Nakatsu by JNA Designs

It got down to 29• F last night, so we covered the plants and used a string of lights, clip on lights, pvc frames my husband made, plastic sheeting, and bed sheets to protect everything. Great news: Chard, kale, salad greens, ice plant (a succulent), another succulent called burro’s tail (forget its other name), eggplant, avocado tree, Chinese broccoli, green onions, chives, peppermint, rosemary, Brussels sprouts, Kikuna/chrysanthemum, and artichokes look good. Tomatoes, basil and okra got a bit cold zapped, but I expected that. I harvested a lot of green tomatoes last night. So thankful for my handy and quick thinking hubby, and helpful kiddos. Today’s high will be 63, it’s about 58 right now. Cold nights the rest of the week, it will dip into the 30s again Thursday and Friday night, but a few degrees warmer than a freeze. We’ll make more pvc frames so all the beds will have them, and leave those up for the rest of the season so it’s easier to cover them when needed to protect from freeze. Lucky that winter is usually mild in Texas and we get an extra growing season.

My first time fall/winter gardening! All plants from Lone Star Nursery. Holy basil in the first bed doing well, trimmed it back to make room for the artichokes (2 varieties). Planted kikuna (garland chrysanthemum greens) which I was excited to find, it’s my favorite vegetable! Next to the kikuna is purple Brussels sprouts.

In second bed, rosemary bush needs to be pruned back, some peppermint is coming back, green onions and chives look good, after weeding we can add more plants.

In third bed, the Japanese eggplant has started flowering again (I love the little purple blossoms!) and the okra is sprouting new branches and pods. We planted Chinese broccoli, and my friend Stacey made me a resin Buddha in Kamakura style, looks good among the plants. The yellow pear tomato from spring/summer started producing prolifically again as it’s cooled down from the summer hot, but it did produce all summer and was the one of the most heat resistant tomatoes I planted.

In the fourth bed, we kept a cherry tomato plant rash it started producing again, I planted two kinds of rainbow chard, some mixed salad greens, collards, and blue grilled kale, and purple kale.

These raised beds are probably at least ten years old, built with corrugated metal sheeting and wood, the top wooden sills need to be replaced this year. A few years ago we put in soaker hose irrigation on timers and it’s made all the difference in being able to keep everything alive in the summer when it hits the 100s.

I still need to mulch around the plants, and a tree we just planted (desert willow). We were able to get enough compost from our compost pile/bin, I’m a very lazy composter and usually the big turning of the pile coincides with harvesting the finished compost for planting. Yay gardening!