Permaculture Extravaganza

Welcome back. It's early August. We're going to do another harvest garden tour. This is the second half of my garden area. We're going to visit the Hugelkultur Terrace Pallet Garden. See what's coming out of there right now. Lots of things blooming. So gorgeous. Apples are looking amazing this year. General maintenance and tips and ideas along the way as usual. And I think one could say at this point my whole area, my gardens, could be considered food forest or forest garden. Some of both really. Deciduous and conifers growing around the outskirts. Mingling in a little bit actually too. Grapevine growing up that big dug fir there. All the fruit trees. I love growing with annuals and other perennials. That's just how I love to grow. We're going to start at the top here and do like a loop. On this side we're going to start with some row gardens basically. A no plant potato bed. I planted it the previous year. Dug potatoes out of it last year and I missed that many I guess. This front row was a hybrid that I saved seed from. Kind of scrapped my idea of stabilizing the variety because they didn't turn out. It took quite a long time from a spring planting to start making a head like that and it's kind of open habit so I won't be saving my seed. That looks kind of edible there. Yes. Okay. Wow. Oh those ones got away. Wow. Man. Holy. These are bushy. This is one of those weird ones. About three years ago I had this like symbiosis feeling about comfrey and potatoes and I put it in the trench when I was planting my potatoes. Kind of thinking you know mainly they would just be green good organic matter to put in there and or chop and drop like on the top for a mulch. You know it's high in nitrogen and phosphorus depending where it is in its cycle. If it's flowering it's higher in phosphorus. Later I was researching comfrey and potatoes and sure enough comfrey can help eliminate scab on your potatoes. So I thought that was pretty interesting how it just came to be naturally. Yeah it's a great plant to be using in the annual garden too as long as you keep it under control and I don't find it too hard to keep under control as long as you're not tilling. See potatoes growing right out from under comfrey plant most likely will help the scab. Your potatoes flop open like this especially with the volunteers sometimes they're close to the surface so keep the sun off them like that keeping from going yellow. Comfrey. Row of beets here and some turnips. These were direct seeded. So there's thimble berries growing on the bank there and they just kind of merge through the fence line here. It's a little bit of a nuisance in that they sucker into my garden bed and I do have to pull them out every spring but they're also of benefit. They are helping create a draft block or wind block for my squash here. So early on I take off kind of the heads or like the big bushiness of the thimble berries to get them out of the way and then throughout the season I just pluck leaves here and there if it's too much cover for my squash. Even with the thimbles there it's still a little too hot for them but it helps. See this is they're creating a bit of shade for sun scorch so they're playing together and it's useful to have the thimble berries there and potatoes along the bottom here. Yeah so you can see the comfrey here too. So it's making a wall behind my tomatoes and potatoes. It's like a wall and it flowered already and it was more full this way and so all the flowers are up close to my tomatoes and the bees were on there. The only thing you got to watch with comfrey is it does tend to get powder and mildew but I find it really doesn't transfer much often. So it's not too much there's a little bit there it can transfer to squash a little bit easier than tomatoes but I don't worry about it for the most part. We've got tomatoes and potatoes, nightshades and nightshades planted together. If everything's healthy it's no problem really. I do it all the time. These potatoes were planted in the autumn. I'm going to harvest the tomatoes and some beans and this beautiful bed of garlic is coming out right now too. Yeah there's some pretty nice little truss and clusters here. Trusses or clusters. Yes the first beans. I had a heck of a time trying to get beans going this spring. Slugs just kept eating them right off my full trellises. All right a couple of trellises in places I've planted beans with other crops just as backup. I might leave these ones for seed actually they're already almost oversized. I do like to add a little bit of bone meal after I plant in the autumn and then the mulch and that's all I do pretty much. If I have some kind of compost I put a little of that on too sometimes. So if your soil is wet and you're gonna wash, you want to wash your garlic right after you pull it. You don't want it to dry out and then re-wet it right. But the longer you leave it the more kind of dark skin you get. I like just to get that one layer off. I haven't seen any cracked ones yet. I've got two more beds here to harvest as well. I'll show you those. Breeze! Oh! And you want to keep it out of the sun. We'll store it here until I get the other beds harvested. Woohoo! Got that changeover done. Napa cabbage, bok choy, and spinach. And I threw the um oh you know what I forgot is a bit of fertilizer. I'll have