A Sunny June Sunday Balcony Garden Report

It’s mid June and the balcony garden is finally started to come into its full potential! All plants are growing well, many have started flowering and some are even growing fruit already!

The past couple of weeks since my last balcony garden report we’ve had wonderful summery weather and it has clearly been enjoyed just as much by my plants as by me! Everything is looking green, lush and healthy. And I’ve been able to have my breakfast and other meals on the balcony amidst all this greens almost every single day!

balcony garden seen from the bedroom window — *bedroom window view*

planters hanging outside the railing — *outside the railing*

purple Melissa bean blossom — *Purple Melissa bean blossom*

Pops of Colour in the Balcony Garden

And there are little pops of colour amidst the greenery from the blooms that are slowly appearing more and more abundantly as well. Lots of yellow tomato blossoms, a few orange calendula flowers, a bunch of light purple aubergine flowers, bright red nasturtium flowers and dark purple bean blooms.

The purple Oda bell peppers are getting bigger and bigger and more plentiful, lots of cherry tomatoes are developing and there’s one gorgeous looking Silvery Fir Tree tomato growing as well.

Leafy Greens

The leafy greens are doing great! Swiss chard, Dazzling Blue Kale, Cavolo Nero and Flanders borecole are growing beautifully, and so is the pink Chinese celery! I did see a cabbage white butterfly yesterday so I will have to keep an eye out to make sure they don’t lay eggs on the kales or that their caterpillars start munching on them!

a variety of kales growing in pots — *kales*

pink Chinese celery — *Pink Chinese celery*

pink Chinese celery seen from the top — *Pink Chinese celery*

And I’m doing a little lettuce experiment! After seeing someone on Instagram grow lettuce in full shade I decided to try this myself because I have a lot of full shade and would like to make that space more green and productive. And so far it’s going very well! I’m growing a mix of salads in one container and recently started some olive leaf arugula seeds as well.

Sugar Snap Peas & Squashes

I ended up planting some Opal Creek sugar snap peas recently as well. Last year I didn’t have much success with them but this year I’ve put them in a better spot and I think they are doing well. Fingers crossed there will be some of these tasty little yellow sugar snap peas for me to eat soon!

mini cucumbers and nasturtiums — *Mini cucumber & nasturtiums*

closeup of cucamelon tiny flower buds — *First tiny cucamelon flower buds*

And my cucamelon and mini cucumbers are doing great as well! I must admit I am super curious to get a taste of these cucamelons! I spoke with a friend recently who had grown them before and she did not like the taste, saying it was to sour or bitter. But when I hear what other growers say about it on their social media, they all seem to say it should taste like crunchy cucumbers with a slight lemony taste to it, which sounds yummy to me! Have you ever grown these? What did you think of them?

Raspberries

And last but not least, my raspberry plant is growing the first couple of raspberries! Just four if I counted correctly 😅 but there are more buds on this branch and the other branches started growing later so I’m hopefully they will follow suit soon!