SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany

Hello everyone!

haven't had time and patience to update recently. My joblife is currently a mess and draws a lot of energy. But heres a current status of our garden:

Finally, finally plantet the physalis and sweet potatoes out. They where really getting desperate in their cointainers... Physalis at the top half of that image, the ones with the big and fluffy leaves, sweet potatoes on the bottom half, due to a recent aphid attack almost without leaves but still went in with strong roots.
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany

Relocated the biggest of my own 3 rhubarb seedlings outside. It was getting too big for it's corner in the greenhouse. The other two are nwhere near that big. mind you thea where planted as seeds mid-march, and look at this 3 month old monstrosity...
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany

The cucumbers are now finally starting to pick up their growth, I think they needed a lot of time to adjust because of all those root voles. But now they are slowly getting taller and starting to flower.
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany

The 1st raised gardenged is doing great. The first pea pods are developing, the carrots on the one side are also coming along nicely and on the other side yellow beetroots and endive are florishing as well.
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany

The greenhouses are starting to get really green. Some of those tomatoplants are just exploding in growth. But no ripe tomatoes so far...
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany

SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany

my fiancé was able to harvest a 10l bucket full of sweet cherries from our neighbours. And I finally braided the onions from the greenhouse into a little braid that hangs on the patio for storage reasons. I also produced around 0.75 l of elderflower sirup and 3.5l elderflower jam. 😋 yum!
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany

SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany

Hauro the bunny also had some nice trips to the garden.
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany

and some flowery pics for general enjoyment 😍
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany

Aaaaaand I proudly introduce our froggy team. There are three of them croaking along, but sadly one of the is still a little bit shy so I have only pics of one...🤣
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
 
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Especially considering the added work stress and the aphids... the garden is looking amazing!
Love the flowers and froggy too - always makes the gardens look so lovely and lively.
 
Hello again!

We had a huge rainstorm last night. a few kilometers away the had hail in golfball size.... luckily we ecaped that part... but there were still huge windgusts and a lot, I mean a LOT, of rain. some houses in our city needed help from the firedepartment in getting rid of drowning cellars😅
So I went out this morning to have a look at our garden.

our small greenhouse got a pretty good watering becouse of the door beeing open at all times during summer, otherwise it's getting too hot in there. look at this Oxeheart tomatoe plant... it's gone wild. And anyone that tells you that it's not good for the fleschtomatoes to have more that one stem.... they really don't know what they're talking about. this one has 5 branches now and is flourishing. But I do prune all of the new branches that want to come now, because it's just getting too much. 2nd pic shows the Tschernij Prince Variety. Also a fleshtomato type and already with some fruit hanging on it.
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany

our second greenhouse is slowly becoming a jungel 😂 1st pic shows the 4 Ananas Tomato plants (flesh) that are also growing quite profusely. 2nd+3rd pic show the Roma Variety with first fruits.
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany

checkup on the yellow (1st pic) and green (2nd pic) zucchini shows that they are doing great. and a little closeup on those beautifull flowers. (and as you can see in the 2nd pic there are root voles literally EVERYWHERE)
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany

then there's our blue pumpkin:
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany

and the hokaido Pumpkin
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany

one of the apple trees is just bursting with fruits... they are still a long way away from getting ripe (about 2 month) but wow...
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany

The sour cherry tree is also quite full of ripe fruits
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany

and the black currants are also bearing some fruit.
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany

Then I pulled the 2nd harvest of onions (1st pic, stuttgarter Riesen/giants) I did pull the a bit earlier because i don't like big onions... they are now curing befor I'm going to braid them together like I did with the first onion harvest (2nd pic)
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
 
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Hello everyone!

Finally with my working situation under control there's suddenly energy building up again for the garden. Even if the heat is a little distracting... 33°C in full sun isn't what we're used to 😅🙈 luckily there was a bit of rain again yesterday, so today it's cooled down again, plus we don't have to water 😁
But I finally had enough energy and enthusiasm to start the mulching process. We got a bag full of straw from a local farm. But it's the long stuff, so I lay it out flat on the lawn and mow it over. The mower does a good job in cutting most of the long stuff shorter.
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany

SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany

SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
 
I may have missed a few posts, but I've generally caught up. It's always interesting how every year is different, bringing better or worse weather for particular plants or pests.

I wonder if the tea-monarde could be a monarda (aka bee balm). I think the leaves look right and the name is similar. If one is attempting to translate, it may be best to go to Latin since everyone can get their local names from that. It also helps when sometimes the common name gets repeated so you have the same name for two or three different plants which really confuses things.
 
