So, come wander around and see what’s growing! I’ll share plenty of fun tidbits and tips along the way, plus a little sprinkle of bird nerd action. Last but not least, I’ve included a smattering of my favorite photos of the garden this season below. I love putting these together as a photo-journal for our own reflection, and hope you enjoy taking a peek as well!

The New Berry Patch

One small change we made on the homestead this spring was to create a dedicated space to grow cane berries, including blackberries, raspberries, and ollalieberries (a classic here on the Central Coast of California) – each in their own bed.

Since gophers prevent us from growing directly in the ground, we opted to use Birdies metal raised bed kits for this project and absolutely love them! They’re really high quality, durable, and were a breeze to put together. If you’re interested, code ‘deannacat3’ will save 5% off Birdies raised beds here. We added hardware cloth below for gopher protection, a thick layer of burlap for weed suppression, and finished it off with fresh wood chips and a steel border all around. Up next: build a berry trellis support system!

Summer in the Raised Bed Garden

After a record-breaking wet winter and gloomiest, greyest spring ever, our summer garden got off to a pretty slow start this year. But, she’s booming and blooming now! We’ve been harvesting ample beans, zucchini, leafy greens, carrots, beets, cabbage, basil, and other goodies we planted in late winter to early spring. Not to mention all the stunning companion flowers that are going off! We have yet to harvest any tomatoes, peppers, eggplant, or other warm-weather lovers though.

For a complete list of all the vegetable and flower varieties we planted this spring/summer, see this post. I’ll also link related seeds, grow guides, and other resources in captions of each photo!

The New Pollinator Orchard

A HUGE undertaking we accomplished this winter/spring was creating our new pollinator orchard over on “sandy hill”. We broke ground on the project in January, finished in April, and were able to add over a dozen new fruit trees plus hundreds of native and drought-tolerant plants for pollinators to an otherwise barren, weedy hill on the far side of our property. It has quickly become a thriving ecosystem already – full of native bees, butterflies, lizards, bunnies, quail families and more!

If you missed it, I shared a blogpost and YouTube video with a tour along with the step-by-step by process we took to transform the space: clearing the weeds, creating natural terraces or permaculture berms, using burlap as natural landscape fabric, planting trees, adding mulch, a solar powered drip irrigation system, and more! So, I’ll only share a couple of my favorite shots here.

Thank you for coming along for the tour!

And that’s a wrap. I appreciate you tuning in for our summer garden tour and homestead update today. I hope it gave you plenty of ideas, inspiration and tips! Please feel free to ask any questions or just say hello in the comments below. See you next time!

You may also like:

• How to Build Raised Garden Beds: Step by Step Guide
• 8 Best and Easy Annual Companion Flowers to Grow from Seed
• How to Create a Bird-Friendly Garden and Yard
• The Best DIY Tomato Trellis Tutorial
• The Top 23 Plants for Pollinators

The post Summer Garden Tour and Homestead Update (Video): July 2023 appeared first on Homestead and Chill.

Come along to see how we transformed the space over several months. In this post, you’ll find a video tour of the new orchard on a hill that also includes footage of all the work we did to create it.

I’ve also included a written summary and plenty of photos to outline the steps we took to design the space, clear weeds, contour the land to make natural terraces or berms, use burlap as natural weed fabric, select fruit trees and other orchard companion plants, install a solar-powered irrigation system, add mulch, rock and steel borders, and more. Your bound to pick up plenty of useful tips along the way!

If you’re here from YouTube and looking for the full list of plants I promised, jump to the complete plant list here.

Video Tour and Transformation

Watch this video to see our new orchard on a hill, including all the work and steps we took to create it.

Location and Design

Our new orchard on a hill is located on the far side of our property on a sunny, south-facing slope. The previous owners used it as a goat and horse pasture, thus keeping the weeds in check. After being here a couple years now, invasive weeds grew back with a vengeance. We wanted to put the space to much better use – and grow some food!

With any new garden project, I always consider wildlife and pollinators too. My goal was to add plenty of native and drought-tolerant plants to offer food and habitat for them, as well as increase pollination and fruit production in the orchard for us! Plus, they look pretty darn beautiful too. 

I knew right away we’d need to figure out a way to terrace the hill. Terraces help create level areas that are more easy and comfortable to work and spend time in. Even more, the water runoff was quite significant on this hill! Especially paired with our super sandy native soil, which has terrible water absorption and retention. Terracing hills reduces water runoff and therefore increases the water absorption and availability to the plants growing on it!

At first, I contemplated bringing in a bunch of stone or blocks to build up rock wall terraces. Yet after terracing a much smaller area at our last property, I quickly realized that would be far too costly and laborious on this much larger scale, especially because we intended to do 100% of the work ourselves (and I’m not getting any younger over here)! So, we decided we’d try our hand at contouring the land and creating permaculture berms to terrace the hill instead. 

Site Prep

The first step in the orchard hill project was to clear the area of weeds – which we did entirely by hand, shovel, and rake. This stage took several weeks, working for a few hours and a couple days a week. We definitely could have brought in a tiller or tractor to make the work much faster (and easier), yet we wanted to avoid tilling and also pull up as much of the roots and seed heads as possible. Plus it was an extraordinarily rainy winter, so I enjoyed being outside and getting my hands in the soil whenever I could. 

After clearing the weeds, we played with math, stakes, and drew lines in the sand to plan and outline key features: where the berms, trees, and pathways may go. This enabled us to determine how many terraces to create, how wide each level would be, how many trees we could fit while still providing adequate space between them, and finalize other decisions before “breaking ground” and starting to terrace the hill. 

Terracing the Hillside (Making Permaculture Berms)

Next, it was time to start forming the terraces and berms. Let’s back up and break this part down a bit:

What is a berm?

A berm is a natural or man-made mound of earth (usually made from compacted soil, rocks, and/or other natural material) to create a terrace or shelf, most often on a slope or hill.  In landscaping and permaculture, berms are used to contour the land, break up and add variation to a space, create planting zones, and most importantly, to divert water runoff in a more favorable way. 

Berms are often used in conjunction with swales, which are low depressions or shallow ditches that also help to facilitate improved drainage, water retention, and vegetation in an area. The middle of our terraces have a slight depression, and we also created one rock-lined swale to divert runoff from the steepest slope to a nearby tree. 

Forming berms for our orchard hill

We created berms with a combination of native soil and bulk soil and compost we brought in. Adding higher-quality bulk soil and compost served two purposes: 1) to better help level and build up the berms (reducing the amount of native soil we had to move), and also 2) offer more nutrients and microbial life to the trees and plants that would grow here.

• First, we used sturdy 36″ wide landscape rakes to scrape and dig into the uphill side of each terrace, pulling the native soil downhill several feet to both level the space and form the berm below. Again, our native soil is super sandy so it was possible to do this with rakes and muscle power alone, though different tools (e..g shovels, backhoe) may be required for different soil types.
  
  
• We started at the top of the hill, forming the shape of the top terraces and berms first. Then we moved down to the next terrace, where we cut and dug into the base of the berm above, pulled back the soil, and repeated the process moving downhill. See photos below.
  
  
• Once we created the rough terraced berms with native soil alone, we brought in bulk soil and compost to augment them. We dumped loads throughout every terrace, and then used the same wide landscape rakes to spread and smooth it out – focusing the majority of the material on the top and face of the berms. 

Helping the berms hold shape

When making natural terraces or berms, there is always a small risk that they could shift or settle with time – and even more so on a slope. I was definitely concerned about this, especially since our native soil is so soft and sandy. So, we did a few things to help our berms hold shape:

• After building up the berms with bulk soil and compost, we gently compacted the soil by laying down plywood and lightly stamping on it. (The soil was far too soft to use a traditional tamper, the edges of the berms would have just collapsed). 
  
  
• We covered the entire orchard space with burlap (explained more below), including an extra layer on the face of the berms. The burlap is tucked tight against the front of the terraces, hugging and holding the soil in place until the plant roots grow in. 
  

• Next we planted dozens of low-growing, trailing plants along the front face of the berms along with several shrubs and trees on top. As the plants grow in, their roots will really help to stabilize the soil. 
  

• Finally, the addition of mulch will help the berms stay more moist, encourage plant root expansion, and further support the terrace structure. We’ll also avoid walking on the berm edges until they become more established. 

Burlap Ground Cover 

After forming the terraces and berms, we immediately covered them in burlap – especially because it kept raining on us, and I was afraid all our hard work was going to wash away! We chose to use untreated burlap as a natural alternative to traditional weed barrier fabric in this project. 

Burlap is biodegradable and will break down within a year or two, feeding the soil organic matter as it does. So while it won’t offer long-lasting weed protection, it will be enough to help smother the weeds for the first season or two, plus help support the berm structure until the plants get established. Burlap also acts like mulch (which we added on top later) and helps with runoff and water retention too. 

Originally, we ordered several long rolls of natural untreated burlap (similar to this burlap but even wider) from a local landscape supplier. The shipment kept getting delayed, and delayed… and eventually we were told it was lost in transit. With significant rainstorms on the horizon and sandy soil sloughing more every day, we changed plans and decided to use burlap squares we could readily source locally instead. You may also be able to find burlap coffee sacks (for free!) from local coffee roasters, which are ideal for smaller projects. 

