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A bumper crop of apples in the Fall
In California, the Fall is synonymous with apples. For Edible Landscaping we have many varieties that will grow, from the coast up to the Sierra Foothills. My own trees have four varieties of apples on one tree. With two trees, that gives me a grand total of eight varieties, in one small area. They ripen at slightly different times, to extend the season. Check your nurseries for types that work in your climate. If you go to Smart Gardener you can type in your zip code and they’ll tell you what your growing season is.
Sun Gold cherry tomatoes
Of all the vegetable crops, tomatoes are one of the few that almost everyone wants to grow at home, because they ALWAYS (almost) taste better than store bought. If you live in a cool climate, as in the California northern coast, or a short season climate, as in higher elevations, then you want to grow Cherry tomatoes, which ripen earlier, faster and longer than larger tomatoes. Check out the varieties of heirloom tomatoes that give wonderful taste, great yields and all kinds of colors. Organic gardening is more than a buzz word, it’s way to enjoy life.
One of my favorite Edible Landscape plants is the delicious Strawberry. Strawberries can be early, middle and late producing. Some varieties give two crops, such as the one pictured below. Some are everbearing and some are Wild Strawberries. You will get a lot of information from this site, Peaceful Valley Farm Supply, and you can order plants from them as well.
It's Fall and the Strawberries keep on coming
More on Fall Plants Tomorrow!
One Response to “The Fall Edible Garden”
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I love my apples too–I grafted several varieties onto a mature apple tree many years ago, and while most of the tree is Winter Banana, there are also branches that bear Calville Blanc d’Hiver, and two very round green/red varieties that may be the same thing, but maybe not–and whose names I lost long ago! I make apple sauce and apple juice out of many of them, but used to also pack a good many away and eat them over the fall as fresh apples. Not so much lately as I seem to have more scab and a critter who is not a codling moth, whose damage is not noticeable at harvest or if one uses the apples quickly, but turns the inside into many thin tunnels if left to sit.
I use dormant oil spray, place codling moth pheremone traps and apple maggot traps, rake up leaves in the fall, thin the apples when they are the size of walnuts, and don’t leave fallen apples on the ground. Anything else I could do??