Tilling the Earth

Nice! I decided to start a new garden this year too. But the weather in Marina is not typical "bay area" weather haha. So it's generally not hot enough (or enough sun exposure) for many fruits. One thing I learned for my area is that you can put things like tomatoes & peppers in large glazed pots because they retain heat better than the ground or normal pots.
My main inspiration was to make hot dilly beans like Sackyak makes! So I have a ton of bean varieties. The ones that really surprised me were the snowpeas...those things grew really big really fast. And I eat em right off the vine. My kids LOVE picking fruit & veggies from the backyard.

I always plant cool weather vegetables. I'll be replanting after this heat wave is over. Shame, my Brussels sprouts were coming along nicely before the heat came. All time record July temperatures this week. Didn't see that coming.

One crop we accidentally got into was garlic, just by burying cloves that'd begun to sprout. 

Fresh garlic is amazing...do it less for the root, and more for the greens. 

Fantastic stuff, and not so easy to find retail.  Take 'em and sautee them in olive oil with andouille and a lot of red wine, 'till the whole mess is fairly thick, you'll thank yourself.

Thanks for all of the tips and suggestions for vegetables. Its amazing to see so many of you guys have such awesome gardens. Although I'm new at this, I can see how addictive it is. Every day I get home from work and the first thing I do is head to my garden and water my plants, take any new pea shoots and train them up the trellis. Super calming and helps me relax and unwind. 

Sailfish - I actually just put in 3 different types of peppers, shishitos, padrons, and a single vietnamese devil pepper!

AlsHobieOutback - Thanks for the tip on seeds, its pretty amazing what you can find and plant straight from the supermarket instead of a nursery

MANBEARPIG - Golden Gate Gardening downloaded! I want to get into chickens, but I think our place is too small. I did some research and there is an Oakland city ordinance where a chicken coop has to be a certain number of feet away from a building

I actually had to look up what "espalier" meant. So fricking cool!

polepole - Have you looked into a rainwater harvesting setup? I've seen a couple of DIY type setups that daisy chaing 55 gallon barrels that look interesting

Andy - Beautiful garden!

Pat - Yep, snow peas and sugar snap peas are like candy. I'm contemplating putting in a second bed now. In addition to pots and raised beds, I heard that smaller cherry tomatoes with shorter fruiting cycles do a little better with overcast and cooler weather along the coast

newfuturevintage - I'll have to check out growing garlic!

polepole - Have you looked into a rainwater harvesting setup? I've seen a couple of DIY type setups that daisy chaing 55 gallon barrels that look interesting

That's on the list of things to do for next year.  I have to redo a downspout on one corner of my house as it has caused some foundation issues.  As part of that, I plan on a water catchment system.  I was thinking about four 55 gallons barrels.

You need about an inch water per tomato plant per week, more when the temp gets hot.  I have three 4x8 plots, which translates into about 25 gallons or more a week.  At 25+ per week, that will last less than 2 months, which is ~1/3 of the summer growing season.  It's a drop in the proverbial bucket.  But it's a tradeoff I can live with.  I cut my gardening water by about 1/2 this year, which I learned the hard was was too much.  But if I drop by 1/3 and make it up with water catchment, then I should be good to go.  Live and learn!

-Allen

Get the book golden gate gardening on Amazon used for like a dollar.

Thanks, John.  I got it for 16 cents.     I have a lot to learn about what to plant, when.

Great threat, thanks for sharing all your information guys! I've been wanting to get this started as well, especially since my backyard lawn is close to dead. Might as well make better use of the space!

polepole - Have you looked into a rainwater harvesting setup? I've seen a couple of DIY type setups that daisy chaing 55 gallon barrels that look interesting

That's on the list of things to do for next year.  I have to redo a downspout on one corner of my house as it has caused some foundation issues.  As part of that, I plan on a water catchment system.  I was thinking about four 55 gallons barrels.

You need about an inch water per tomato plant per week, more when the temp gets hot.  I have three 4x8 plots, which translates into about 25 gallons or more a week.  At 25+ per week, that will last less than 2 months, which is ~1/3 of the summer growing season.  It's a drop in the proverbial bucket.  But it's a tradeoff I can live with.  I cut my gardening water by about 1/2 this year, which I learned the hard was was too much.  But if I drop by 1/3 and make it up with water catchment, then I should be good to go.  Live and learn!

-Allen

a super cheap way to get a catchment tank is use an old pressure tank form a well system. Over time the pressure tank bladders get waterlogged and a new tank is needed. The old tanks are usually 220 gallons and are powercoated steel, and have threaded pipe receptacles as part of the tank.

For mine I used our old tank when it needed to be replaced, and  made up a quickie PVC L-shaped pipe to a quick connect garden hose fitting. I unbolted the bottom panel and removed the old bladder, then cleaned everything and bolted it back on.  I used a metal drill bit and a metal blade on a jigsaw to cut an opening in the top of the tank and simply routed one of the porch downspouts into it. We catch 220 gallons if we get .10" of rain (I checked it after each "storm" we had last "winter"). It drains via gravity to our lower garden.

In my neck of the woods the tanks are found through well servicers or at the metal recycling at our local waste facility. The eventual plan is to hook 3 more in series for our garden water needs.