Cultivate a balcony garden

I had partial success this summer. My 2 jalapeño and 1 cayenne pepper plants did well, as did my 1 “Patio” tomato. Lesson learned: you cannot fertilize tomatoes too much. I had a pretty poor yield until I discovered a tomato bloom spray and started fertilizing every third day. The biggest success was my lettuce bed. I planted a department store window box (about 6”x30”) and ate out of it almost daily for a month and a half. Lettuce dies out in the heat of summer, but I’m getting ready to plant a fall crop. You can also plant green onions and most bushy greens at this time of year. Peas are my favorite cool weather crop, but simply take up too much room.

Many of my herbs didn’t survive. My rosemary is thriving, but my sage and thyme both died out from drought over a four day weekend. All three were easily started from seed. Purchased oregano also died that weekend. The only problem with the basil plant I purchased is that I’ve found that I need two or three plants in order to avoid over harvesting. One recipe can require up to 50% of a single plant. Same thing with chives (grown from seed).

The entire container garden takes up about three feet by five feet of space on my balcony.

Tomatoes offer one of the best yield for space ratios and are great for full sun balconies. For cooler or partial sun balconies, leaf lettuce and green onions can be planted together in a 3-5” deep bed (2’x4’planter box works well, although a much smaller window box will do). It might be a bit late for lettuce and onions right now in southern zones, but they can be planted again in late summer.

Mmmm… chopped lettuce and onions drizzled with bacon or salt pork crumbled in its own hot grease is one of my yearly indicators that spring is here.

Some varieties of sun loving cucumbers are trellis friendly, but the vines can be very sensitive. If you have to cut them back you’ll likely lose your crop. These work well on second floor balconies where you don’t have to worry about the lawn mower damaging the plant.