The burlap we ended up using was a bit thinner than the rolls we’d hoped for, so we laid down two layers across the entire orchard area, and four layers (two squares, folded in half) across the front face of the berms. The burlap is held in place with 6″ galvanized landscape staples.

Fruit Tree Variety Selection

Believe it or not, narrowing down (and locating) our selection of fruit tree varieties was one of the more difficult tasks of this entire project! I feel like every time I settled on a “final” list of varieties, we either couldn’t find a certain one or I found something even more tantalizing (which then threw off the pollinator partner varieties I’d selected too). I also really wanted some almond trees, but ultimately accepted they’re not known to do well in our area. 

When considering fruit tree varieties for your garden, there are so many things to consider. In addition to sounding tasty, it’s important to choose varieties that are compatible with your growing zone and chill hour requirements, tree size and spacing needs, and also if they need another variety for cross-pollination to produce a respectable crop. Learn more about choosing the best fruit trees for your climate here, or dive into this lesson all about fruit tree chill hours. 

Here on the Central Coast of California (San Luis Obispo county, zone 9, about 400-500 chill hours) the fruit trees varieties we chose for orchard hill include:

• Red Baron peach (pollinates with Pinamint)
• Panamint nectarine (pollinates with Red Baron)
• Blenheim apricot (self-fruitful)
• Golden Dorsett apple (pollinates with Anna)
• Anna apple (pollinates with Golden Dorsett)
• Pink Lady apple (pollinates with King David)
• King David apple (pollinates with Pink Lady)
• Monterey pear (self-fruitful, but would bear better with a partner)
• Fuyu persimmon (self-fruitful)
• Desert King and Celeste figs (self-fruitful)
• Loquats (self-fruitful)
• Hass avocado (pollinates with Fuerte)
• Fuerte Avocado (pollinates with Hass)

We were able to source all of our trees from a handful of local nurseries, with the exception of the Desert King Fig (my fave), which we got online from Nature Hills Nursery. We were honestly thrilled at the quality and condition of the tree when it arrived! Fast Growing Trees is another excellent reputable online tree supplier.

Other Edibles

In addition to the fruit trees, we also planted several pineapple guavas, blueberries (Emerald, Jewel, and Sunshine Blue), and kiwis in the new orchard hill space. Fuzzy kiwis have male and female plants, and both are required to set fruit. So, we planted two females (Saanichton and Vincent) up our gorgeous moongate trellis, and a Tomori male kiwi along a nearby fence for pollination. In other parts of the property, we also have plums, limes, lemons, oranges, pomegranates, apricots, grapes, and several more fig, peach, and apple trees. 

See related grow guides for figs, avocados, and pineapple guava here.

Planting Fruit Trees

Learn best practices for planting fruit trees in this comprehensive guide. In summary, dig a hole that is about twice as wide but only as deep as the existing root ball or pot. Maintain the top of the rootball and root collar at or just above the surrounding soil level when planting, and never bury a tree trunk or pile mulch up around it! It’s best to backfill the planting hole with mostly native soil, though we do also like to add some higher quality soil and well-aged compost as well. Do not fertilize at the time of planting. 

It’s best to space fruit trees at least 10 feet apart (e.g. smaller varieties or those that will be kept pruned) and up to 20 feet for larger varieties. Maintaining about 12 to 15 feet between them, we were able to fit 9 fruit trees on the terraced portion of orchard hill, along with several more off to the side and along the lower fence line. We planted the fruit trees closer to the berms and left a wider pathway behind them on the more flat portion of the terraces. 

Gophers are rampant in this area, so we have to plant every tree in a large durable gopher basket to protect the root ball. Learn how to make a DIY gopher cage from hardware cloth here, or buy sturdy gopher baskets here. I also put together this list of over 50 gopher-resistant plants for California and beyond.

Orchard Companion Plants and Pollinators

Next up: it was time to plant all the beautiful native and drought-tolerant pollinator plants. California poppies, rosemary, rock rose, catmint, lavender, sea daisies, CA buckwheat, fuchsia, comfrey, and more! We also scattered California native wildflower seeds in the open fields around the perimeter or the orchard. See the complete list of orchard companion plants below. 

Honestly, planting these was one of the most physically taxing jobs from the entire orchard hill project, but also SO rewarding to see once they were all in the ground! We chose to plant them after the burlap went down – so the soil and berms would hold in place, and so we wouldn’t have to try to tuck burlap all between them after the fact. It was easy to cut holes in the burlap where needed. I also came up with a super handy hack for planting on a slope to prevent the holes from collapsing! Check it out below.

Comfrey in a Permaculture Orchard

Comfrey is a fantastic multi-purpose companion plant in a permaculture orchard. So much so, it deserves its own little spotlight here! Comfrey is known as a “dynamic accumulator”. With its deep taproot, comfrey is exceptional at drawing up nutrients from the soil and storing them in its tissues. 

We plan to use comfrey for “chop and drop mulch”. Once or twice a year, we will cut the comfrey back, chop it up in small pieces, and use it as green mulch around the base of the trees – where those concentrated nutrients will return to the soil and feed the fruit trees. Even more, comfrey can be used in herbal medicine and topical healing salves, to make nutrient-rich fertilizer teas, and native bumblebees absolutely love the flowers!

NOTE: Readily spreading by seed, common comfrey is considered invasive in many environments. We grow Russian Bocking 14 comfrey instead. Many permaculturists consider Russian Bocking 14 the best orchard companion variety because it grows very robustly but isn’t invasive. The seeds are sterile, so it can only be planted from rhizomes.

Complete Plant List

In addition to the edibles and fruit trees (listed above), here is a complete list of the other companion plants we chose for the orchard hill space:

Drip Irrigation System

And now one of the most essential elements: water! During the time we were working on contouring the land, we were also working on installing a drip irrigation system on the side. That included tapping into the main water line at the top of the hill, installing a 4-station valve manifold, a solar powered control panel, PVC lines down to the site, and then a 4-zone drip irrigation system weaving about the entire space. I put together a separate post and video tutorial on that process – check it out here.  We did this before mulch went down, and then covered the lines in mulch.

Mulch

Mulch is an essential part of an organic garden and landscaping. It offers numerous benefits including suppressing weeds, reducing runoff, improving soil’s organic matter and moisture retention (and thereby reducing water needs) and insulating plant roots against temperature extremes. It also makes the landscape look polished and sharp – like the final cherry on top! 

For the orchard hill project, we chose to use a “walk on bark” (sourced locally in bulk) that is like a blend of irregular shredded wood chips and chunkier bark bits. It is longer-lasting than shredded mulch (like gorilla hair) but holds in place better than classic bark mulch, especially on the slopes. We opted to not use local tree wood chips or “chip drop” for this project, just to be extra cautious as to not introduce any tree diseases to the orchard.

After planting all the plants, we spread mulch about three inches thick around the entire space, with the exception around the base of trees. It’s best to avoid piling mulch up right around a tree trunk, so leave a couple feet of clear space around it.  We plan to refresh and top it off with more mulch as needed every few years. Read the pros and cons of 8 common types of mulch here.

Rock & Steel Borders

Though we opted to not build rock wall terraces, I still wanted to bring in some landscaping rocks to add dimension and further define the space. We added a row of large cobbles to top of each berm, which also helps us keep track of where the irrigation lines are and prevents us from stepping on the edge of the berm. The rocks also provide ideal habitat for western fence lizards, who help keep the insect population in check too!

We also installed steel edging along the uphill and outer edge of the orchard hill space. The edging will hold in mulch, help keep weeds out (like the creeping invasive ice plant), and also stop water runoff – forcing it to infiltrate along the uppermost terrace instead. We like to use the hammer-in corten steel edging from Edge Right. We used the same edging around our raised bed garden project too.

The Finished Space + Before-and-Afters

Now it’s time to sit back, relax, and watch the space grow. Well, there will be a tad more maintenance and upkeep to come (pruning, deadheading, fertilizing, refreshing mulch…) but it sure feels good to have all of the heavy lifting done!

Thank you for touring our new orchard on a hill!

Ooof! I told you this was one of our largest projects ever. I realize that was a lot of information to digest, and many the things we did may not exactly apply to other sites or climates. Yet I hope this gave you plenty of fun ideas and useful tips nonetheless! Please feel free to ask any questions or just say hello in the comments below. I really appreciate you tuning in today!

You may also like:

• Tree Planting Best Practices
• About Fruit Tree Chill Hours + Chart
• How to Build a Raised Garden Bed
• The Benefits of No-Till Gardening
• How to Kill or Remove Grass (and Grow Food, not Lawns!)
• Raised Bed Drip Irrigation System
• Solar Powered Drip Irrigation Controller

The post New Pollinator Orchard Garden on a Hill (Permaculture Berms Terraces)  appeared first on Homestead and Chill.

