blackberry reclamation project update late may: in late march, I brought in a truckload of leaf compost (and hazelnut shell for pathways) from the city of portland. I'm learning that perhaps this isn't the best idea, since even though the city doesn't spray its trees, a lot of anti-biotics are injected instead, not to mention the leaves are scraped off the street. so I'll call them for chemical analysis if they have it, but for the moment, treat my eatibles with care. not that I know what "care" would look like. somewhere between not eating the tomatoes and realizing that we live in a poisoned world any way you slice your tomato. next time grow flowers. actually, lupin is a sponge for toxicity, as I read about it... radioactive toxins, even... and then I promptly planted garlic and sunchokes
in late april, started nasturtium, sunflower, chervil, elecapane, sculpit (campion), borage, melons, fennel (bulb), hyssop,, ground cherry and leeks. most of the seedlings were ready in a month
Mid-may: got the shrubs planted. I was going to wait on buying them to observe just how many blackberries came roaring back over the course of the year, but I seem to be able to remove the ones that do easily enough to proceed. from onegreenworld.com permaculture nursery in molalla, I bought a bay tree, evergreen huckleberry, and a few rugosa roses for a different area (privacy hedge). All of them are shade and drought tolerant. For the b-berry bed, red george gooseberry, crandall currant, a few seaberries, 2 european elderberries, viking aronia, and giant ostrich ferns. From Naomi's garden in portland, two kinds of mugwort, crocosmia, coneflower, a rosemary, mizuna. Direct seeded: "decorative compost" mix from bountiful gardens, a mix of phycellia, cali poppies, lupin, red cover, and wooley vetch (all nitrogen fixers), as well as their benficial insect mix in the front.
looking southwest: a little cage of mustard
There's a method to the madness, though the learning curve is steep. I want an area for foraging salad greens/ chlorophyll-rich leaf ferments.. maybe to harvest just in the early part of the year, but point is that what I don't want is to maintain tidy rows of lettuces just to have tasty nutritious greens. If I can identify greens high in minerals that will aggressively self-seed in relatively poor soil, I have the beginning of what Peter has deemed "conquering" an edge. I have identified: miner's lettuce, mizuna, borage, lambsquarters, chervil, salad burnet, purslane, parsley, staghorn plantain, sorrel, mustard/cress. Of course they all grow to different heights, so when getting their seeds started, I tried to make my own mixes based on that. also, the deco compost mix is generally on the 4' side of things, so I'll try to seed that only in the back, relative to the sun. the question now remains: for the future, how tightly will I need to select out (weed) the seedlings. if I let them all compete, will the tall ones move forward into the shorter ones? or will it be more a question of who's most competitive?
I have asked the question of: so, nitrogen-fixing plants benefit the soil around them as they grow. within what radius? I am not finding a definitive answer. will keep asking. what I have learned is what organic farmers seem to know so well: harvest before they seed, since the nitrogen is concentrated in the root and upper parts until it is time to make seed, at which point all nitrogen is concentrated there. if you let it go to seed for next year, fine, be be warned... !
this area gets sun till ~2pm. for kicks, I planted a few tomatoes and eggplant too. I love my nightshades...