South West Florida offers some interesting challenges to organic gardening but I'm starting to find some modified methods that are working.
Growing Vegetables in South West Florida
I'm far from an expert but we love eating fresh vegetables from our own garden. My wife commented the other day that she hasn't been to our favorite vegetable market for several weeks. It's early March and our tiny vegetable garden has kept the two of us supplied with plenty of fresh veggies.
Organic Gardening
I have been an organic gardener for many years. SWFL offers some interesting challenges to organic gardening but I'm starting to find some modified methods that are working. I think plants that are grown without chemical fertilizers are stronger and healthier and better survive the sometimes severe conditions of this area. And they are healthier and better tasting to eat!
Small Area Gardening
Since most of us in SWFL live on a single lot usually about 125 x 100 feet or less and our homes take up a good portion of that land it is necessary to squeeze our gardens into a very small area. I've found a few tricks to use that small space more efficiently and I'll share those here.
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Our Garden
The photo above is where all our vegetable gardening is done. From the palm trunk at the right to the left end of the wall is about 40 feet. The distance between the two walls is on average about 6 feet.
This was taken March 8, 2007. I finished the wall about 6 weeks ago so the left side of it has not been planted very long but the tomatoes on the right side were planted in December.
From the left there is a small transplanted cherry tomato self sown from last years plants, a patch of Lettuce Mesclun Seed Mix (3rd planting), the trellis is for Malabar Spinach which they claim will grow in our hot summer weather, in front of that is basil, Nasturtium (great salad greens and flowers) parsley and thyme. I also have a watermelon I'm training up the trellis as well as over the front wall, cosmos and a second planting of beets. The tall plants are sunflowers and in front of them is a mixture of beets, dill, mustard and spicy lettuce mix (2nd planting). To the right of that, hanging over the wall is yellow squash which is just about done (we had plenty). Then 3 tomato plants that we weren't very happy with and in front of them spicy lettuce mix (1st planting) with some more self sown cherry tomatoes which I'll allow to grow over the wall since that lettuce is nearring the end of it's useful life.
We got the trellis from Eileen at Diva Clothier in Venice. Thanks Eileen.
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