We plan to grow several new-to-us things this spring and summer, but there will also be many repeats on the list. So to keep things interesting, I figured I’d share more than just our “grow list” today, and will share some of the exciting homestead goals and projects we have planned for the new year too! Plus, a few reflections about our first full year here with a new garden. Isn’t that what January’s all about? I’d love to hear your 2023 garden aspirations in the comments below!

Click here to skip straight to the grow list.

Need Seeds? 

As you go through our grow list, you’ll quickly notice that almost all the varieties are from High Mowing Seeds. That’s where we get 99% of our seeds these days! High Mowing is a fantastic small certified organic seed company that offers a wide variety of quality veggie, flower and herb seeds.

Use this link + code “23DCAT10” to SAVE 10% on orders over $50 or more, now through the end of January ‘23! Using our link helps to support the work we do here at Homestead and Chill. We appreciate you using it, very much!

2022 Progress and Reflections

2022 was our first full year at this new property, so our main focus was getting the raised bed garden installed. And it turned out better than I ever imagined! (If you missed that project, you can see the step-by-step process here – including ground prep, materials, building raised beds, and irrigation.) We also planted dozens of pollinator plants and a handful of fruit trees. Otherwise, we spent our time enjoying the new space, continuing to learn our slightly different climate, and contemplating what to do next.

Overall, our 2022 spring and summer garden did great. Harvests were bountiful… too bountiful in some cases! Lesson learned: grow less eggplant. Lol. With 9 robust plants producing, we ended up donating SO much eggplant to our local food bank and neighbors, along with eating and preserving as much as we could. Other crops were more on the pitiful side however, like our bush beans and peppers. I’m not totally sure what was up with those! So far, our fall/winter garden is a little lackluster compared to normal too. I think we got a slightly late start, but it’s also been an exceptionally cold and wet winter here!

2023 Homestead Goals 

Now that the raised bed garden is done, I’m itching to tackle new projects! I love the entire planning process: the daydreaming, sketching, math, list-making, sourcing supplies… and of course the reward once it’s all complete. I even love the hard physical work and construction phase, though my body often tries to convince me otherwise.

More fruit, please

In 2023, we have one large project in mind: to create a secondary orchard. With 12 trees in our existing orchard space, it’s already at maximum capacity. We have a mature apricot tree plus young apples (2), peaches (2), figs (2), a nectarine, plum, lime, orange, and persimmon… but there is still a lot of other fruit I want to grow! Pears, more stone fruit, figs, and citrus varieties, and maybe even a couple of almond trees. Macadamia nuts apparently do well in our climate too! Can you imagine? 

The area we have in mind for a secondary orchard is on a slight slope, over on the corner of our property that we refer to as “Sandy Hill”. Before we even think about planting trees, we’ll need to terrace the wild and weedy hillside in order to create a suitable, functional planting area and to reduce runoff. I think it will look really sharp too!

I’m envisioning short walls made of natural rock or stone as the terrace barriers, though that sounds like a lot of heavy lifting… We shall see. We’ll also need to install a new drip irrigation system for that area. In addition to trees, I want to plant pollinator-friendly natives and companion plants around the base of the trees like borage, comfrey, rosemary, marigolds and yarrow. And of course, mulch mulch mulch!

Since it takes many years for trees to mature and bear fruit, it’s a great idea to focus on planting trees early on when first developing a new homestead or garden. If you’re also working on a new space and are feeling overwhelmed, check out this article for guidance: How to Start a Homestead: 9 Must-Read Tips for New Homesteaders.

Related: How to Choose Fruit Trees for Your Garden, How to Plant a Tree, and Fruit Tree Chill Hours Explained

Other 2023 Projects

Beyond the secondary orchard, I have several smaller projects in mind:

• Expand the chicken run. The current run is plenty big for the three chickens we currently have, but when we eventually expand the flock, I’d like them to have more room. I’d also like to provide them with more green pasture area instead of just dirt, though that is very seasonal here. I wish our girls could free range at this property, but there are too many hawks constantly around! Learn more about raising Backyard Chickens 101 here.
  
• Start a mushroom farm. Lol, maybe not a “farm” per se (just enough for personal use) but “mushroom farm” sure is fun to say! The oak trees on our property offer so much shade, so we might as well make use of it. Mushrooms are one of the few edibles that thrive in shade. Plus oak logs are some of the best wood to inoculate with shroom spores! Don’t worry, I’ll be sure to document and share that process as we go.
  
• Build a larger 3-bay compost system. The existing garden area already had a modest 3-bay compost bin we’re using now (plus our worm bin of course), but it’s undersized for our needs. It’s also not large enough to build up a proper hot pile, which I love to do! Learn more about composting at home here.
  
• Expand our “calendula farm” area. In addition to our raised beds, we currently grow the bulk of our calendula flowers in four 100-gallon grow bags in the pasture next to the old orchard. We need to grow a lot of calendula to keep up with the demand for our calendula salve and new face oil in our shop, so I’d like to at least double the growing space, plus improve the current irrigation system there.
  
• Hang more bird houses. In an effort to create even more shelter, food sources, and places to raise young for our local birdies (all key elements of a wildlife habitat!), I have a few cute birdhouses and feeders on the way from Gardeners Supply Co. Seeing the baby quail, blue jays and crows around our property last spring was such a delight! I also need to relocate our screech owl box because we haven’t yet had any visitors there. 

Grow List: What We’re Growing Spring & Summer 2023

Without further ado, here a full list of all the varieties we plan to grow in our spring and summer garden this year! We’ll plant a handful of cooler-season crops like leafy greens, cabbage, and root veggies next month, and then follow with tomatoes, squash, flowers, and other warm-weather crops later in spring. Don’t forget to refer to your planting calendars to figure out the best schedule for YOUR zone! 

Also, remember to read plant descriptions to choose things that suit your needs. For instance, the varieties I’m listing here do (or should) grow well in our temperate climate, and may offer natural disease resistance that we’re otherwise susceptible to here – such as powdery mildew. 

If you’re new to growing from seed, our Seed Starting 101 guide will help get you going. But there is no shame in buying started seedlings too! Learn how to pick the best seedlings at the nursery here.

Tomatoes

I’m more excited than ever for tomatoes this year! Between the warmer (less foggy) weather and a new kickass tomato trellis system, we had such a stellar tomato crop last summer! You can see the trellis system in action in this post, as well as other ways to prune and support tomatoes. As you browse the varieties below, note that we grow mostly indeterminate tomatoes (trellised) but usually grow a couple determinate varieties in large DIY tomato cages as well. 

Repeat favorites:

• Sakura. Large 1 oz. cherry tomatoes (more like saladette) that are prolific, delicious, and resist cracking. These performed SO well for us last year! Indeterminate. 
• Pink Boar. Beautiful, petitie (2-4 oz) wine-colored fruits with metallic green stripes. Said to perform well in challenging climates. Indeterminate. 
• Mountain Merit. Excellent red slicing tomato with firm flesh and 8-10 oz fruit. Productive and highly disease resistant. Determinate.
• Granadero. Large plum tomatoes 4-5 oz in size. Produces abundant and continued yields throughout the season. Offers high disease resistance. Great variety for homemade tomato sauce. Indeterminate. We may try Amish Paste (below) instead of this, or in addition to.
• Green Zebra Tomato. 4-5 oz. fruit with sweet and tangy flavor, color has dark green stripes that yellow as it ripens. Indeterminate.

New to us:

• Rosa de Berne. 4-8 oz. fruit that is resistant to cracking, early to mature than other larger varieties, and the flavor has a perfect balance of acidity and sweetness. Indeterminate.
• Plum Regal Tomato. High-yielding plum paste tomato with 4 oz. fruits that are great for sauces and canning. Good natural disease resistance. Determinate.
• CubaLibre. Abundant and round 7 oz. fruit that are similar to Cherokee Purple in appearance with less green along the shoulders. Indeterminate. (rare)
• Valentine. A highly productive red grape tomato with firm flesh, delicious flavor and holds up well after harvest. Indeterminate.
• Amish Paste Tomato. Large classic paste tomato with 8-12 oz. fruit, very few seeds and sweeter than most paste tomatoes. Indeterminate.

Related: Organic Tomato Grow Guide or 6 Ways to Support, Prune, and Train Tomato Plants

Summer and Winter Squash

Yep! Despite its potentially misleading name, winter squash is planted in spring and grown during the summertime – just like zucchini. It’s called winter squash because it lasts for a long time in storage post-harvest, so you can enjoy it through the winter. But it’s not frost tolerant!

Repeat favorites:

• Dunja Zucchini. Our go-to green zucchini variety. The plants are beautiful, prolific, and naturally resistant to powdery mildew!
• Nutterbutter Butternut. This butternut did absolutely fantastic for us last year. We harvested 28 squash (over 50 pounds) from just TWO pants! It’s described to “reliably mature in regions that have trouble ripening butternuts”.