Glad to hear at least the tomatoes are doing well @Lunai . I hope that the new workplace is very nice and that you ease right into it. I am looking forward to seeing the bigger update :D
 
Hello everyone! Long time no see😅

sooooo sorry for the long wait 🙈 beeing pregnant with my second child sometimes drains out all energy 😅 especially with all the weather changes during the last few weeks... It's crazy I tell you... one day we have 37°C no clouds at all, the su is burning down... 3 days later there is a thunderstorm that rains down for only 20 min BUT! well... 47L/sqm in those 20 minutes... There was water everywhere... And like I mentioned before, our soil isn't the best nor used to hold or drain that much water, not to speak of our sewers... The pictures tell their own stories I think. The first two pictures I took while at work. It's the street right in front of the hotel... took that water about 30 minutes after the rain subsided to drain away enough to be able to at leas use the sidewalk again. The two other pictures show a cellar of a good friend of mine. We also had some water in the cellar of the hotel but nearly not a smuch...
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany


Back to the garden: good news, it's green🤣 the Tomatoes are doing great. The peppers not so much but still ok. What's kind of a disaster this year are all the Pumpkins/Cucumbers/Melons/Zucchini... the whole family. I've 15 Cucumber plants and tho I did pickle some of them with that amount of plants I should'nt know where to put them but I harvested maybe one last week... The Melons don't grow at all but they where planned more as a gimmick and not as mandatory so I don't feel quite sad about them. The Zucchini on the other Hand... I knowingly planted 5 now I have 8 Plants. I seems as there has been a mixe up with the seeds, because the 3 I planted thinking they where blue pumpkins ended up beeing Zucchini... that said... I've maybe harvested a handfull in total and that's a total disaster... following pics show the zucchini sadness... with all that rain mildew as also kicking in...
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany

The cucumbers:
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany

Well at least the Hokaido Pumpkin is going better, not strong, but it's going...
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany

All that aside it can be said, that this year is an apple-year. There's a ton of apples... sadly most of them ending on the ground beacause we had no time to harvest nor to process...
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany


And well the Tomatoes 😍 at least one thing that mostly worked out... The greenhouses produce most of the harvest and the plants are going strong.
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany

SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany

The firs big harvest was around 6 kg:
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany

With beautifully coloured Ananas-Tomatoes😍
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany

A few days later I took another almost 4 kg harvest home so I decided to cann some sauce...
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany

I did let this first batch cook for a relatively long time so the volume reduced quite a bit. No real recipe for the whole thing I'm afraid... For the biggest pot I added 2 whole garlic bulbs, 3 tble spoons salt, 2 tble spoons parseley 2 tble spoos oregano and 1 tble spoon black pepper. for anothe batch I also added rosemary... but these things are always up to my mood😅 For one of the smaller pots i actually added some sugar and reduced it even more to make some ketchup.

The last harvest was the biggest until now... almost 10 kg in one go... just insane just the Ananas-tomatoes weighed 5,4 kg the heaviest single one with 734 g...

SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany


SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
 

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Oh my - such a bountiful harvest!

Hope the floodying didn't cause too many issues or damage :O

Would most definitely love your recipe for the tomato sauce, and if you have time, perhaps put it in the articles thread :D
 
As draining as it must be, you must be so excited to meet that little bundle of joy! My sister-in-law is now pregnant of her 2nd child as well. I think she's due somewhere in December. I wonder how the firstborn will take it, but I bet she will like the bub. She's very social and loves playing with others.

Goodness the water. Glad to hear there wasn't quite as much water in your cellars; hopefully damage has been limited. The issues appear very similar to The Netherlands really, though we don't often have cellars (crawlspaces instead). We've had water up to our door a couple times, but luckily it never entered. I've seen neighbours barricading their doors with sandbags as cars would stir up the water quite a bit.
Here in Australia (at least where I live) it's so different! We live in a valley (between two mountains), and the water drains to the little creek we have down the backpaddock. I heard from granddad-in-law that the water once came almost all the way up to the house. They were lucky that they brought the cows up, because the whole backpaddock was completely flooded. And even up here cows were standing in water. It must've been quite terrifying for the poor things. And hectic for granddad and my partner too - they are kept in by an electric fence, powered by a shed in the backpaddock. That would've definitely shut down on them.

Considering the odd/bad weather, your plants don't look half-bad at all. Most issues are to be expected when growing in such challenging weather. Thankfully this weather is quite uncommon, so next growing season you should be able to absolutely thrive once more.
The apples look so healthy! Somehow the apple tree must've loved it all. Oh, how I'd love to make some applesauce to serve with a pork roast. My mouth is watering, haha.

For others reading, ananas is a word many countries use for pineapple.
So many tomatoes! Yes! :D
 
As draining as it must be, you must be so excited to meet that little bundle of joy! My sister-in-law is now pregnant of her 2nd child as well. I think she's due somewhere in December. I wonder how the firstborn will take it, but I bet she will like the bub. She's very social and loves playing with others.

Goodness the water. Glad to hear there wasn't quite as much water in your cellars; hopefully damage has been limited. The issues appear very similar to The Netherlands really, though we don't often have cellars (crawlspaces instead). We've had water up to our door a couple times, but luckily it never entered. I've seen neighbours barricading their doors with sandbags as cars would stir up the water quite a bit.
Here in Australia (at least where I live) it's so different! We live in a valley (between two mountains), and the water drains to the little creek we have down the backpaddock. I heard from granddad-in-law that the water once came almost all the way up to the house. They were lucky that they brought the cows up, because the whole backpaddock was completely flooded. And even up here cows were standing in water. It must've been quite terrifying for the poor things. And hectic for granddad and my partner too - they are kept in by an electric fence, powered by a shed in the backpaddock. That would've definitely shut down on them.