to do that. A drip tape in there that'll hook up really soon. I think it'll just be more successful if I irrigate that way for this autumn crop here. Slugs generally don't like garlic that much. I have seen them on the plants but in general this was somewhat slug free. So perfect bed to plant you know greens after. Got my matcha, iced matcha. Look at these beautiful beans. Had the cauliflower there before. Cut that out and planted the beans and cilantro. And meanwhile the cabbages are heading up and they're uh they're getting real close now. We'll be doing flowers really soon. It's definitely time to cut a few of these green ones out of here. Makes a little bit more space for the beans. So good to see you. So good to see you. I guess these are actually really done. I'm just harvesting a few right now. Yeah when you start seeing some cobwebs you know they're done. Gorgeous. So I've got a cherry tree right here that dropped all its fruit this year. It's just because it was a pretty good cherry year. Lots of other places actually close by saw those cherries that I picked last video. So that was kind of sad. I ate one or two off of there that held. And we got more garlic and potatoes under the cherry here. Beautiful hollyhocks finally took in this area. I've been sprinkling seed the last couple of years with the sea buckthorn. Beautiful crop of them as well. They're just oranging up. Yeah whoa look at that. Sweet. And the hollies. Nice crop of corn going on here. We'll show in a minute. If you miss a garlic they just come back in a cluster pretty much. And I've had some clusters do amazing. They get a lot of water and sun and space. A cluster can produce big garlic bulbs. I've had that happen. Get these over in the shade. Actually no it's pretty shaded right here. I think I'll leave them right here. These potatoes just growing along with the garlic on the sidelines. But there's tons right here. Holy smokes. So this is one of my main corn patches right here. Everything that I planted was from saved seed. The variety is called Who Gets Kissed. It's open pollinated and it kind of rivals some of the hybrids. Started a little compost trench in the pathway here but didn't really finish it. My dog was getting into it so I kind of stopped that. And it's coming along. It'll be ready soon. Mostly two ears on each plant. But yeah looking good on the sea buckthorn right behind a nice juicy big crop. Wow yes. Another cherry tree right here. A rainier and then a big fir tree. I've got a beautiful grape that's just cropping up crazy. Growing up it. Cropping crazy this year and over the pussy willow. Last year it wasn't a big year for it. This year came back strong. It's just really really full. I hope the wasps don't get it this year. And it's gorgeous. Just draping down across here everywhere. Climbing up the pussy willow everywhere. That's exciting. And then I've got another variety, green variety, coming up here going all over this pussy willow here as well. Horseradishes are in here. I've been meaning to dig some of these. And the red currant. And we've got some yasta berries in here. And holy it is thick. Can't even walk. And this huge lovage cracks over. And the grapes growing with the uh these are honey berries in here as well. Wow look at that. Oh I can just oh sorry get through here. Okay coming around. Beautiful grapes. Wow. Tomatoes that are wow some ripe ones. But this tomato trellis kind of got scorched. I was overhead watering. Didn't like that. And inconsistent. So this it's kind of lame this uh tomato trellis this year. But we got some nice tomatoes there. All the hollyhocks. We need to uh tie some of these up. Although more light's coming in. They're spreading. As long as they don't knock the corn over totally. Under this cherry tree here there's nasturtiums and hollyhocks and potatoes growing. Onions and scallions are trying to get them to just propagate themselves. Look at these potatoes in here. Let's dig these. Yahoo. I love growing potatoes under fruit trees. Look at that loamy soil. All the mulch I've been putting on the trees. They could get bigger but uh might as well start eating more now. Oh yes. Ooh some uh seed potato slime. Roots of the tree there. Be careful of that. Oh they're all in here. Look at them all. Wow thank you beautifuls. Holy. Nice golden potato. Got a rosebush right here. There's more potatoes. Look at those beauties. Put the mulch and all the uh potato stalks back into place. I'm sure I missed some so they should come back next year. All right. Oh looking a little bit dry here. These hollyhocks have just split right open. Check these gorgeous hollies out. It's so incredible. And the borage and the blueberries and the high salt. Let's grab some tomatoes here first. There's definitely a few nice tomatoes on here but I think this is going to be like the one crop pretty much. That's okay. I've got backup crops here. Look a few beans here. Let's just get all these tomatoes. It needs to get a little bit redder but it is a pink brandywine. Yeah so onions in here too. Look at that calendula and borage. Kale needs a bit of water. It should green up for the fall though if I start giving this bed more water. These onions are definitely finished. This is a day neutral. They did all right. They did pretty decent actually. Nice medium storage onion. Gorgeous. All of