Saturday 3 September 2011

Fiona's balcony garden

Our younger daughter, Fiona, lives in a 3rd-floor flat in Ferney-Voltaire, France. She has a long, narrow balcony that faces roughly South-West, and it gets full sun for several hours a day (sometimes too much sun).
Since Fiona has inherited from me a strong love of gardening, she has put her balcony to good use.


In a series of pots of various types and sizes, Fiona has established a very diverse collection of plants, some of them ornamental and some of them productive. For instance, she has a number of different Petunias, like this bicolour purple-and-white one:


This lovely golden Chrysanthemum:


And this unruly but nonetheless decorative Pelargonium:


The edible plants are also strongly represented. This is a very healthy specimen of Purple Basil:


Here are two varieties of Tomato - a plum variety (Roma):


and a red Cherry variety (Gartenperle):


This is a pot of mixed lettuces:


And here are some radishes, swelling up nicely:



Stars of the show of course, are the Chilli plants (Cayenne), some of which are well-behaved and regular:


Whilst others are non-conformist and very confused:


Fiona's achievements just serve to demonstrate the fact that you don't actually need a huge space to be a successful gardener. Care and attention, and a love of your plants is more important! I suspect that much of Fiona's success is also due to her prowess in successfully producing her own special brand of home-made compost, which you can read about here...

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P.S. Thanks to everyone who offered advice and shared experiences concerning Physalis. Most helpful.

11 comments:

  1. Very nice patio garden! Everything looks very healthy.

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  2. That purple basil is growing so big, I might have to try my hand at purple pesto. Thank you for refraining from showing pictures of my dead thyme, whitefly-infested mint or ailing lavender! And for whatever you did to magically revive my beetroot. Voltaire says hello (actually he says rrrrooooow).

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  3. Love all the colours and greenspace you have created up there. I have one chilli that has grown into a heart shape. Have youtried growing cat nip for voltaire? Ourcats have no interest in the fresh stuff but some love it :)

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  4. Looks like green thumbs are inherited!! What a beautiful balcony garden!!

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  5. Gosh, everything looks so fabulously healthy! I love the plum tomatoes.

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  6. I always find it amazing what you can do in a small space and I am always moaning that I don't have enough in my large garden! Her greenfingers are obviously in the genes.

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  7. What an impressive balcony garden! Your daughter has converted such a small space into a beautiful green patch. Reading this, I feel inspired to do more in my own balcony.

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  8. hmm.. now i got shame to have more space but less plant than fiona... :)

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