Midsummer Photomapping Part #2

Installment #2 in the photo-mapping project covers the middle section of the back, basically the area in between the two red lines in the “sky” shot below.

This was where the garden project started; the beds labeled as “6” officially replaced lawn in June of 2009 and things only accelerated after that.

#1 is a recently constructed mini-bed to “contain” peppermint that was an impulse purchase.   Behind it you can see #2, the raspberry brambles cascading over a trellis.  As an afterthought, I put an odd-shaped bed in the mulched area to the left; this would be #3 and it contains an artichoke plant and a 2 year old chard (“Fordhook giant”) root that just keeps on growing.  I moved it there from a back bed “temporarily” and there it has stayed all summer.

Looking back towards the raspberry trellis:

and

I moved this 3 year old rosemary bush (also visible above) from the nearby beds to a spot where I could unbind it and let it spread to its natural shape.  It has a way to go yet but is looking much better now.

 

The nearby artichoke plant (with old chard in the background):

 

Down the fence a bit, the area marked #4 is a tangle of odd transplants like oxbow daisies and sage planted around the two Carolina Jasmine vines slowly gaining a toehold on the fence via the iron gates secured to the front.   (The black/gray panel between the gates is a framed shade cloth panel that migrates around the garden as needed. )

 

The next 3 pictures are from panning the camera to the left over the whole middle area:

And from a different angle, a shot across the yard at Lizzies’s house (#5).  Confederate Jasmine is slowly climbing the two corner posts and several small Japanese rooftop Iris are planted at the left corner.

Panning right across #6, you can see that there is a middle bed, a strawberry pyramid.   The bottle rack is something i made on a whim when I was in possession of a borrowed welder/ the bottles were all found buried on the property, mainly in the ground under the privet hedge I pulled in the winter of 2009-2010.

Looking over the same ground (#6) towards the patio you can see that I like Thai basil and am remiss in removing volunteers so that they eventually take over a large part of some beds. The blooms are a great attractor of pollinators; they have been covered with honeybees lately, presumably from the same hives that found the pond last month during the dry spell.  The black frame was made to hold two shade cloth panels if needed; I shaded the last of the spring lettuce to try to slow the inevitable bolting.  There it stays until it is needed elsewhere.   Kale is behind it, suffering through heat and harlequin bugs until cold weather arrives.

 

Area #7, the blueberry beds (I may move one to get better alignment for the bird netting frame next year.

Another confederate jasmine and rosemary bush are at the corner of the shed behind the blueberries.

And finally, #8 in the map- the curved bed in front of the shed and 3 small afterthought beds that have stayed in place since 2010.   The tower is made of a couple of bamboo tripods secured to the ground with re-bar (the beans are “Christmas” limas and no, I don’t know how i will pick the beads in the top half yet.)

Some snap beans are planted in the far end of the curved bed and in between rutabagas are coming up.  I made a rough border of logs around the stump behind them and back filled with soil mix; two types of Iris were planted at the first of June and are doing very well, probably due to the good drainage of the leaky bed.

That’s about it for the middle section; I’ll get off my rump and think of something to work into the plan this fall even if only cover crops.