New to Us:

• Goldy Zucchini. Long and slender bright yellow fruit that resists greening. 
• Green Machine Squash. A prolific classic green zucchini with exceptional disease resistance. We’ll either plant that or Stardust Zucchini – another productive zucchini variety with lightly speckled fruit.
• Winter Sweet Squash. Pale gray-blue kabocha squash with complex flavor that improves with storage. These guys only produce 2 squash per plant, but should be fun regardless!
• Delicata Squash. Vining plant that produces oblong striped fruit with superbly tender, sweet flesh.
• Autumn Frost Butternut Squash. A specialty butternut with unique frosted appearance that is rich and earthy in flavor.

Psst! Have you ever had zucchini or other squash that starts to grow, but then shrivels or rots on the vine? Chances are it wasn’t properly pollinated! Learn how to easily hand pollinate squash to prevent end rot here, or visit our full Zucchini & Summer Squash grow guide. 

Beans and Peas

Quick tip: soak bean and pea seeds in water for several hours before direct-sowing them outside for a speedy germination! Pop over to our bean grow guide for even more tips, and be sure to come back and try our fermented dilly bean recipe later.

• Pole Beans: Pole beans (vining) usually take longer to grow and bear fruit than bush beans, but they produce more and over a longer season. My favorite are Northeaster Pole Beans: a long, flat, tender, early-maturing Romano variety with great texture and buttery flavor. We’re also going to try these pretty Blue Coco Pole Beans this year. 
• Bush Beans are great for succession sowing all season long, and tucking between larger plants to maximize your growing space. In addition to classic green beans (like Provider or Jade bush beans), we’re particularly fond of beautiful purple and white Dragon Langerie, red-streaked Borlotto, tender Gold Rush Yellow Wax, and flat tender Roma type bush beans. 
• Sugar Snap Peas are always a spring staple! If you need an easy and inexpensive trellis for growing peas, beans, or any other vining plant, pop over to our DIY trellis tutorial.

Annual Flowers 

I love planting annual flowers in the raised beds amongst the veggies. They’ll add a beautiful pop of color, draw in pollinators, and some even deter pests! Learn more about companion planting here, and a full list of our top 23 plants for pollinators here.

• Calendula, my favorite flower and medicinal herb to grow. See: “All About Calendula: How to Grow, Harvest, Dry & Use Calendula Flowers” to learn more. Resina, Strawberry Blonde, Orange King, and Pacific Beauty are all staples around here. We also picked up a new variety called Erfurter to try. 
• Marigolds. Did you know these repel root knot nematodes? We usually grow classic French marigolds along with these adorable Tangerine Gem marigolds.
• Sunflowers. Evening Colors, Lemon Queen, Goldy Double, Mammoth, Strawberry Blonde, and Autumn Beauty are all on the list for this season. We enjoy a lot of branching, multi-headed types.
• Zinnias are a close runner-up to calendula, and a monarch butterfly favorite! Our zinnia seed collection includes Giant Coral, Purple Prince, Giant Yellow, Benary’s Giant Salmon Rose, Queen Red Lime, Oklahoma Carmine and Gold, and many more. 
• Nasturtium. In addition to attracting pollinators, both nasturtium leaves and flowers are edible! They taste peppery like arugula. Compact nasturtium varieties (like Alaska Mix) are great as companion plants in the raised beds. Vining varieties like this Nasturtium Blend look amazing trailing down the outside of a bed, as sprawling groundcover, or trained up a trellis.
• Cosmos bring such a cheery vibe to the garden, and our resident goldfinches love to eat the seeds! My favorites are Seashell cosmos and Sensation blend, and I also got seeds for Daydream cosmos this year.
• Chamomile. We’ll be planting A LOT of it this spring and summer so we can make ultra-healing and hydrating face oil for our shop. So far we’ve ordered seeds for classic German Chamomile, Zloty Lan, and Bodegold.
• Other: Bachelor’s buttons (Polka Dot Bachelor Button and Jubilee Gem), Opopeo Amaranth, Lion’s Mouth snapdragons, Goldilocks Rudbeckia, and Roggli Riesen strawflowers.

For cultivation tips on all these beauties, see: 7 Best Easy Annual Flowers to Grow from Seed

Melons and Cucumber

I figured I’d lump these cucurbits together. Not only are cucumbers and melon part of the same plant family, but they’re both crops that didn’t grow very well for us at the old homestead – and did great here last summer! We’re planting the varieties that did best again, and trying some new ones as well. 

Melon

• Blacktail Mountain Watermelon. Round 6-10 pound melons with crisp, sweet flesh that does well in cool or short seasons. These grew well here last summer.
• True Love Melon. A large, high-sugar, cantaloupe-like melon with great texture that produces later in the season. High powdery mildew resistance.
• Sugar Baby Watermelon. Perfectly round juicy and sweet melons that weigh 6-12 lbs with solid green rind and dark red flesh. Great for short seasons.

Cucumber

• Manny. A vining plant that produces thin-skinned 5-7 inch crisp fruit. Early maturing, high yielding, and good disease resistance.
• Tasty Green. An Asian burpless variety that produces super long 9” fruit with thin skin and sweet flesh. Produces heavy yields. Best results when trellised.
• Excelsior Cucumber. A pickle variety that eats well fresh with great flavor, fruit has uniformed size and shape.

Eggplant and Peppers

Eggplant had been a mediocre performer for us in the past, but absolutely kicked butt last summer! We’ll grow three of the same varieties plus one new one (but fewer plants overall). On the other hand, our peppers were kinda sad last summer. We honestly don’t eat all that many hot peppers anyways, so we’ll be scaling back the amount we plant grow this year.

Eggplant

• Little Finger. An early and productive plant that produces 3 to 6 inch slender dark purple fruit with wonderfully thin skin.
• Ping Tung Long. An Asian variety of eggplant that produces long and slender fruit 12-14 inches long with thin skin and bright lilac color. My favorite!
• Piccolo. Small 3-4 inch ovate (egg-shaped) fruit with stunning purple and white variegated striping. Productive variety that will bear fruit over a long season.
• Black Beauty Eggplant. A high-yielding Italian eggplant with bell shaped 5 to 6 inch fruit that is deep purple in color. New to us this year, but a classic variety. 

Peppers

I haven’t yet narrowed down the pepper list for this season, but some of our past favorites include: Red Picnic (sweet mini bell) Black Magic jalapeños, Glow (large orange bell peppers), Aji Rico (medium-hot pepper with sweet citrus-like notes), Red Ember (a Cayenne pepper type, great for using fresh or creating powder, shishito peppers (SO good pan-blistered!) and banana peppers, which make excellent pepperoncini-style pickled peppers.

Brassicas and Leafy Greens

Our winter garden is already full of brassicas right now, so we aren’t going to grow quite as many in spring. Since most brassicas appreciate cooler weather, these will get planted out in late winter to early spring here and will likely be gone by midsummer (with the exception of the kale and Swiss chard – those should stick around!)

• Cabbage: While we have about 6 different varieties of cabbage growing right now over winter, we’re going to plant another round of just one type this spring: Expect cabbage – with dense, uniformly round green heads and  notable heat tolerance.
• Broccoli. Belstar broccoli is a trusty broccoli variety we seem to come back to year after year. It matures fairly early and then continues to produce decent little side shoots after the main head is harvested.
• Joi Choi Bok Choy. Our powerhouse and number 1 favorite green to grow (and one of our top crops to grow, period!) The big thick juicy stalks and open heads are perfect for cut-and-come-again or perpetual harvesting. It doesn’t love hot weather, but is far more slow-bolting than most varieties of bok choy. 
• Lacinato kale. Dazzling Blue lacinato kale is our go-to slow-bolting variety… and it’s darn beautiful!
• Swiss Chard. I have yet to find a chard I love more than Peppermint swiss chard (named for its candy-striped stalks, not flavor!) but are also growing this gorgeous yellow-stemmed Sunset Chard this season too. 

Herbs

We already have many established patches of herbs that grow as perennials here, including sage, rosemary, oregano, bay laurel, lemon balm, mint, and thyme. That means the only annual herbs we’ll likely plant are basil and dill, including: 

• Dill Delight and Bouquet dill – ideal for adding to homemade pickles
• Basil: We have leftover seeds for two classic Genovese types: Prospera Italian Large Leaf and Rutgers Devotion.

We always grow multiple basil plants so we can stock up the freezer with enough Besto Pesto for the whole year, along with dried basil leaves for the pantry. Learn how to grow bushy basil to harvest all season long here. (Hint: pruning young seedlings and routinely cutting back established plants are key!) 

Root Veggies

Remember, it’s best to direct sow root vegetable seeds rather than start them indoors! Root veggies don’t take kindly to transplanting. 

• Carrots. We always grow several different varieties of carrots including Dolciva, Cosmic Purple, Naval, Scarlet Nantes, Bollin, and Bangor. Get tips on how to successfully grow carrots in our carrot grow guide. 
• Beets grew better than ever last year! Especially Boro Beets, my new favorite variety that we’ll definitely plant again. They’re super sweet, produce excellent leafy greens, and can be harvested anywhere from 2 to 6+ inches, perfect to gradually harvest as you need them over time!
• Potatoes. We ordered several different potato varieties (all from High Mowing) that will arrive in April. We love growing potatoes in large durable fabric grow bags, which means we can always find some space for them! Interested in growing your own spuds? Learn how we grow potatoes in containers here. 
• Radishes – a spring staple. We’ll likely sow some egg-shaped purple Bravo daikons, attractive and reliable Pink Beauty, and juicy, mild White Daikon radishes. To learn all about growing radishes from seed to table, see this article. 

