Gardening Lessons Learned: A List

Things we have learned about gardening this year (so far–there are another six to eight weeks left in the growing season here, so stay tuned):

• If you buy an oregano plant, put it in your garden, then start eating it and think “Hmmm, this doesn’t taste anything like the dried stuff”, chances are good it’s not oregano even though that’s what the label said. (Turns out it’s an herb called summer savory. Thank goodness it’s still an edible herb, since we ate it for weeks before cluing in…)
• Basil goes with eeeeverything. We have basil coming out our ears. We’ve eaten it in tomato salads, in stir-fry, on pasta, on skewers with cherry tomatoes and bocconcini (small balls of mozzarella cheese), and there’s still more in pesto form in the freezer…good thing we love the stuff!
• Related: once you have had fresh herbs, it’s very hard to go back. Or garden-fresh or made-from-scratch anything, really. Since my spouse and I are not actually homesteaders or even homemakers, this is a problem. (We haven’t gotten as far as canning yet, but we did just make fresh Irish soda bread, peach compote, and refrigerator pickles, and our freezer is filling up with slow-roasted tomatoes and chicken broth. We miiight be wannabe homesteaders.)
• Beets are prone to diseases and pests (at least ours are). But you can still eat the beets, just not the leaves…which is sad because the leaves are tasty too, as it turns out.
• Squirrels like cucumbers even more than they like zucchini.
• Squirrels do not like under-ripe tomatoes. (Actually, we learned that one several years ago, and now we pick all our tomatoes while they’re still pink and let them finish ripening on the counter.)
• Plants that are small and stunted still want to do their best to produce. We have a couple of bean plants that are valiantly making two beans at a time, and the same with the sweet banana pepper. It’s sad and admirable at the same time.
• On that note, buying seedlings from the random corner store instead of the big gardening store is maybe not the best idea.
• Raised beds, however, are the best invention ever. (Though I still killed my back this weekend from leaning over the raised beds for too long. Sigh.)
• It’s awfully nice to have a fresh bouquet in the kitchen all the time. Just have to remember to keep picking the flowers. (I’ve been alternating between petunias, black-eyed Susans, and hydrangeas.)
• Flower arranging is a skill that I do not have yet.
• There’s always something new to learn!