What's growing in my crop tanks?

Since I kinda/sorta photographed the driveway crop tanks for my then and now post last Friday (that's a new name I thought of for the stock tanks, and I love it), and this week I wrote about all the edible and "cuttable" crops growing in Linda's garden, well I figured it was time to look at what I'm growing this year in this space just outside our back door...

In the large black pot on the far right (above), basil. A summer without fresh basil isn't really a summer at all.

In the cutting garden tank (one for veg, one for vases) is a crazy assortment of things...

I've never cut a stem from this Russelia equisetiformis for a vase, I wonder how it would do?

I just enjoy it here, since it's not reliably hardy in the garden. Common name, firecracker plant.

I was frustrated some seeds I'd sown in the tank hadn't gone anywhere (more on that below), so when I saw starter plants of these ‘Mermaid Blue’ Lisianthus (Eustoma russellianus) for cheap I thought what the heck, I'll try them! Kris at Late to the Garden Party has been using Lisianthus in her vase combinations for years and I've always been intrigued by them.

What I didn't realize is that I'd bought dwarf Lisianthus. Yep. These plants max out at 8"... that means really small vases.

So it turns out there's a theme at work in my cutting garden tank. Seeds that went nowhere, plants I bought that I didn't realize were dwarf... 

And this! These Zinnia were supposed to be Zinnia elegans 'Queen Orange and Lime'—which look like this. Not mine, mine look like this...

The others were supposed to be Zinnia elegans 'Queen Lime'—which look like this. I had hope, I willed those buds to open into something sweet and varied. 

Nope. This is what I got...

The last flower that I'm waiting on to open is this, SunFill™ Green, a "novel green sunflower"—which is supposed to look like this. My fingers are crossed.

Meanwhile I'm also using this tank as a catch-all for an assortment of sun-lovers that have yet to be planted out in the ground. 

And there are a few of those seeds I mentioned just now sprouting (there were others that got larger and kind of sort of bloomed at about 3-4" tall). They are Moluccella laevis, Bells-of-Ireland, and should be 24-36" tall. Such a dissapointment!

Moving on...

The sarracenia assortment loves the summer sun and heat...

As does this crazy tangle.

I bought two 4" pots of Mexican sour gherkins (Melothria scabra) and they've exploded!

So far I've just been snacking on them while I garden, but soon I'll need to harvest them and work them into dinners. Maybe I'll even have enough for a batch of quick-pickles.

This is my first time growing ground cherries (after trying one last summer at Secret Garden Growers).

Physalis pruinosa 'Aunt Molly's'

They're ripe when the husk turns yellow and falls from the vine. Small ones are starting to ripen for me now, but there are larger ones ahead, lots of them.

As you might have guessed, if I'm going to devote time, space, and water to growing edibles they should be things that are not readily available at the local market, so I'm also trying a Toma Verde Tomatillo (Physalis philadelphica). This variety is supposed to mature early and taste like "a cross between a lemon, a pineapple and a tomato. This dependable, prolific variety also produces larger size fruit than others, up to 2” in diameter"... not so much here though. I have lots of blooms, but only 3 fruits that are maturing. 

Earlier in the year I had this tank filled with rat-tail radishes, Raphanus sativus, var. caudatus, I grew from seed. That experiment was a huge success and I will definitely grow them again. We ate the long, seed-filled pods for weeks, I took them to gatherings and made radish pickles too.

One other seasonal planting to show, Datura meteloides 'Double Lavender'. It's taking a little break at the moment but has been blooming non-stop since I bought it just after Memorial Day weekend (yes, those bumpy things are seed pods).

Here are flower photos taken on a sunnier day...

That's the driveway crop tanks for 2025, along with several spiky plant friends...

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All material © 2009-2025 by Loree L Bohl. Unauthorized reproduction prohibited and just plain rude.

A visit to Flicker Farm

I'd planned to tour Linda Wisner's Flicker Farm on Sauvie Island (just a few miles west of downtown Portland) in mid-July, part of a group tour. Unfortunately a comedy of errors involving an electronic key fob that locked itself inside my car prevented that from happening. So I was thrilled when Linda decided to open her garden for the HPSO last week. 

This was not my first visit to the garden, I was there in 2016 and again in 2019.  

The garden is 1.3-acres and much longer than it is wide. I started my exploration in the shady front garden.

I went to brush that leaf litter off the Astilboides tabularis (for a better shot of the Paris polyphylla) and got a bit of a surprise.

I disturbed this little fellow.

What an interesting bench.

There is a lot of food being grown at Flicker Farm. These gorgeous plums were just the beginning...

Blechnum chilense, aka Parablechnum cordatum

It also goes by "costilla de vaca" or cow's rib, I bet you can see why.

Moss!

Moss and Asplenium scolopendrium.

Diphylleia cymosa

I've now moved on to the "Mediterranean-meets-Pacific-Northwest courtyard" where this Hemiboea subacaulis var. jiangxiensis (hardy gesneriad, on the right), and an Astelia, look great together.

There's a fabulous grape arbor over part of the courtyard, I'll share a pulled back shot at the end of this post.

Greenhouse!

Sarracenia, carnivorous pitcher plants.

This is such a lush, romantic garden.

The map Linda created of the farm refers to this area as the "old vegetable garden."

There's still a lot going on here, put it definitely has a feeling of age—delightfully so.

Here's one of many signs Linda places throughout the garden on open days, they tell the stories she would tell if she could walk through the garden with all of her visitors.

I love this gate!

Its patina is wonderful.

Looking back at where I've been...

And where I'm headed...

There's a stylized sort of crevice garden straight ahead in the above photo, it's got a little piggy watching over it.

I think this was the area referred to as the rock garden on the map.

Summer's abundant growth was hiding most of the rocks.

The berry round, with boysenberries, loganberries and raspberries.

Which ones are these?

The corkscrew willow hideaway.

And another of many sit spots throughout the garden.

The white pine (Pinus strobus?) grove and folly.

And the vineyard...

On the left is one of several vegetable/floral crop rounds, on the right the flower covered dead tree I wrote about on Monday.

I could have done an entire post on the fruit and vegetables growing (beautifully) in the garden.

The Dahlia bed, with cabbages...

I walked away from here seriously wishing I had room to grow a few dozen dahlia...

I'm back near the front of the garden again. I could have wandered for hours (I'd already been there an hour and a half) but I needed to be heading for home.

Agaves!

And that grape arbor covered courtyard. See what I mean about romantic?

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All material © 2009-2025 by Loree L Bohl. Unauthorized reproduction prohibited and just plain rude.