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How does your garden grow?

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Several readers have asked about my front yard vegetable gardens, so I thought I’d post some pictures. And who knows? If everything doesn’t die, maybe I’ll drop in from time to time with news about how things are growing and what I’m cooking.

The raised beds are the brainchild of my brilliant garden designer Nick Tan, of Urban Organics Design. My wife and I had dreams of a fairly basic xeriscape garden, but he knew of my interest in cooking and growing and suggested the beds and as soon as he said it, we all immediately knew we had to make room for them. Our house is on a corner lot and the vegetable beds are arranged along the side yard, behind a fence that will soon be covered by a climbing rose. There are four beds, each about a yard square, and there is another long, narrow one along the back with a trellis that runs up the wall.

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I’ve been traveling a lot lately, so it’ll be a couple of weeks before everything is planted. Right now I’ve got Victoria rhubarb from Burpee’s intermixed with some California irises. Waiting to go in are a bunch of seeds I ordered from Victory Seed Co. One bed will have melons — an old variety called Queen Anne’s Pocket Melon; they’re very small (softball-sized) and extremely fragrant. Supposedly, they were carried by Victorian women in their purses as deodorants. I’m also planting zucchini, if you can believe it. Actually, it’s a zucchini predecessor called Cocozelle that I almost never find at farmers markets. It’s supposed to have really terrific flavor. The trellis bed will be a mixture of Scarlet Runner Beans (the hummingbirds love them) and an old Italian variety called Valena that can be eaten as green beans, as shelly beans and as dried beans. I’ve talked to Barbara Spencer at Windrose Farms about tomatoes for another bed. I’ll definitely do something Brandywine-ish, and maybe a great paste tomato, especially if she can come up with true San Marzano. The final bed will be a cut-and-come-again salad bed with mixed herbs and greens.

Besides the beds, I’ve got a Fuyu persimmon tree and a Panachee fig tree, plus three artichoke plants that may or may not be used as ornamentals. We’ll see how that goes. A garden, like a blog, is always a work in progress.

-- Russ Parsons

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