Vigorous vines

It is a beautiful day in San Diego. I love December because San Diego temperatures generally stay above 60 in the day and rarely dip below the 40s at night. We have had some lower than normal overnight temps. recently but our days are crisp and sunny, perfect weather to be a gardener.

It may be getting a little cool at night for our tomatoes but they seem to be working it out

The peas might like a little cooler weather during the day but they are doing fine and taste irresistible! 

I decided today may be a good day to finally go over to my neighbor's side and prune the out of control vines I have going on our shared fence.

This passion flower is growing much faster than the one in the front garden did.

The black eyed Susan vine looks spectacular from our side of the fence 

Both of these plants are growing equally as well if not better on the neighbor's side. I don't want to impose on them with my overgrown foliage so I am going to give both of the plants a good pruning today.
 

The black eyed Susan vine is certainly encroaching on the neighbor's walkway

And the passion flower is trying to take over their whole yard

The neighbors have the sunny side of the fence so they are getting the fruit

I won't prune so much that I take the fruit off. I am hoping the neighbors like passion fruit and will enjoy it as a token of my appreciation for being kind neighbors. If they don't then Sierra and I will happily enjoy it together. Passion fruit is delicious in our opinion, though many people feel it's quite bitter, I think it tastes almost identical to sour patch kid candy.

Sierra says, "Passion fruit is okay but I'm more interested in Spur Valley Ranch chicken!"

These are vigorous vines and along with the pink jasmine, I prune them aggressively a couple times per year. Pruning makes them more vigorous and healthy. 

Gidget is really tired...of me talking about flowers.

Rust on roses

Roses are one of the few flowers that I am willing to spend any amount of time to grow. Typically if flowers aren't extremely care free, I don't grow them. I make an exception for roses because I really love the way they smell and I wanted to provide some for the neighborhood to have an opportunity to stop and smell the roses in front of our garden.

A Mr. Lincoln rose

"Are you seriously talking about flowers again?"

Our roses are getting very tall and have a number of blooms that are moments away from opening but they are also suffering from a bad break out of rust.

Roses growing tall in the front garden

Rust is a fungal disease that lives in the soil. It is very difficult to control once it becomes a problem and we have been battling it for a couple of seasons now. I ended up cutting the roses down to the canes in July because of it and it is back again now. One sign to look for is a yellowing of lower leaves like below.

Rust infected leaves

When you turn the leaves over, they will have orange spots of fungus.

The first course of action I take is to carefully prune off the affected leaves. This stuff is powdery and will fly off the leaves if you aren't careful which will potentially spread the problem to your unaffected leaves. It is important to try to prune without spreading the spores around. It is also important to sanitize your tool so you don't spread this stuff from one plant to another. 

Once all of the blooms have opened and we get to enjoy them, I will cut these plants all the way down, make sure that I pick up all the leaf littler from around the base of the plants and work some powdered milk into the soil to help kill the fungal spores. I do use Safer brand fungicide too to try and control the spread of rust and powdery mildew which is also a problem for the roses.

One of the reasons we are having such an issue with fungal disease is due to poor air circulation where the plants are planted. They are right next to a fence and the ground is about a foot lower than the rest of the garden. I may choose to move them to a spot with better air circulation if we aren't able to get the rust under control in the coming seasons.

Pruning and propagation

I decided it was a good day to prune some plants and attempt to start new plants from cuttings.

Gidget says, "I'm sorry, I didn't hear you, but did you see that bird fly over and land here?"

The lemon rose geranium was one of the plants I needed to prune.

One of the first pieces

Our lemon rose geranium is taking over the garden and I decided now was a good time to start to prune it back. We cut pieces off every week but it was time to make a dent in it. I cut it where the branches were woody and thick, hoping that would give the cuttings the best chance at successfully rooting.

