up to it, stopped, and circled around the post after it bounced off the wire. Goofy dog.
I have a hundred mesh bags to tie around the bunches as they form this year. The wasps can find something else. I guess now I know why grapes come treated with neonicotinoids. Tying bags around your grapes would be impractical for commercial growing operations, and people who supply to home gardeners still act as though you’re a commercial enterprise. Simply look at their distance spacing instructions. You don’t really need to plant your corn in rows three feet apart unless you’re cultivating with a tractor.
In the fall, we’ll add more fruit trees; peach, fig, and cherry, probably. We have room and plans for two more, though I haven’t decided what yet. Apples, pears, and the three I just mentioned are things we eat now. The final two will be additions to our diet. We have some sampling to do before we choose.
In a few years, perhaps even next year, I will be harvesting enough berries to freeze for the winter months as well as to eat fresh in the season. The trees will begin producing in a couple of years as well. I’ll be getting a freeze dryer to preserve that harvest. Fruit filled yogurt and parfaits. Tarts and pies, cobblers and crisps. Muffins and shortbreads. Jams and glazes. It’s coming.
And now I want pie…
The Little Farm in Town 