these guys here. So many flowers in this bed. So gorgeous. Can't seem to get the blueberries to green up in this bed though. Probably because there's so many other sweet soil loving plants just going nuts in here. So red lily finished off. So magnificent. Making some babies though that I can transplant. Oh no way! Another mushroom. It's hiding away in there. Oh there's more! That's sweet. They're still coming. It's like the third fruiting this year. Apples and go for the garlic too. Single row garlic in here. A few right here. Oh yeah. Honkers. You're looking fat. Yeah. There's parsley in here. In the past I've had this as a tomato trellis and they're tumbling over the top at this time of year. But yeah some things work out sometimes and other times they don't. But got a lot of different crops in here that are successful to some degree too. A few carrots. Yeah. There's so many plants in here even though it's like looking a little dyed back. Still lots going on. There's also this salad brunette. It's like a watermelon-y flavored green you can put in salad. Now the runner bean is starting to flower and all the lettuce seed is we're growing some seed for next year. Oh there's another runner bean. Look at the salmon one. Beautiful. Hollyhocks are finishing off. Perennial rocket arugula in here too. That's actually just perfect like that. Pie sop. Licorice-y. All right. Pretty decent onions out of there. Really good looking garlic. Big. Look at that. I love these green carpet heads that the carrot makes. First they're you know they're bright white and then they go more green and carpet-y. So beautiful. And bouquet. I was doing that recently. So soft and so mossy. And there's some carrots that are ripe or well on the way. I need some carrots for hot sauce. Dig some of these right now. Baby carrots. But I'm usually surprised. I wait till a little bit later. But we'll pull some babies. I just need some for hot sauce. Look at those beauties. Perennial rocket down in here too. Kind of just got to yank out everything to get something out. Oh that's fun. And right here on this side are these garlics. I'm pretty sure that's a garlic. I saw it the other earlier today. I was like is that what looks like an onion head. I planted them two years ago and then I forgot. I remember picking the scapes off of these garlics this year because they came back and they're in a cluster. But I planted them the previous year. It was some I don't know what variety. They were just really big that someone gave me. And let's see how they did. Whoa. You know what? I think this is elephant garlic because of these. Yeah this is different. So elephant garlic is in the leek family actually. It's not a true garlic. Ah whoa. Yeah that one's that's wild. This almost looks like it's sprouting. Take a gander at that. Look at all these little buddies. Oh that's a surprise. Okay this is this is definitely elephant garlic. That's kind of cool. Look at them all. Oh what a surprise. These were all growing in a cluster eh? Like I mean elephant garlic can get bigger but these were growing all together because I just left them in for a whole year. That's why that explains the heads on on those ones over there. Because I swear it looked like an onion seed right? It's in the leek family. Look at these buddies. Wow those are cool. Those are sweet. Okay there's a couple clusters then of these. This is too beautiful. I'm not going to pull these ones. I'm going to leave these ones. That's totally like a leek head. Edible acres right? He was pulling elephant garlic and talking about how they start them. And these are like the mono bulbs. It's like a single one. And so they were planting these to get the largest heads of elephant garlic. And they got these little dangler little buddies too. I think you plant these and then they turn into this size next. And then they turn into your your big head. But instead of like breaking one of these out and planting it you would get a larger bulb he was saying by planting this mono one. So they must have made these because I left them in. Yeah picking blueberries next actually. We're going to do that. There's a little uh some little corn beds here. Start them in tree plug flats and a bush butternut winter squash. Okay one two three. Some marigolds. These guys are looking all right. Some of them are smaller. A little pollen there still. I just want to always come around and shake them. Make sure they're getting pollinated. Smaller little patches like this. You want to make sure the pollen gets on the silks in there. Let's check out the squashes. Yeah blue curry. Oh there's another one. Yes oh another one there. Going with the onions almost. Sage. Got buttercup on this side. Yeah there's a bunch in here. Throwing in the clover. Brings the bees down for the flowers. Look at these guys. Just swallowed up by the clover almost. Beautiful flowers popping through. And some red clover and white clover. Carpets. Love these mossy. Gonna have a lot of carrot seed kicking around. So you pick the blueberries and rub the eyes off and eat the blueberries. Wow. This first blueberry is a legacy. It's like more of an evergreen. The flavor is a little more particular. That's incredible. There's so much to look at. These onions have been grown here since last year and they keep dividing. Look at that. They're just really, I don't