A hoe, a claw and a rake : Part II

The potager is completely cleared, the soil has been turned and amendments have been incorporated. We're ready to sow our peas! While cleaning the bed we had to pick out lots of rocks, small and not so small thanks to the plumbing work done last winter. Wing Nut found some very interesting little rocks.

Hey, those aren't rocks at all! They're purple potatoes from my little experiment last summer. They were spuds that went a little too long unused and sprouted in our wire hanging basket. I thought the little violet colored sprouts were so beautiful, I threw them in a container and threw dirt on top. We so did not follow Steve Solomon's advice in Growing Vegetables West of the Cascades, usually our bible when it comes to growing things we've never grown before. These were store bought spuds and not the garden center's certified ones. I didn't hill them up. I watered at the wrong time. It also never occurred to me to check the pot in the fall, so certain was I that there would be no potatoes in there. So imagine our surprise and glee when we dumped out the pot that you see sitting in the potager in the photo from our post "A hoe, a claw and a rake : Part I" and found about 2 dozen purple spuds that looked to be quite edible.

A hoe, a claw and a rake : Part I

This is the "before" shot of our potager. Last fall we thought the golden grassy stuff looked very cool. As you can see from these shots taken last fall, the grassy stuff was taller and fuzzier.

Whatever were we thinking? Hopefully it will pull up easily, but just in case, we are ready with our favorite weed whackin' implements. Curmudgeon has a predilection for the claw, while Wing Nut prefers the hoe. While working to clear the bed, we discovered that the Camellia around the corner of the house is blooming. Camellia fanatics out on the east coast are just in time to catch the American Camellia Society's annual conference Feb. 22-24 at Longwood Gardens in Kennett Square, PA!

Growing along the edge of the garden bed we found vines with bright red berries and violet stems. Wing Nut remembers the vines having pretty little purple flowers. No clue what these are! Any ideas?

I hope the peppers enjoy this heat!

I hope the peppers are enjoying this heat because I'm certainly not!! Ugh. 90+ degrees in Seattle?? The East Coast had hot summers. The blast furnace prairie plains had very hot summers. Seattle is not supposed to have hot summers! So today I'm very grateful that I'm not a plant! Okay, there are many days when I'm happy I'm not a plant, but that's another story...

The peppers seem to be growing and there are more buds and some flowers now on the Italian Sweet Peppers. Ivette said she waters the box daily as the six little plants are really soaking up the water. Here are some new pictures of them. The plants are now between 8 and 9 inches tall. We should have measured them previously, but didn't. Oh well. Trust me - they're growing!

It's amazing what the right tools for the job will do. Last summer we purchased a 50 ft hose to replace the one the previous tenants left behind. Well, apparently, 50 feet is just not long enough to reach the end of the garden bed or the top of the hillside garden. Curmudgeon complained that the bronze fennel and rhubarb in the garden patch and the various plants on the hillside were not getting enough water. We recently bought a 75 foot hose and she is able to not only reach the top of the hillside garden, but also the spot where I park the car! I wonder if she'd hose down the car if I sprinkled a few flower petals on it? It could really use a bath! But I digress. One of the plants on the hillside is something we planted 2 or 3 years ago. We no longer remember what it is and cannot find the tag for it. But it is blooming more beautifully this year than any previous year! I think the longer hose and better watering is really making a difference. Here's a picture of the mystery plant. If anyone can identify it - please let us know!