First Fruit: Tomato, Eggplant, Peppers from the Roof + Vertical Views

Plucking the first fruit off the vine is an experience like no other. What started as a minuscule seed in February-March (thanks Bruce!) has matured under the warmth of indoor light and brought--blinking, I always imagine--out into the sun to harden off before being planted in the incredibly supportive SIP environment.

When you see the first summer harvest on your cutting board, you know another season of good eating is underway.

Eggplant pingtung long + udumalapet (at left)
and tomato Black Sea Man

The heirloom Black Sea Man start came from a local nursery in the wake of our early tomato troubles.

These eggplant taste like cream to me and cook in moments. I halve them lengthwise and lay face-down in a hot cast-iron skillet with a little hot peanut oil over medium-high heat. Let them sear a few minutes and then flip and briefly cover and cook until soft. The pingtung long don't even need a cover.

A drizzle of olive oil, S&P, and there you have it: lunch. I also sliced and fried a couple of the peppers just below. They're hotter this year at this early stage than they were last year.

Santa Fe grande peppers
and summer greens

(I moved the cool-weather greens to a shady part of the roof to extend their production.)

I do love those Santa fe grande peppers--sturdy growth and endless fruits, pretty colors (yellow to flaming red) and variable Scoville heat.

Money shot of the Sea Man:
grey winter dreams come true

You don't need a roof full of soil to do this or a fancy vertical garden system. And you don't need to spend a lot of money either. I stand with our pals at Homegrown Evolution on this (and not just because they linked to us, but hey thanks!): vertical farming is alluring in all sorts of ways...but impractical for many and currently not the most economical way to grow.

As Erik at Homegrown says:

A SIP is as close to "plant and forget about it" as you can get with vegetables. In short, perfect for schools where maintenance is always an issue.

Thanks in part to Bob Hyland's Center for Urban Greenscaping (CuGreen) students in Brooklyn took home their school SIPs for summer vacation.

The SIP home base is the PS 102 garden but due to limited access over the summer recess, it is not the best place to be. That is why the SIPs are growing fresh vegetables at the homes of parents and teachers over the summer.

Here's the truth: you can grow all kinds of food without any trellising at all: bush beans, determinate tomatoes, eggplants, and most peppers. Still, I find trellis vegetables some of the most beautiful because of their twining habit and the way they hang off a vertical plane. So maybe that's part of the allure.

Art made this vertical extension on our cool-weather greens run (which I promised him would never be used for climbing things and therefore wouldn't require a climbing frame...thanks, love). He re-used some wood, bought a couple of 2X3s, and found the small grids at Salvation Army. They appear to be from the endless stream of Ikea junk that ends up on the sidewalk, in the garbage, or at resale shops.

No problemo, we take what we can find. The green grids are from an auction years ago. You could also used old refrigerator shelving as climbing structure. Soon the thin-skinned and deliciously cooling Armenian cukes will be scrambling upward.

Regardless of whether your vegetables are climbing or just squatting in their SIPs, early summer delivers magic.

Almost any garden,
if you see it at just the right moment,
can be confused with paradise.
--Henry Mitchell

Making Trellises

The idea is to keep it simple. Like so many things, that takes a bit of planning.

A good trellis is.........

• Sturdy/Won't blow over
• Cheap
• Easy to assemble/take apart
• Weatherproof

and

• Doesn't make holes in the roof; holes = leaks

The key thing is to use the weight of the SIP (about 40 lbs for the 2-bucket design) to anchor something that you fasten poles to. Angled braces keep them from tipping over.

I've spent the last three Friday mornings building a simple set of trellises for about 100 2-bucket SIPs on the rooftop of the Pacific Garden Mission.


After setting a post at either end--and at each of the corners--of what viewed from above looks like a giant question mark, we used a variation of the Florida Weave to support the tomatoes, squash and cucumbers.


Each post, nothing more that a scavenged piece of 2"x4", was attached at the bottom to a 4 foot long piece of salvaged 2x10 deck joist. 1x4 angled braces were placed to prevent the post from tipping over. To keep it all in place, 2 or 3 planted SIPs were set on each 2x10 plank.

I put a few of the extra photos of the PGM Rooftop garden in my Picasa account:

Pacific Garden Mission Rooftop SIP Garden

My rooftop garden has an overbuilt, industrial strength trellis, made of electrical pipe and 2x4's. I was worried about a tall plant catching the wind and blowing the entire thing off the edge of my roof. Now I think all that piping is overkill. Also, I could have eliminated all the "A" frames next to all the SIPs in the middle of the grid.


If I were starting from scratch, I'd make something like what I did at PGM. It's so much easier--cheaper too--and works almost as well. A downside to the Florida Weave is that you need to add a horizontal run of twine every 8-10 inches, following the plant up as it grows. Also it's only good for one season. What I did on my roof is more permanent and works year after year.

Art (Mr. H2) had another idea, one that worked well with all their 2-bucket SIPs.

He used several of the green metal grids he bought years ago at an industrial auction. If you did the same, here's your chance to put them to work.

For more good trellis ideas, check out this Fine Gardening article.

Good luck making your own!

[Updated 6.8.09 - In the comments, Russ added this useful link, "Tomato Staking Techniques Evaluation", put together by the Master Gardeners of Santa Clara (CA) County.]