Balcony boxes - update

My balcony boxes turned out to be lovely. It’s not a full garden, and it by no means could support me, but it’s lush and green which is pretty much all I could expect from 2 square meters.

The top boxes are mainly a flower mix, which look like random meadow flowers such as can be found in Poland. I also have some wild strawberries, garlic and lamb’s lettuce in the top boxes, both of which are thriving (the first strawberry was eaten today).

The lower boxes have been mainly taken over by radish, which when allowed grows to be massive. I’ve already pulled up quite a few to make room for tomatoes. There weren’t any radish roots to speak of, but the leaves can be made into a good pesto. Or fried with garlic slices, which is delicious. I wanted to have at least one of the lower boxes for peppermint, but I accidently dried my mint out last autumn, which it barely survived, and planting it in the box finished it off. I’ll plant some more when I get a new supply.

I have 2 larger boxes, on the sides of the balcony. One of these I use as a compost box, as I wanted to make my own soil (I sort of gave up on that for this year, but around 1/4 of the current soil is kind of my production). That being said, I planted a grape vine at the end of it in the hopes that the compost won’t kill it off. It doesn’t seem to be thriving, but it is putting out leaves, so maybe it’ll work?

The other big box has a redcurrant, 2 blackberries and a raspberry. Though only the redcurrant seem happy - the others seem to be barely struggling along. It could be that they’re too much in the shade. Turns out the balcony is south facing, but done well enough that the sun doesn’t shine on it too much during summer. Which is nice for me, but not for the plants…