remember what variety they are, but they're they're honking. I think this is mustard seed here. Cabbages along here. Yeah look at that. We're ready. That is like solid rock. Zinnias. Blueberries. All the new cabbages that I planted in. Cauliflower came out of the middle and then I've got some, you know, zucchinis and zucchini and cabbage planted back. Oh yeah there's one coming. There's another little cabbage. We'll see if they do too much. Getting a little bit eaten. These are certainly beautiful. They didn't really get too bug ridden either. Onions in here finishing off. I think these some of these could be harvested. Look at that. Look at these buddies. Yes. Gorgeous. Oh let's pull one of these purples too. That's a Rosa D. Milano I think because it's got that little bit of a barrel shape. Compost potatoes. I just keep composting this lemon balm because it gets out of hand. But we've got potatoes growing out. I think these are gonna be good potatoes in here. Ha! Onions. These are getting a little swallowed up. Let's get these out of here. Make a little bit of space under everything. Yeah they're getting a little bit shaded. A little smaller. Make room for zucchini and potatoes coming in. Onions. Oh there's more garlic. This is a cluster but they're gonna be big I think. They're really strong. Make a little more space in here. I got a whole cluster at once. Who says you need to space garlic eh? Look at that. These are huge. Yeah we got one smaller one but four big. That one's huge. So they were garlic. You know I missed one bulb the year before and then they come up as a cluster and if they get enough everything they do really well all together. Totally done. See they're going yellow and brown skins. Ah look at that. Beautiful. These are Rosa D. Milano. See the barrel shape. That one's really defined like that. What a gorgeous onion. Oh I'm so excited for these. The day neutrals. Hey they sized up pretty good. Just growing under the cabbage leaf. That's hilarious. Oh man wow. Look at that crop. It was just totally shaded out by the cabbage. Amazing. These guys here too. Wow I'm impressed actually how big these sized up for a day neutral. I thought I was I planted them last too right? Like you should be planting the day neutrals first. That's a that's probably the biggest one so far. Yeah I've got to keep harvesting some of these here. I don't want them to go off. Holy smokes. You're kidding me. That's even bigger. This is those. What was this? Candy. Candy hybrid. It is a hybrid so but uh wow. I haven't been that successful with this type of onion before. That's amazing and they were pretty packed in here too. Wow yeah these are I don't want to let them go any longer. Whoa wow. Holy. I don't know what to say right now. I'm just I'm the worm on there. I'm just totally in bliss and I'm feeling euphoric. These are incredible. I didn't think these were that nice. I didn't really see them probably because they're covered up by the cabbage leaves. Beautiful squashes. One, two, three squashes right here as well. Holy all these onions could be cold. I'm figuring I'm gonna leave some. It's the hardest one. Oh and that's only like maybe a third out of here. So I keep forgetting I'm picking blueberries. Wow yes. Cropping out. Wow and the corn lettuce seed. Wow. Hollyhocks mingling with the corn. Isn't that beautiful? And the poppies. That's gonna be fun spreading those around. Yeah so we're going down this way and then looping around. This is a Fuji apple. It's really taken off this year. It's really like a big fluffy ball. It's gonna be a good apple year. Oh looking forward to that. Good storage apples. Same with the honeycrisp. It's just loaded. Potatoes under the tree. These bells. So gorgeous. Yellow loose dry. Like goji berries. Oh black cap raspberries. Hey cool. Well they're finding their way in here. I do love them. Beneath the tree here to get through. Yeah the goji berries. I think I will move them. It's funny they're getting yellow too. Really cropped them back this year. But uh whoo the honeycrisp. The honeycrisp apple tree is boom. I was concerned I left too many on. I didn't really thin. But I put all these supports here. We got one crack from I think it was there last year too but with this kind of load on her I had to put three of these ladder supports in from old like dry rack kind of thing. But wow they're starting to fatten up. Oh so excited about the honeycrisp and the Fuji this year. Amazing. There's the other side of that jungle that we can't even get in now. There's like a 20 foot maple tree from a seedling. A couple of them. And wow the grape vines. Parsnip seeds squirting everywhere. Can I go? I'm getting strangled by a kiwi vine. That's just massive all in here. I will cut her off though. I don't want her going up the pussy willow and taking over. Because they do take over. I want the grape to be good here. Big clusters all up in there. I'm getting all these peas that I left for a seed crop. They've been on here for quite a while through a few different periods of rain. So I was wondering if they're still good. Sometimes they will go moldy. Throw some around. I always love doing that. That's how you get all the volunteers or just encourage them you know. And planted a bunch of scarlet runners. It was one of the last things I did. And so it's nice to have something