I’ve slowly winterized our terrace garden over the past few weeks, even though it makes me feel sad to say goodbye. 🙁 I’ve harvested the last tomatoes and chilis, pulled out the annual plants (mostly flowers, the tomato and chili/pepper plants, some herbs), and planted a few winterproof plants and bulbs for spring. Now it looks like this:

I trimmed the clematis and put snowdrops, ageratum, daffodil and tulip bulbs everywhere. We decided to plant erica and gnaphalieae in the flower boxes, but left most of the space there for the bulbs. Winterproof plants aren’t that pretty IMHO, and I know I’m going to be excited to have more colourful flowers in early spring.

There’s still stuff to do, though. I still have to harvest the last basil and trim the chive a bit. The latter, plus the sage, the rosemary, the thyme, the peppermint, and the oregano are perennial. At least rosemary, thyme and oregano hibernated just fine in the past winter. The roof terrace is protected well from the elements; the plants will get plenty of warmth from the walls too.

I harvested marjoram (annual herb), oregano and peppermint and hung them to dry. We’ll use the dried peppermint for tea in the cold winter months. Oregano and marjoram taste even better dried!

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When I harvested the tomatoes, some of the fruits weren’t ripe yet. I’m trying to ripen the green tomatoes by wrapping them in newspaper and leaving them in the warmest room of the apartment. Hopefully we’ll be able to enjoy them after all!

I figured the lime tree and the pineapple plant wouldn’t appreciate the winter temperatures outside, so I put them in front of the (mostly unused) terrace door inside my office. I hope they won’t hate heating season too much … I’ll mist them once a day and keep my fingers crossed!