I'm delighted to have found this site - finally some people who understand my obsession with growing vegetables!
I've been growing fruit and vegetables for years but this last year have really started to make an effort to try and grow more of what we use, and I got myself some chickens last year. Home is an elderly house in a state of perpetual renovation on 500 square metres in central Christchurch, New Zealand.
For fruit we have persimmons, pears, a plum, one runty peach that started life as a nectarine, a quince, tayberries (more thorns than berries), several rampant grape vines (more greenery than grapes), a hazelnut, strawberries, raspberries, redcurrants, a service berry, and Chilean cranberries (ugni), worcester berries, black mulberry (too young to produce yet). In the underperforming and about to be yanked out department are three feijoa bushes, a loquat (climate is too cold for fruit here), a gooseberry (not a single berry this summer), cherry guavas (once again, too cold for them), and some pitifully tiny blueberries.
Sheesh, I didn't realize quite how much was there until I wrote it down. There's also the lemon tree (shrub) - the third so far - winter seems a bit much for them. And a pomegranate in a pot which is probably never going to be more than decorative.
There is enough fruit for a few batches of jam, and I'll probably dry some of the pears as well. I'm hoping there will be enough tomatoes either to dry or make sauce, but they've been very slow to ripen this summer. The seed packets said 80 days but it has been more than 100 days for most varieties....a glasshouse is definitely on my wish list.
The corn has done well this summer - 8 ft tall for some plants - this turns out to be not such a good idea when gale force winds come along. Possibly I overdid it feeding them liquid chicken manure
I should be starting to get the winter garden planted soon, but most of the space is filled with summer vegetables....might have to evict some flowers from the front garden!
Welcome!
I'm in Taranaki.