that comes in and flowers a little bit later. Yeah this is an aracara. This must be like a blue curry. But I thought they were the same and I thought it was some variation. But I think that's what's going on here. We're just... and we're just like walked right in here with the hollyhocks. So gorgeous. Get through this way. A little hyssop. Zumble bees. Wow it's getting high in here. Yeah out from the jungle. Oh what do we got? More garlic. This is the highbush cranberry. Oh yeah let's open it up here right now. It's time to pull this garlic. And potatoes. I've used all this bark mulch from firewood. Yeah all the irrigation is on here. There's a fat garlic. It's like a scape. Oh weird. Way down low. Look at that. Huge. That's strange. Maybe I should save that. I'll just plant those guys. See what happens. Some carrots in here. Carrots. Potatoes. Hey there's quite a few carrots kind of spaced about. They might actually be good now that we've opened this up. In about a month time they might fatten up. Oh I just got showered in delphinium seeds. Ah yes a new shoot. Look at this buddy. That's a new shoot. Should have some roots on it. So I think next spring. Wow. Okay get this out of here. Got a tower of cucumbers here. They're working out okay. I had a lot of compost in here. They were held back for quite a long time. And then I planted some beans in here just because it wasn't really filling out. But actually they're starting to fill out now. This is looking good. Look at those new ones. Yeah Still been cropping out regardless. Left these a little bit long. These are a little big. This is Chelsea prize. It is a hybrid. It's one of my favorites though. Yep time for a lot of juice. They are everywhere. Coming up to the hugelpal terrace real soon. Hang in there. Got a little bit more to harvest over here. Nice big juicy box garden from mined pathway soil basically and around. And yeah it's looking really good. Pretty much two ears on each plant I think. Got the mulch on there and the drip tape irrigation working out beautifully. So nice to have the surface watering for things like corn versus you know overhead. You don't want to get the tassels all wet when they're trying to pollinate. Again come around and just shake these guys especially the ones on the edge so you get consistent ears of corn. Consistent kernels. Yeah and the eggplant are actually surprisingly working out in these pots this year. Yeah I got a separate little valve. This has drip tubing and a little emitter different than the drip tape. But wow usually I get their early crop and then they get mites and they shut down. But I've been picking leaves off and they're a little bit more isolated you know from slugs in the pots in this tarp here. And wonderful there's wow this is how like eggplants should grow. I mean it's difficult in my climate zone five ish. Beauty that one will be ready soon. Just go over to the wicking towers here. It's just These are hilarious. I'm actually gonna use scissors this time. That's best. I don't know if these are all gonna fit in here. Look at all these little pudgies in here. Holy smokes. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine up here. Little baby in there too. Holy. That's pretty loaded. Around on the other side there's a bunch too. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven. I don't think these are all gonna fit in here. I don't know there's like 25 or something. The hollyhocks are just everywhere. I can fill this. This is my filling point here or down below there. I can also fill it in the overflow valve. It's adjustable. I also just water them on top because they are so tall. You know some things the roots don't go all that deep. They might be going down there. I mean they're doing really good. It looks dry on the top. So yes. Yahoo. The melon tower. Whoa. There's one right there. They come on fast. Oh I noticed some little sets but wow. Oh sweet. It's gonna work out this year. There's two right there. There's a nice big one going. Lots of flowers still. Lots of little starts and they're just right down to the to the earth now. Oh wonderful. They grow up and down. So I got this soft pipe insulation on the edge there just so they can curl over nicely without getting wrecked or kinked. Wow so that's guys that's gonna work out. And some more cukes here. They're looking a little bit dry. These guys are on their way out. Make sure the melons have lots of water constantly. Gotta remember to keep on that. All right thanks for making it this far on the video. The hugelkultur pallet terrace development just going off. It's so gorgeous. I'm so pleased with it even though some things are failing a little bit. There's enough crops in here that some are awesome as well. I'll take you on a little tour of the terrace garden right now. Needles. So I'm not sure what's up with the butternuts. I just thought they'd be about twice Look at that. How gorgeous that is. See all the new growth. It's doubled in size since I put it in. So wonderful. There's so heavy mulch in here and then hugelkultur underneath. Volunteer asters are coming in. They're gonna bloom. Hey look at that. Pee. How we see new things. Didn't even see that. Wow. I think that's the third one. I have like two more. There's one up there and there's one down here somewhere. Mini mini. Excellent for a tiny melon. you