Things growing in our yard

Now that summer is over, we have things growing in our yard that won't survive in the scorching heat. It did take a little adjusting to the idea that you can't plant things in the spring here. There seem to actually be two growing seasons here... fall and late winter/early spring, basically taking a break from the coldest 2-3 months, when it actually gets down into the 30s at night sometimes.

In our last growing season, we started noticing plants growing out of our compost pile. We weren't sure what they were at first, but after some time passed, we realized we had tomatoes, Indian corn, butternut squash, and pumpkins.


Here's a photo of the harvest we had in June... the green beans and tomatoes were "on purpose" plants. Unfortunately, Jack the dog discovered he loves going into the garden and harvesting tomatoes, so most of those were secretly eaten in the night while we slept.

The pumpkins are long gone, so we can't use them to decorate this fall, but I saved the ears of corn and now have them on the wreath on our front door. When we're done with them, I'll throw them in the compost pile and we'll see if we get new ones in the spring again. :) Not exactly what the compost pile was intended for, but it still works...

The compost pile, as of this morning: one stalk of corn (we're not sure if it's Indian or sweet corn yet), and what I believe is butternut squash, if I remember correctly from this spring.

This, I believe, is a pumpkin vine. I'm not sure how it decided to grow where it is, but there it is. And we'll have pumpkins in time for... Christmas, maybe? I can't remember how long it took once the blooms came.

The grapefruit tree isn't an accident... but you can see our one little grapefruit growing on the lower right side of the grapefruit tree. Not bad, considering it's only been in our yard since this spring! :) And, I discovered today that there's a volunteer tomato plant just behind it, to the left, if you look hard. :)

This is our bougainvillea plant. I love it! It's not at all an accident, but I had to post it because it's starting to "perk up" after the blazing hot summer. :)