Other

• Onions. We’ve already started seeds for sweet Walla Walla, Rossa Di Milano red onions, and Calibra spanish onions (my favorite). When growing onions, it’s crucial to choose the right variety for your latitude – short day, long day, or intermediate day onions. I prefer to start from seed or seedlings rather than sets. Visit our onion grow guide for more info and tips for success.
• Artichokes. Last year we planted several Wonder artichokes in our raised beds and in our pollinator border area, and the perennial plants are still going strong. This year, we’re also adding a purple artichoke variety! If you aren’t familiar with preparing artichokes, learn one really easy way to cook and eat them here – and then visit our artichoke grow guide and learn how to grow your own!
• Glass Gem Popcorn is going to be so beautiful and fun! The 8-10 foot tall plants offer heavy yields of 5-8 inch ears speckled with every color of the rainbow. Who doesn’t love popcorn? Yum!

That’s the plan, and I’m sticking to it! (maybe, lol)

Well, that sure felt good! As overwhelming as the garden season and homestead upkeep can feel at times, putting “pen to paper” (or in this case, fingers to keyboard) certainly helps me collect my thoughts and feel more prepared and organized. This process helped me narrow down my grow list – and I hope it inspired you to create your own grow list and spring plans too! I also hope you found a few new fun varieties to try this year. Please let us know if you have any questions in the comments below, and thanks for tuning in today. Cheers to a bountiful season ahead!

Other Useful Resources to Explore:

• Seed Starting 101: How to Sow Seeds Indoors
• How to Design & Build a Raised Garden Bed
• How to Fill a Raised Garden Bed: Build the Perfect Organic Soil
• Transplanting Seedlings Outside: Best Practices for Success
• How to Fertilize & Amend a Raised Garden Bed Before Planting (or Between Seasons)

The post 2023 Spring & Summer Garden Grow List + Homestead Goals appeared first on Homestead and Chill.

This post will serve as a nice little recap and photo dump, including some fun drone shots and updated before-and-after photos. (I can’t believe it’s been exactly one year since we started creating the new garden space!) I filmed a new fall garden tour video to share with you too. I’ll also briefly talk about how we transition our garden from summer to fall crops, since that is something that folks ask about quite often.

Gardening aside, we have had a few fun developments on the business side of Homestead and Chill. In addition to the organic sourdough starter, handmade salves, lip balms, bath salts, and other goodies we always offer in our shop, we just recently released pollinator-themed recycled greeting cards with some of my favorite photos. I had so much fun creating them to share with you, and hope you love them too!

Fall Garden Tour Video

Wrapping Up Summer

This summer, our most prolific crops were tomatoes, eggplant (sooo many eggplant!), cucumber, basil, onions, peas, and squash. We had so much to enjoy and preserve! For whatever reason, our beans and peppers just did so-so this year. In the orchard, the mature apricot tree and grape vine blessed us with loads of fresh fruit. We also had a great harvest of homegrown potatoes, and quite a few nice melons!

Transition to Fall

The swap from summer crops to fall is always a bit of coordinated dance – but after many years, we’ve found our groove! Here in zone 9, we start our fall seedlings in the grow room in late August, transplant them out in the first week of October, and amend the garden beds with fresh compost, mulch and slow release organic fertilizer in between. Use your Homestead and Chill planting calendars to figure out the best timing for your zone.

Admittedly, it does require us to remove some of the summer crops that are still producing in order to get the fall crops planted on time. For instance, the tomatoes were still pumping out fruit when we cut them out in early October – but we’d already had PLENTY to eat and preserve by then. To us, it’s worth sacrificing the tail end of the summer season to give the fall garden a strong start. If we wait too late to plant fall seedlings, they easily get stunted by the colder and shorter days of late fall. 

The Fall Garden

Before-and-After Photos: October 2021 vs October 2022

I love fall gardening in general, but this year is extra special – it’s the first fall garden in our new space! I can’t believe it’s been a year since we first “broke ground” out here. In October 2021, we were just starting to level and define the new garden area with borders. In November, we added the ground cover and gravel. We built and sealed the raised beds in December/January, and got them in place, filled and drip irrigation installed by February of this year. For more details, I shared the whole build-out process in these posts: Starting the New Garden and the New Garden Final Reveal.

And that’s what is going on in the fall garden right now! I can’t wait to see how the beds continue to fill in as the plants mature over the next couple of months. I will definitely do another tour video and update then – once the cabbages, cauliflower, and broccoli are all heading up! Thank you so much for exploring the garden with me today. Please let me know if you have any questions, or just say hello in the comments below!

The post Homestead Update: Fall Garden Tour ’22 (Video and Photos) appeared first on Homestead and Chill.

This post features an updated garden tour video that shows the current state of the garden, snippets from spring, exciting wildlife developments (like, we have dozens of wild baby California quail here right now!!!), and highlights some of our favorite flowers and veggie varieties. 

Other than the video, I’m basically using this post as a photo-dump for all my favorite garden photos from the last few months. It’s a great way for us to journal and document our first growing season in the new garden, and I hope you enjoy looking through them too!

I had to start with a few of my favorite images first (I mean, we can’t wait until the end of the post for baby quail and sunflowers, now can we?!) and then added the rest of the photos in somewhat chronological order.

Wow, are you still here? Lol! That’s all I have for our summer garden update. Please let us know if you have any questions in the comments below, or just pop in to say hello! We appreciate you tuning in today.

The post Homestead Update: Garden Tour Summer 2022 (Video and Photos) appeared first on Homestead and Chill.

Before we dig into the updates, let’s catch up on where we left off in October. In our last homestead update, I showed you how we prepared the blank slate (aka, an open weedy, sandy field) to become our new garden space – including leveling the area, adding steel edging and landscape rocks to define the borders, and commercial weed barrier fabric as a base for the gravel to come. Check out this post for more details if you missed it. If you’re extra new here, we just moved to this property in July 2021! You can see the story of our property hunt and move here.

Summary of what’s happened since the last update:

• We added gravel to the new garden space… 40 yards of it! 
• Built and installed 19 new raised garden beds.
• Filled the beds with bulk soil and compost.
• Installed drip irrigation to the raised beds.
• Added whimsy and flair with arched trellises, outdoor furniture, solar lights, wine barrel planters, pretty pots, and a new fountain – which is also an important feature for wildlife!
• Planted the very first seeds and seedlings in the new garden. Our new grow room is working out amazingly! So much so, we are contemplating not adding a greenhouse to the new homestead at all… but we shall see. 
• Created a new pollinator garden near the raised beds, as well as incorporated more pollinator-friendly plants and edibles into the old existing garden space.
• Installed a new central paver patio seating area.

I’ll show you each stage with photos, tips, and more details below! But first, here is the updated tour video I promised.

New Garden Tour Video

Gravel Install

When it came time to choose gravel for the new garden, we already knew we wanted to use ⅜” crushed rock like we did at the old homestead. Unlike smoother pea gravel, angular crushed rock locks and stays in place quite well. It doesn’t sink or move as much when you walk or roll a wheelbarrow over it. 

Even though it created a little more work, we chose to mix two different colors of gravel we found at a local landscape supply yard: a dark green ⅜” rock plus some gray-gold ⅜” granite. The blend created the perfect natural rustic vibe I was aiming for: not too modern and cool (like our old garden), but not too bright and warm-toned either. 

It’s usually recommended to apply gravel about 3 to 4 inches deep. So, to figure out how much we needed, I first calculated the square footage of the garden space (LxW in feet) and then multiplied that by 0.25 (since 3 inches = a quarter of a foot). The math said we’d need just shy of 35 yards, but I wanted extra for wiggle room plus a couple pathways I didn’t account for. So, we had 20 yards of each gravel color delivered in bulk and dumped in our side driveway. We have done far smaller gravel projects with just shovels and wheelbarrows alone, but for this… let’s just say my body is grateful for heavy machinery! 

To move the gravel, we rented a small “Dingo” skid-steer front loader thingy for the week. It was the perfect tool to scoop up loads of gravel (in alternating scoops to mix the two colors) and dump it into the back bed of our Kubota UTV. Then we could drive the UTV around back, dump the load, spread the gravel with rakes, jump back in and repeat the process… over and over and over again! We got all that accomplished in November. 

Building New Raised Garden Beds

Next we started building all the new redwood raised garden beds: fifteen 4×8’ beds, two smaller 4×6’ for the narrow far end of the garden, and two 3×5’ beds to frame the backside of the center “courtyard”. Yep, that was A LOT to build! We took our sweet time and slowly built a few beds here and there over the course of a couple months (December and January). You can find a detailed tutorial and video of how we build raised garden beds here! 

