We experienced a first drought period with warm weather in the end of May and beginning of June, which gave many plants severe growth delays, though I guess we were lucky there was quite a bit of moisture left in the ground for some plants with deeper reaching roots to survive. Last week it was unseasonably cold; this week warmer weather was predicted but instead a rain front has arrived.
Regardless, we have been lucky enough to harvest quite a few fruits and vegetables so far. Salads are of course a main crop and grace our dinner table virtually every night. Peas and green manche-touts have been served several times now. Last week I picked the first courgette with more to follow this week if the weather permits.
It turned out we had quite a few rhubarb plants, so we have eaten it in several different forms, and there's quite a few jars with rhubarb marmalade and strawberry/rhubarb marmalade waiting in the cellar for times when fresh fruit is less abundant. The strawberry bed we inherited was actually quite a mess, so we transplanted about 90 plants in April;we got some hands full of berries from them, but tried to pinch out most of the berries to get them settled properly hoping for a nice harvest next year. The remaining plants in the old bed gave us around 5 pounds, which I guess we can't complain about. The bed has now been cleaned out, and another 50 plants have been transplanted (current rain should do them good!!).
Our red currant bush did quite well. I had never seen one before that had been grafted, but apparently it works quite well. The berries mostly ended up in a mixed berry marmalade which also include josta-berries, strawberries and raspberries. We are currently waiting for the Logan and blackberries to ripen, which shouldn't take too much longer, depending on the weather.
Our cherry tree bloomed wonderfully in early spring, and many cherries appeared. Unfortunately, the bird population of Zurich seems to have had quite some nice parties among ours, and those of the neighboring gardens, so we ended up with just a couple of handfuls. Our plum tree didn't even bloom, so there's nothing there. They are Reine Claude's, a variety that's hardly available on the market, but supposed to have a great taste. We can only hope for next year....
Our small apple tree did quite well, though I removed about two thirds of the budding apples not too challenge the tree too much. With a bit of luck it should be able to give lots of apples in a couple of years, even though it is not ideally placed.
Last, but not least on the fruit front are the grapes. I am utterly inexperienced with them, and had thought I had pruned them rather rigorously this winter. It seems I have to be even more merciless because they are putting shoots in every direction imaginable, but there's relatively few grapes....
I'll try to post some photos next time around.
Did add one single photo.
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