Thursday, June 5, 2008

Strawberries, Oregano, and Fruit Trees

My two strawberry plants are doing well. Unfortunately, there are no new strawberries yet. I ate the first and only two strawberries from one of the plants. But as of today, no new growth. They are the ever-bearing variety, so I'm hoping they will fruit later this summer.

Below: The potted strawberry plant.

The potted plant is pretty healthy, and it continues to grow new leaves every day. You can see its new growth at the bottom of its stem. Very green and incredibly promising.

Below: The strawberry plant in the SFG box # 2.

The planted strawberry plant has nice foliage, and the leaves are very green. Even if it doesn't fruit again, it is pretty to look at. I love the leaves--similar to three-leaf clovers.

I'm in need of education from you expert gardeners. I'm not sure how strawberries even form. Do they come from flowers? Or does the fruit just grow off one of the leaves? I'm so clueless. I need to do some research on this.

Above: Oregano from the front vegetable bed. (2 angles of the same plant).

I planted two oregano plants. One is in the front (the photo above), and the other is planted in one of the SFG boxes. The front oregano is flourishing and one sprig is growing very tall. I think I may need to harvest some soon and try my hand at drying. I’d love to make home-made dried oregano for my Italian dishes. Italian food is my absolute fav. (Kinda strange, huh? Since I'm Vietnamese).

I've heard that oregano spreads very quickly, but Cam and I wanted to grow an herb that would come back yearly. At least with oregano, it'll come back for several years and we don't need to replant any.

Below: The nectarine (right) and cherry (left) trees

I absolutely love fruit. I don’t like candies or chocolates that much, but I’ve always had a sweet tooth for fruit. My parents grow delicious apples and pears in their garden, so Cam and I decided to plant a few fruit trees at his home.

In the late April, we planted three trees: (1) cherry (2) nectarine (3) red delicious apple.

Below: The red delicious apple tree
The apple tree (above) had bloomed in early May, and I was expecting to have a small harvest of apples this year. But alas, it was not meant to be. After the flowers "died," we had one small baby apple, and I was so excited. But a bird flew down and carried it away. So sadly, no apples this year. Hopefully, next year.

The cherry tree is still very young, and we didn't have any hope for cherries this year. So hopefully in the next few years, instead of buying cherries from the grocery, I can just go to Cam's house and pick some the tree.

The only tree that we've had any success with is the nectarine tree. I really enjoy eating nectarines, so we bought a tree that already had fruit. We figured we couldn't go wrong!

Below: The nectarine tree


7 comments:

Dawn said...

Hi, I believe strawberries set a flower on a seperate stem then the fruit becomes. They also send runners that plant within inches of the mother plant, once this happens you can snip the runner and wha-la, another strawberry.

Daphne Gould said...

Yes fruit sets on the flowers. The first year you are supposed to pick off any flower that forms so the plants energy will go to the plant. The next year you will get lots of flower and berries.

I've been told that oregano is an invasive plant too, but in my garden it isn't at all. It is healthy and comes back every year, but it doesn't spread very quickly for me.

Dr. White said...

Your fruit trees look great. I, too, dream of no longer buying fruits at the grocery.

tina said...

It all looks good. Daphne, I too love oregano and you can't beat it for a filler. I have a request, I may have missed it but can you do a post explaining what exactly SFG is? How you do it and so on? I don't know much about it.

tina said...

Where is the video of Cam and the kitty? And what is the kitty's status? I want to show a friend.

DP Nguyen said...

Dawn & Daphne, Thanks for the info about how the strawberries grow on the plant!

One acre homestead: I agree! I'd love to never have to buy fruits or veggies from the grocery again. They just taste better when you grow them yourself.

Tina--I will definite write a post about what square foot gardening is. Cam and I will be building a few more boxes later this summer, and I'll document that process.

Also, here is the original video of the kitty: http://fox17.com/newsroom/top_stories/vid_1861.shtml
You should be happy to know that I have adopted the kitten, and she now lives in Cam's very roomy sunroom. We've named her Luka. She's as cute as can be. I'll be posting pictures of her!

Gail said...

Wow! It looks terrific.

I use Oregano as a ground cover...it's related to the mint! Just planted a variegated variety, so pretty.