Considering the odd/bad weather, your plants don't look half-bad at all. Most issues are to be expected when growing in such challenging weather. Thankfully this weather is quite uncommon, so next growing season you should be able to absolutely thrive once more.
The apples look so healthy! Somehow the apple tree must've loved it all. Oh, how I'd love to make some applesauce to serve with a pork roast. My mouth is watering, haha.

For others reading, ananas is a word many countries use for pineapple.
So many tomatoes! Yes! :D
oh what a coincidence! 🤣 i'm also due on the 20th of december 😁 but it's still a mystery what it will be, didn't want to show us on the last ultrasound...🤷‍♀️ But that's ok as long as everything is ok.

yeah with the apples... I just havn't had enough time to cook applesauce 🙈 I have about 10kg waiting on the kitchen table...
 
Haha, so bub will be a Christmas surprise! So long as he or she is healthy, all is well :)

Haha I don't blame you! And there is a little munchkin also draining your energy now. We've made applesauce the lazy way. Just put them on the stove with some cinnamon, sugar and a little lemon juice (stirring every once in a while against burning, but basically set and forget), then toss them in a blender and badabing badaboom, it's done. Though some people like to mash it on the stove (like mashed potatoes). Each their own. I liked the lazy way as it took me next to no effort. And to clean the blender I just added hot water and soap, letting it blend itself clean :blush:
 
love the post and pics Lunai your garden has come a long way :) . love the tomato harvest. i used to have a huge garden area out back. but it got to point with leg it was too much to handle at time at one point had 48 tomatoes and 48 sweet pepper plants plus hot peppers along with all the normal staples to grow my gardens was 50 by 150 Ft ( 15 x 45 Meter )and it was all wide row intensive / raised beds and some areas were multiple crops companion planted. at one point i did testing of new varieties for a couple seed companies. the hybrids are nice but i still like my heirloom for flavors and textures, largest tomatoes every grew was 3.6 pounds 450+ grams with an old standby beef steak variety , did try a few Atlantic giant pumpkins from seeds i got from a gent in Nova Scotia couple years ago but it was intensive work took up huge amount of space. ive been trying to find my photos but not sure where they are at moment
 
Hello everyone 😃

Not a real update today. Just some very much needed maintenance work in under 2 hours...

First I changed the old and crumbly flange from our newest gardenmember: IBC container instead of 3 rain barrels. And I also got an adapter with quick change for installing a hose or two 😍 getting the old flange off was actually the hardest work but my fiancé had beating arguments on his side, and with the help of a hammer finally won the heated discussion whether it should go off or not...
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany

Then I stared a bit in wonder at the yellow climbing roses that are currently shooting off into the sky. Tomorrow I need to bind them onto the trellis but had no time today... maybe you can spot the meter long offshoots in-between all the other overgrowing greenery 😅🙈
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany

Then I took my new whippersnipper and just went through all the overgrowing weeds that grow where we actually planted potatoes... but the potato bug was very busy this year and there was no chance saving the plants... so no potatoes but loads of weeds... the tagetes did come good tho ... and the sunflowers... need to dig all that mulch down some time but, well no time for that today...
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
 
A hint if you have a stone crusher that break large rock to gravel for cement or pavement and general use gravel nearby stop over see if they have any of the stone dust under the conveyors, get a small hand crank crops duster and dust the plant with a good coat of dust top and bottom the abrasive nature of the dust cuts the bug and soft larva and aphids enough that they die , if you cant get rock dust use powdered Diatomaceous earth.

Another option there is a natural occurring fungus called Beauveria bassiana commercially you can get the dust for it to apply to plant this fungus infect and kills the potato bug and larva, but can infect other insect though.

Essential oils to make a spray. this spray can be used on numerous plants additionally extract oils from basil leaves garlic and cayenne pepper and other herbs are natural insecticides and work wonders on them
2 tablespoons neem oil
1 teaspoon of peppermint oil
1 teaspoon rosemary oil
1 gallon of water
teaspoon of liquid castile soap

Also available are pheromone traps that attract potato bugs and and some for Japanese beetles warning do not place close to the infested area because they will also attract from long distance ones that are no on your property place them to a far away corner to attract.

Companion plant beans, catnip, coriander, dead nettle, garlic, marigold, flax, horseradish, and tansy with the potatoes

Final option Lady bugs love the eggs of potato bugs and aphids along with numerous other other bad insect infestation.

here is a style of a crops duster
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
 
Hello everyone!

It's still Winter over here, but the new growing season lurks around the corner and I couldn't resist to start helping it along 😁
The following Chili varieties already went into their new earth beds.
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany

The following one already showing two seedlings.
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany
SelfSufficiant Gardenventure in eastern Germany


More varieties and also Tomatoes are to follow over the next weeks.

Now I need to tend to my babyboy with RS-Virus again😅🙈
 
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