Thanks to our fabulous furry friends (insert eye roll here) the gophers, we made sure to add hardware cloth to the bottom of every bed. We also took some additional steps to seal the beds this time around… since we want this garden to last as long as physically possible! (During this project I kept swearing how I never want to build another garden again… lol). I wrote up this post about the non-toxic sealer and silicone we used, plus other tips to make wood beds last longer. 

Because we wanted to utilize the UTV to fill the raised beds (much like we moved the gravel), we couldn’t put all the garden beds in place at once. If we did, it would cut off our access for the UTV because the pathways between beds are too narrow for it to fit. So we ended up stacking and storing the empty garden beds in the orchard area until we were ready to start filling them with soil. 

Installing and Filling the Beds with Soil

Next it was time to go soil shopping! As you may already know, soil health and quality is one of the MOST important variables in overall plant health! After visiting a few local landscape suppliers to scout out the best-looking bulk soil available, we settled on a premium “performance” potting soil blend from Central Coast Landscape. We were also fortunate enough to coordinate a bulk delivery of certified organic compost from Malibu’s compost. From there, we created our own mix of 65% bulk soil, 30% compost, and 5% ⅜” lava rock for added aeration and drainage. You can find more detailed information about soil composition and how we fill raised garden beds here.

One row at a time, we moved the empty raised garden bed frames into place, measuring and adjusting to get them nice and straight, and then filled them with soil. Before adding the soil, we tucked a PVC riser inside each bed so we wouldn’t have to dig in the irrigation connection later! (See more details on irrigation below). 

Just like the gravel project, we rented the “Dingo” skid-steer again to load up alternating scoops of soil and compost into the back of our UTV. With a little finessing, good teamwork and communication, we were able to back the UTV right up to each bed, dump, mix and spread the soil. Each bed took two full UTV loads. Again, this is something we’ve totally done with wheelbarrows and shovels on a smaller scale before. You certainly don’t NEED heavy equipment to create a garden!

Installing Drip Irrigation for the Raised Garden Beds

I never knew irrigation could be so utterly sexy until now. Really though. What isn’t attractive about saving time, energy, money AND water?! Drip irrigation is much more effective and efficient than hand watering or sprinklers, and our plants are totally loving it too! 

I won’t go into much detail here because I made a full tutorial and YouTube video on how we installed automated drip irrigation in our raised beds already. Check that out if you’re interested to learn more. Though I will say that I’m dang proud of us! I had some general conceptual knowledge of water systems (thanks to my past career in Environmental Health) but hadn’t actually worked with cutting, gluing and installing pipes myself – until now! It’s not nearly as difficult as you may imagine. You CAN do “hard” and new things!

Personal Touches, Whimsy and Flair

Now for the fun part! The garden was already looking quite fabulous with the raised beds, borders and gravel, but it was definitely missing some personality and pizzazz. If you tuned in to my recent post on “9 Ways to Add Whimsy and Interest to Your Garden”, then you already know how we spruced up the space. Arched trellises, wine barrel planters, outdoor furniture, solar lights, garden art, and pretty potted plants were among some of the additions.

One of my favorite additions is the new fountain. We created a rock border and bed of various succulents at the base. It really makes the fountain pop visually, and the succulents get passively watered by the inevitable bits of overspray and splashing around it. Double score. We’ve already seen wild birds thoroughly enjoying the fountain, and perching on top of the trellises too. I even spotted a hummingbird bathing in the top of the fountain the other day! So. darn. cute. Learn more about creating a wildlife-friendly garden here. Your yard can even become a certified wildlife habitat – like ours!

Last but not least, we just installed a new paver patio in the center of the garden this weekend. It creates a courtyard vibe and more distinct seating area, and really makes the whole garden pop! We used 2×2 ft concrete pavers, sourced locally from AirVol Block in San Luis Obispo.

The First Plants

Mere hours after installing drip irrigation, I couldn’t wait any longer to sow the very first seeds in the new beds! That process never gets old, but felt exceptionally exciting in this new space. It was still early February so my options were fairly limited. We direct-sowed radishes, turnips, carrots and snap peas first, and beets a couple weeks later. (Learn which crops are best to direct-sow vs start indoors here).

Then towards the end of February it was time to transplant out the cool-season seedlings we started in the grow room back in January. That included broccoli, cabbage, kale, bok choy, mustards and collard greens, kohlrabi, leeks, onions, lettuce, cauliflower, and more. Many of those we typically grow during our fall-winter garden, so it’s a bit of an experiment this year! Check out the full list of what we’re growing this spring and summer in this post, including specific varieties and descriptions.

As you can tell from the photos, many of the beds are still empty right now. Over the next month or two we’ll be transplanting out all of the remaining summer crops, including squash, peppers, tomatoes, eggplant, melon, and cucumber along with more annual flowers and herbs. We’ll also direct-sow pole and bush green beans. The plan for the arched trellises includes pole beans, vining squash, and cucamelons – along with the peas that are already growing up one of them now. 

Seeing the new garden come to life with plants has been SO rewarding! The very first harvest of radishes and greens was even better…. and I can’t begin to imagine how it’s all going to look and feel in the height of summer! 

New Pollinator Garden

We celebrated the recent spring equinox by installing a new pollinator flower bed near the entrance to the raised bed garden. I honestly can’t believe what a HUGE difference this one change made! It really ties everything together, and I can’t wait to see it mature and bloom. Especially with the fountain so close by, I think it’s going to be the new hummingbird hotspot! 

The new flower border is full of 40 nectar and pollen-rich plants including lavender, hummingbird sage, other various salvias, yarrow, milkweed, California fuchsia, chamomile, agastache (aka anise hyssop), lupine, scabiosa, lantana, and trailing rosemary. See this list of the best 23 plants for pollinators for even more ideas! I also threw a couple of artichokes in there too… because why not? 

The plants we selected for this space are all petite and low-growing varieties – mostly 1×1′ or 2×2′, a few up to 3 ft. That way they won’t block the view of the rest of the garden once it all fills in. Plus, we already have larger pollinator shrubs along the back fence. Stepping stones will be added soon to break up the large bed into three sections, making it more manageable and providing access for maintenance, pruning, and harvests. 

This area is watered with an automated drip irrigation system we connected to a nearby spigot. Learn how to create a simple DIY drip system to a hose bibb here!

Other Changes and Updates

Last but not least, we’ve given the existing gardens plenty of love too!

In the last Homestead Update I shared that we removed the catmint border that previously lined the brick pathway. (It was too high maintenance and got really infested with leaf hoppers). So to add some interest, color and pollinator flowers back into the space, we planted about 25 new plants a couple weeks ago. Going for a Mediterranean garden vibe, I chose several large spineless agave attenuata as the focal points with a cluster of low-growing plants all around them – including blue fescue, trailing lantana, echinacea, petite salvia and lavender varieties, and African daisies.

We also converted two of the three existing metal raised garden beds into perennial beds. The one closest to the house is now full of herbs: several varieties of sage, oregano, thyme, lemon verbena, and dill. We planted 4 semi-dwarf blueberry bushes in the middle bed, with strawberries tucked in between. “Sunshine Blue” is our go-to blueberry variety since it requires so few chill hours, perfect for our temperate climate. They’re also self-fruitful! The 3rd and final existing bed will be used for overflow plants from the main garden for now – likely hard winter squash this year.

Out in the orchard, we’ve added two lemon guava shrubs, a couple of fig trees, and a fuyu persimmon. I plan to train the lemon guavas espalier-style along one of the black fences (and will likely add some horizontal wires behind them for additional support). I still want to find a spot for pears, plums, and more! 

Just a few more photos…

That’s it for today’s update!

Holy moly friends. Everyone keeps teasing me: where does the “chill” part of Homestead and Chill come in?! I’ll be the first to admit that the R&R has been seriously lacking lately. But now that we have the vast majority of our dream garden built, I think it’s finally time to sit back and relax a bit more. And I think I know just the spot!

In all seriousness, thank you so much for coming along for the tour. We are so excited about our new space, and are honored that you take time out of your busy schedules to follow along with our journey. Please let me know if you have any questions in the comments below, or simply say hello! See you next time.

The post Homestead Update: New Garden Reveal + Tour Video appeared first on Homestead and Chill.

So, let me show you what we’ve been up to! You know me: I’ll share my thought process, lots of photos, details on the materials we used, and drop plenty of helpful tips and resources along the way. Also, get ready for quite a few kitty pics! We’re absolutely smitten with the barn cats we adopted with the property, and I think they love us back.

I hope you enjoy following along – and learn a few things too!

In case you missed the previous updates:

• A Brand New Chapter: We’re Moving!
• Chicken Coop Deep-Cleaning & Makeover
• Homestead Update: Our New Grow Room
• Full New Property & Garden Tour (video)

Fruit First

If you’ve read our “how to start a homestead” guide, then you know one of the things I recommend doing in any new homestead or garden journey is to plant fruit trees early on. Unlike veggies or herbs, trees can take many years to mature and bear fruit, so it’s great to get them in the ground (and feeding you) as soon as possible. Once established, they’re often far less work than a veggie garden too!