Gidget spends another morning trying to mail herself somewhere that isn't talking about flowers

The lavender also needed pruning so I cut a few woody pieces off the bottom of it 

This is the lemon rose geranium after pruning

I should have trimmed some off the height but I want to propagate the cuttings and already took lots off by this point. In a month or so I will look to see how it is filling out and will come back to take some off the top.

I am hoping the woody cuttings I took will root in regular potting soil.

I trimmed off the excess branch and lower leaves of the cuttings and planted in E.B. Stone Edna's Best potting soil. I planted each cutting at least 2 inches deep. 

This is the pile of cuttings I look off the lemon rose geranium and the lavender plants. 

This is one of the best looking cuttings of lemon rose geranium

We got about 15 new plants, a mix of scented geranium and lavender. 

A lavender cutting I put it in soil up to the first set of leaves

Frijole wonders what any of this has to do with lunch.

We have lots more cuttings to plant tomorrow.

Gidget is hurrying to the house, she heard someone say lunch!

Harvest day

 It is a small harvest week but things are progressing nicely so I am not too concerned.

We have the last of the tomatoes from the front garden which are delicious and some very tasty lemons and limes

Gidget is tired of discussing produce with us, she feels hens would be a much better use of time

Whatever Gidget.

We have many things we plan to harvest in the morning including a Japanese cucumber, herbs, Swiss chard, baby bok choy and peas.

We'll have a variety of mint

and a variety of basil and sage, as well as some rosemary.

We hope to have 1 basket of peas.

And we'll have some baby bok choy.

We also have aloe leaves if you want them, and some lemon rose geranium stems.

First of December stroll through the garden

We're only 21 days away from the days getting longer again and I for one cannot believe I finally understand what my grandmother used to say about how time would get shorter as I got older. It seems like just yesterday that I was counting down to the year 2000 and so many people were speculating about whether that year would bring complete chaos because of the Y2K computer glitch. Now we're almost celebrating the beginning of the year 2012. Wow.

Another year is coming to an end, the holidays are upon us and the garden is in a complete state of renewal which will only last a short time before we start again for the spring season. Change really is the only thing that is constant and I'm happy to be a part of that constant change. The garden is a perfect example of this.

Here's a look at the 2011 First of December garden. 

  

The big front bed, tomatoes gone, broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage, peas, carrots and onions  in various stages

The jasmine under my living room windows should start blooming soon

 

One of my favorite geraniums lost the color in it's leaves over the summer but it is coming back now 

Dad made me a screen for worm castings while he was here and I am harvesting castings for all of the new plantings 

I thought I killed this orange mint but it is coming back to life

I expect the nasturtiums to bloom any minute now

This group of peas and carrots looks good, just awhile longer

Most of the tomatoes are gone but we still have some nice ones on the roof

There is lots of Swiss chard in various stages of development

The green arrow peas are delicious, hopefully we will have 1 basket of them at market this week 

The cabbage is looking good for the most part but we do have some caterpillar activity on a couple of plants, again.

The avocado tree is spectacular and the fruit is beginning to ripen 

Avocados do not get soft while they are on the tree, it takes at least a week and with avocados our size, it takes about 10 business days for them to soften up. We did not pick any more this week because we took enough off in the past 2 weeks and want to give the rest a little more time.

The black eyed Susan vine is a fabulous fall bloomer

The calendula from last year is coming back beautifully

This passion fruit is growing like crazy, I hope it blooms and produces fruit in the spring

We've got bok choy going all over the garden, we may have some baby bok choy at the market this week

 

The roses are suffering with some fungal disease but the Mr. Lincoln is over 7ft. tall and will bloom very soon

We probably won't have enough cilantro for market but we'll have enough to enjoy for ourselves

The strawberries will be happening soon, they look really good

The sweet limes are in full swing, we will have some at the market this week for sure

We will also have pink lemonade lemons, they are doing great!

These are the last of the Japanese cucumbers until next year

Gidget is still trying to mail herself to a place where there is real food. She even lifted the flag .