Charamon Garden Report:Summer 2009

If you read this blog or live in this region you know: gardening in West Texas has some major challenges!  Our major challenge this summer has been keeping things watered.  We normally don’t get much rain here but that difficulty has been enlarged in the last few weeks with our extremely hot weather.  Hot and dry conspire to destroy!  Add to that the constant battle with weeds.  Gripe, gripe, gripe.

Early Summer Dew on a Young Blackberry

Thankfully, we can supplement our needs with well water…hard as it is.  Most of our plantings tolerate it well but the berries hate it.    Half of the blackberries that I planted bit the dust…literally.  But that means the other half seem to be making it.  The strawberries, on the other hand, require daily water and, lately, shade.  I believe they will make it…barely.  My experimental planting of raspberries failed.  Wrong variety, wrong climate.  But I’m not finished yet!  Next year, God willing, I will try some varieties better suited to our hellish conditions.  I hope it works because I’m getting old and I would like to grow and eat some berries before I die.

OK, enough of the complaining!  On the more positive side, everything

Baskets of Summer Fruit plus some Herbs

else seems to be thriving in spite of the water and weather.   Tomatoes, squash, summer peas, okra…all seem to be doing OK.  We have a bumper crop of figs this year…yum!  I am blessed with a huge garden area and soil that gets better every year.

The Berries are Coming!

Digging the Holes

Charamon Garden constantly evolves.  I give natural selection an assist by saving the seeds of several vegetables from plants which seem to do well (productive, tasty, nutritious) and, I am assured, become better adapted to our West Texas conditions with each generation.

The Amendments

Take my tomatoes (a neighbor actually took that too seriously while we were absent).  I have lost track of the original strain now and I try to add more genetic diversity each year.  To my mixed-up heirlooms, I am adding genetic material from a Russian variety called Black Krim this summer.  We will enjoy those delicious Russians and save the seed from those and the original strain which “do well.”  By the time I pass on, I hope to pass on a delectable tomato that grows especially well in our little corner of the world.

Mixing the Soil

Charamon garden also changes in composition.  This year I am adding berries.  Any day now I am expecting a shipment of Blackberries (especially suited for the South), Raspberries and Strawberries.  In regard to the former, once planted they are supposed to last for fifteen years or more.

My response to that longevity is to make sure their soil is the best it can be.  Given my native soil, that’s quite a challenge!  That means I have to make certain amendments.  So, in preparation for the new arrivals I have dug seven holes spaced about three feet (0.91 meters) apart.  The dirt from each hole goes into the cement mixer.  To that I add Texas Greensand, bone meal, blood meal, charcoal and composted manure.  As it mixes, I try to break up all the clods before dumping the improved earth beside the hole.

When the plants arrive, I will sprinkle mychorrizae around the roots and fill in the holes.  I hope it makes them very happy and productive.

I told my wife I thought this post needed a little sex-appeal and asked her to take a picture of me to add to this blog.  When she finally quit laughing she obliged me while gently advising me not to expect too much.  So, please feel free to comment, but hold the offers of marriage…I’m very happily wedded to my high school sweetheart.

In the meantime, eat your veggies (and berries).  Nonnie and Pop said so.