So far, we’ve planted four avocados, two fig trees, a fuyu persimmon, two Meyer lemons, two pomegranates, two pineapple guava, a lemon guava, and a dwarf weeping mulberry. Figs, lemons, and mulberries are self-fertile, but the pineapple guava, avos, and pomegranates will bear far more fruit with a partner around for cross-pollination. Avocados do best with a mix of Type A and Type B avocados around, such as a Hass (type A) and Fuerte (type B).

Many of the new additions were planted in a new hedgerow we created along the southwest corner of the property, while a couple of the trees went into the existing orchard. We planted the avocados in a big open space on the far northeastern property line, which will grow in to provide a fantastic living privacy screen from the modestly busy country road on that side.

We also inherited a few established fruit trees with the property: a mature apricot along with some younger peaches, apples, and citrus. I still want to add pears, plums, and many others with time! What edible trees are on your future dream list?

Clean-Up on Aisle Brick

You know that curvy brick pathway in the center of the existing garden? The one that was once lined with blooming purple catmint? Well… we dug out all the catmint. I know, I know. It was really romantic and dreamy… for the three months or so out of the year it flowered. Yet as the flowers faded, it quickly became an overgrown mess of brown. Catmint needs frequent pruning to prolong blooms, and also needs to be fully cut back to the ground every winter. That was simply too much work for us to maintain looking nice – especially 50+ feet or so of it, times two for both sides of the path!

Maintenance aside, another issues drove us to eliminate the catmint. The catmint became severely infested with sage leafhoppers, which started to spread to other plants in the garden. Leafhoppers are sap-sucking pest insects that damage plants by piercing and sucking nutrients from leaves. They are incredibly difficult to control in an organic manner, and removing the host plant (aka, the catmint) is one of the key ways to knock down their numbers. In addition to digging out the plants, we also released green lacewings in the area – a beneficial insect, and natural predator of leafhoppers along with aphids, mealybugs, and spider mites.

And now, the part you are likely waiting for most…

The Start of the New Raised Bed Garden Space

When gazing out at our soon-to-be new garden area, it was easy to feel overwhelmed at first. First of all, the space is pretty huge – nearly 140 feet long by 60 to 40 feet wide (getting more narrow at one end). It was a blank slate, but not necessarily the most inspiring kind. Nothing but dirt, knee-high weeds, gopher mounds, holes and uneven ground. I had a long-term vision developing, but… where to start? One step at a time.

As you continue reading, keep in mind that we followed very similar steps as we built out our previous front yard garden space – without the help of heavy machinery, just by hand and wheelbarrow, and even had to remove grass first – so all of this easily applies to smaller gardens too!

Step 1: Weeds Be Gone

My mom came down to visit from Washington just after Labor Day, and she unknowingly got the ball rolling on the whole project. Like me, she likes to keep busy and moving. After she’d finished weeding a few planters around our patio area, she asked where to weed next. I looked around and said, “Well, I guess let’s head down there” and pointed to the open field where the garden would go. So all three of us grabbed gloves, hats, and buckets to fill – and set off to start pulling weeds by hand. Yes, pulling weeds by hand in a big field may seem silly, but it was quite therapeutic! We don’t have a ride-on mower, and even if we did, that side of the property wasn’t accessible for small vehicles (yet).

Once the wedding was done and Mom had gone home, we rehabbed an old irrigation system and planted a hedgerow along the far fence. Those few plants and fresh mulch made the whole corner pop! Yet hauling over heavy potted plants, bagged soil and bark for this very modest-size project (in comparison of what was to come) made us quickly realize we needed more help… but not mom help. It was time to look into getting our first heavy machinery for the homestead. 

Step 2: Dirt Bowl

The next logical step was to level out the ground some, including filing a large bowl or depression right in the middle of the future garden. I did a quick calculation and determined that 6 yards of bulk fill soil should do the trick. Around that time we also started looking into used UTVs (Utility Task Vehicles) locally. A tractor would have also been helpful for all the earth and gravel-moving this project will require, but a cart or UTV will be the most versatile and useful for us long-term. We were able to test and then purchase a used Kubota RTV, and we love her already! Her name is Dusty.

In order for Dusty to drive over to the new garden area, we first had to remove a section of the black vinyl fencing that surrounds the existing garden and orchard in the center of the property. I do like that space, but it definitely splits up the property in a way that isn’t the most accessible or free-flowing at times. Once that was opened up (but still a very tight squeeze!) we loaded Dusty up with the bulk soil that had been dumped in the front driveway, shovelful by shovelful and load by load. Once all the soil was moved to the back, we spread and leveled the area with hard rakes. I also leveled other areas, spread gopher mounds, and picked up large sticks and debris. 

Step 3: Defining the Space

It’s amazing what a little definition can do in a space! As soon as we installed the edging, my vision really started coming to life. All of you following along on Instagram said the same, and also that it made the area look even larger than you first thought. 

The plan is to put gravel over the whole space soon (more on that in a moment), along with a long “flower bed” of in-ground plantings and bark mulch along the back side, so we needed a sturdy border that would hold the gravel and mulch in – while also keeping the weeds out.

We chose to use hammer-in steel edging by Edge Right. It’s made of Corten steel, the same stuff sea cargo containers are made of, so it’s incredibly durable and weather-resistant. The metal starts out looking silvery and fresh, but will develop a rustic and protective reddish-brown patina over time. The edging comes in 4-foot pieces, and is available in either a 6-inch or 8-inch deep sizes. Since our soil is very sandy, the folks at Edge Right advised the 8” deep edging was the best option as it would stay most secure in place over time. 

Installation was easier and quicker than I anticipated! We did it all in one long weekend, working on it for maybe 2 to 3 hours per day – so about 7 or 8 hours of active install time total for over 350 feet of distance. I am damn proud to say that I did ALL the hammering myself. I am a Cancer and a bit of a perfectionist, so it worked out best for Aaron to hold each piece steady while I hammered them in. 

Let’s just say thank goodness for CBD! I have been heavily relying on my favorite organic CBD oil and topical roller to soothe my aching muscles and jostled joints with all this heavy lifting.

Step 4: Ground Cover

Next, it was time to prep the ground for the gravel to come. Rather than bark or wood chips, we are going to use gravel in our new raised bed garden area for several reasons. 1) I love the clean look of it, and it’s permanence. 2) Gravel will act as a fire barrier between our home and the neighbors wild, dry property of chaparral brush and oaks. Our new property is more rural and has a higher risk for fire than the last, so this was an essential consideration.

Before gravel, we laid down two layers of contractor-grade weed barrier landscape fabric over the entire space. This will provide a long-lasting foundation for the gravel to sit on, as well as block out weeds and gophers. 

For the first layer, we used our go-to Landsmaster non-woven commercial weed barrier fabric. It’s the same stuff we used under the raised beds and gravel in our old garden, and does a fantastic job. It keeps out even the most noxious weeds, but is still very lightweight, breathable, and permeable to water. We used to be able to buy it in-store at Home Depot, but lately it has only been available online. 

Next, we added a layer of a different type of contractor-grade fabric sourced from a local landscape supply shop that they recommended. It is a thick black woven type with a felt-like underside. Here is a very similar and well-rated product.

Why two layers, you may be wondering? Well, we did two layers of the Landmaster fabric at the old homestead. We were up against incredibly invasive crabgrass in that yard, and we found that it provided an excellent barrier from both weeds and gophers. Plus, the extra layer provided insurance in case one of them accidentally was torn.

Here, we wanted that same durable double-protection, but opted to use two different types of fabric because we need to be able to drive the UTV over the area to move boulders, gravel, wood and soil as we built out the space. The black woven fabric is much heavier, thicker, and stays more taught, so it seemed like the best option for driving over without getting all screwed up in the process. 

A note on using landscape fabric: 

Not all landscape fabric is created equal, nor do I recommend it for every situation! Please avoid the thin, stretchy black plastic-like material you can find at most garden centers. It’s ineffective, rips easily, and makes a hot wasteful mess. Stick with well-rated, heavy-duty contractor grade fabric if you do choose to use it. 

However, there are many other more natural materials you can use as ground cover too! For instance, sheet mulching with layers of newspaper or cardboard under a thick layer of wood chips is a great way to suppress weeds in pathways or around flower beds. Or, climates with regular rainfall are ideal for using cover crops to create living green pathways and ground cover. Learn about the pros and cons of 8 different types of mulch here. 

Step 5: Baby Boulders

Once the edging and landscape fabric was in place, we brought in some small landscaping boulders to further define the space and add a whimsical rustic flair. We used the small boulders to line select sections of the pathways and perimeter of the edging, as well as create an additional border between the raised bed area and flower bed that will run behind it along the fence. 

One of my IG friends told me their local landscape supplier calls these “BFRs”. I’ll let your imagination fill in what that stands for. Fitting indeed, since the four pallets we had delivered weighed a total of 10,200 pounds. I was thanking my lucky stars for Dusty the UTV to help us move these too! 

Next Steps

Next up: gravel! We’re currently deliberating between a few different types and colors of gravel to use here. Since we’ll need over 30 yards, we want to be dang sure of our decision before pulling the trigger. The guys at the landscape supply yard suggested taking home 5-gallon buckets of sample rock to lay out, rinse the dirt off, and see how it looks in the space – both wet and dry.

I want something a little more rustic and natural looking than the bright blue-green 3/8″ gravel we used at the old homestead (even though I do love the look of that one). We sampled one called “Navajo” but it was far too red and warm for my liking. So, I think we are going to mix our own! Yesterday we picked up two more samples: a dark green rock, and a warmer gold and grey granite. Together they create a fantastic “salt and pepper” vibe – the perfect blend of warm, cool, light and dark tones.

Color aside, we always use a crushed type of gravel. Due to its angular edges, crushed rock compacts and locks in place really nicely – unlike smoother pea gravel type stones, which sinks and move as you walk on them. (That drives me bananas!)

After the area is filled with gravel, we’ll slowly start adding raised beds. I have plans for dozens of raised beds in this space one day, but we definitely won’t be building and filling them all at once! See our step-by-step guide to build wood raised garden beds, or how we fill raised bed here.

The garden will also have a center courtyard with pavers, various seating, a fountain, and plenty of pretty potted plants, arched trellises, and wine barrel planters speckled across the space too.

Cheers to good hard work, gardening, and kitty friends!

Wow, are you still with me? Lol… my bad, this update wound up just a wee bit longer than I anticipated. But hot dang, I guess we’ve been busy eh?! I promise I won’t wait so long between updates next time, especially when there is so much to share. We sincerely appreciate your interest in our homestead adventures, and hope that you found some value in this post! Stay tuned to see the progress – and see what color gravel we choose!

EDIT: The next steps and full garden reveal are done! Come check out the space after we added gravel, raised beds, arched trellises, plants, and more – tour video included!

The post Homestead Update: Starting the New Garden appeared first on Homestead and Chill.

With the psychedelic artwork and the term “grow room” being tossed around, I know what you’re probably thinking… cannabis, right? Well sure, maybe we’ll grow some of that magical plant in here eventually, but for now, this space will be the absolutely perfect seed-starting room for our vegetable, flower, and herb seedlings. Especially once we’re done giving it a little makeover! 

Follow along to see the transformation of how we spiffed up an existing outbuilding and converted it to a functional space to raise seedlings for our garden. I’ll share a few tips and thoughts about indoor seed-starting along the way too! Check out our “Seed Starting 101” guide for more in-depth information.

The Backstory 

The small barn that houses the new grow room has a couple sections to it. First, you enter an open workshop/storage area with a few old tables and shelves. We plan to clean up that space soon as well – it’ll be the perfect spot to keep a table saw or things like that! Then to the left is the enclosed grow room area, which offers more protection from critters and the elements. Between the two areas is a hallway equipped with wall racks to hang shovels, pitchforks, tree trimming poles and other large tools. 

So, what’s up with all the groovy art? From what we can gather, our new grow room was formerly used as a teenager hangout. The previous homeowner’s daughter played electric guitar and also liked to paint. (At first we thought she’d done all the art in the room herself, but later realized the largest shroom mural is actually a screen print.) Along with the colorful walls, the room was decked out with a TV, an old tattered sofa, workbench, and quite the funky aroma… Lol. I guess we’ll just have to let our imaginations fill in the rest! 

Our Previous Seed Starting Set-Up

At our last urban homestead, we started seeds inside a 6×8’ hobby greenhouse. We left the greenhouse behind when we moved, but brought along our homemade redwood benches. A new larger greenhouse is likely in the future for this homestead, but not for at least a couple years down the road! You can learn more about using a hobby greenhouse in this guide, (including details about our old greenhouse in particular) and follow our step-by-step tutorial to build your own greenhouse potting benches or tables here too.

Now is a great time to remind you that you do NOT need a dedicated greenhouse, trip shed, or other separate space to grow food from seed! Before we had a greenhouse, we simply started seeds in our guest room – on a wire shelving rack with grow lights hung from the shelf above. Any free space where you can tuck a few seedling trays and a grow light will do, including a garage or basement.

In fact, there are a number of advantages to starting seeds indoors rather than in an outdoor structure! a) It’s less subject to temperature swings, and b) it’s easier to keep your eye on the seedlings. Our new grow room is a hop, skip and a jump from the house (maybe 100 feet?) so it’s still easily accessible for us to go check on our seedlings, but not nearly as “in your face” as having seedlings right in the house for easy tending – like hey you, remember to water me! 

Cleaning Up the Space

The first thing we tackled was clearing out all the old leftover stuff from the room. Then everything got a good sweeping and wipe-down. Next, we primed the raw plywood floor with 2 layers of Kilz, hoping to eliminate some of the bad odor. Once that dried, we applied a coat of quality exterior paint. We chose a dark, dusky grey-blue called “Charcoal Blue” by Behr in a satin finish. We figured that would hide dirt well and also be fairly easy to clean. For now, we decided to leave the walls mostly as-is. Maybe one day we’ll want to refine the space a bit more!

Later we also got a custom screen made up for the window by a local screen company, complete with durable 30-year pet mesh – so that we could safely keep the window open without letting pests or critters in. Good airflow is essential for seedlings, and this will hopefully help with the smell too!

Adding Seed-Starting Equipment 

To turn this space into a proper grow room, the most essential thing we needed to add was good bright light! Whether you’re starting seeds in a garage, shed, or guest room – grow lights are pretty much a “must have” for indoor seed-starting. Unfortunately, ambient sunlight from a nearby window is not usually strong enough, and will result in leggy weak seedlings. Even our old greenhouse needed grow lights during certain times of year since it didn’t receive full sun.  

To give our seedlings plenty of light (and space!), we added this awesome 3-Tier LED Sunlite shelf from Gardener’s Supply. We love it already, and so do the seedlings! It took about an hour to assemble, but went together very smoothly and has loads of useful features. The lights are operated independently so you can use just one shelf, two, or all three as needed. They’re suspended in a way that can be easily raised or lowered – which is great since it’s important to keep lights low, just a few inches above seedlings. Each shelf itself is a rimmed tray that catches water drainage, and you can set seedling containers right inside (without needing an additional tray) and still bottom-water too. 

In the market for grow lights? Pop over to this article! It covers information and frequently asked questions about choosing AND using grow lights, including some of our top light recommendations. In addition to the Sunlite shelf shown in this article, Gardener’s Supply offers many other grow light units too.

Last but not least, we also brought in one of our old greenhouse benches and other various seed-starting supplies: 1020 trays and pots, seedling heat mats, an oscillating fan, a light timer, and our favorite handheld pump sprayer.

Starting Fall 2021 Seeds

Since our new homestead only has 3 raised garden beds at the moment, we scaled way back from our normal fall seed starting routine. (Our old homestead had 15 raised beds!) We’d usually be starting all sorts of brassicas like cabbage, broccoli, romanesco, and cauliflower and also direct-sow seeds for carrots, radishes, and beets. Check out tips on starting a fall garden here, including a full list of our favorite cool-season veggies to grow! If you’re pressed for time with a short growing season, be sure to try these 13 fast-growing fall crops.

Our current space limitations forced us to pick favorites, so we’re focusing on growing our go-to cut-and come-again leafy greens this fall: Joi Choi bok choy, a few varieties of mustard greens and kale, lettuce, and arugula. Rather than a one-and-done crop like cabbage, leafy greens are ideal for perpetual harvesting. Each plant will feed us virtually non-stop for many months to come! Here, they’re keep producing right through the winter and into the spring.

After sowing seeds in our new grow room, we kept the seedling trays on a bench on top of a heat mat. The vast majority of seeds* do not need light to sprout; steady warmth is what helps them germinate. Then once they did sprout (in just a couple days!), we immediately relocated them to the new Sunlite LED light shelf. Note that seedlings will get leggy FAST in the absence of light. So, if you think you may miss the moment they sprout, it’s best to keep them under a light from the start.

*One caveat is lettuce. Lettuce seeds DO need light to germinate, and also prefer cooler soil. So, we put the tray of lettuce seeds on the grow light shelf immediately after sowing – skipping the heat mat.

And that’s the story of our new grow room.

I’m happy to see and say that only days after its makeover, our new grow room is already home to dozens of new happy baby seedlings! Growing your own food from seed is incredibly rewarding, and therapeutic; it felt wonderful to start that process for the first time at our new place. I am already excited for next spring, when this room will hopefully be filled with quadruple the seedlings. We plan to break ground on our new expanded garden space this fall to have it up and running by spring. Stay tuned for that huge undertaking! Thanks so much for stopping by and following this project with us. I hope you picked up a few new helpful tips along the way!

Want to grow along? Check out these articles:

• Seed Starting 101: How to Sow Seeds Indoors 
• Beginner’s Guide to Using a Hobby Greenhouse
• 9 Common Seed Starting Mistakes to Avoid
• How to Design & Build a Raised Garden Bed
• Using Grow Lights for Seedlings and Indoor Plants
• When to Start Seeds: Garden Planting Calendars for Every Zone

The post Homestead Update: Our New Grow Room Makeover appeared first on Homestead and Chill.