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A top-down view of rows of vibrant green lettuce seedlings growing closely together in a tray, with healthy leaves overlapping and forming a dense, leafy pattern.
Garden | June 3, 2026 16:35

Early Summer in the Feierabend Garden

Garden Update from our Head Gardener, Saskia Detz.

Early summer has arrived at the Feierabend Garden, and you can tell it’s here everywhere you look. What was planted in the beds as a young plant back in April has now grown well. The lettuce plants stand in tight rows, the Swiss chard is showing off its colorful stems, and the fennel is already forming nice bulbs.

It’s starting to feel like summer in the plastic tunnel, too. The tomato and cucumber plants have taken root well, are being trained upward as they grow, and are already showing their first flowers. Now is the time to start pruning, staking, and tending to the plants regularly so that they can channel all their energy into flowers and fruit.

It grows, blooms, and buzzes

It’s not just the vegetable garden that’s bustling: The currant bushes are already bearing small, green-and-red berries; the sage is in full purple bloom, attracting bees; and the elderberry is also displaying its fragrant white flowers. It’s exactly this combination that makes the garden so special in early summer. Everything is growing and blooming everywhere; life is stirring all around, and every day you discover a new little piece of summer among the flower beds.

The first salads can now gradually make their way into the kitchen. This year, the deep red lettuces are especially beautiful; they’re not only delicious but also quite a sight to behold.

Croissants, Kornspitz, Semmerl, and Kipferl

Our mallards are once again busy in the garden. Crossaint, Kornspitz, Semmerl, and Kipferl regularly check to make sure everything’s in order, chatter their way through their area, and have by now become almost as much a part of the after-work garden as lettuce, tomatoes, and herbs.

Now it’s time to keep tending to them, watering them, training them upward, and harvesting them. Early summer is always the time when many small plants slowly come together to create a true summer garden.

A close-up of many small, bright green lettuce plants growing in neat rows in a tray. They have fresh leaves and healthy, dense growth.
A close-up of a lush field with tall, blooming purple flowers and green leaves beneath a clear blue sky, capturing the vibrant colors and natural beauty of the scene.
Rows of green leafy vegetables—probably Swiss chard or beets—growing in a garden bed with drip irrigation lines, a wooden fence, and a brick wall in the background, bathed in bright sunlight.
A close-up of a cluster of small, white elderflowers on a green stem, with a blurred background of trees and grass in bright sunlight.
A small currant bush with ripening red and green berries and green leaves, surrounded by mulch and tall grasses in bright sunlight, grows next to a stone border.
A close-up of a fennel plant growing in the ground. You can see the bulbous white base and the feathery green leaves above it. The sunlight brings out the plant's bright green and white colors.
A close-up of deep-red heads of lettuce growing in a sunny garden bed, with green leafy vegetables in the out-of-focus background. You can see the soil between the plants.
A close-up of a gooseberry bush with clusters of small, green, unripe gooseberries and serrated green leaves bathed in bright sunlight. The background shows more foliage and a blurred outdoor landscape.
Green tomato plants growing in a greenhouse, surrounded by soil and mulch, with sunlight streaming through the plastic roof. A red head of lettuce can be seen in the lower right corner.
On a sunny day, four ducks walk in a line down a garden path lined with green metal fences, surrounded by grass and plants, with a wooden fence in the background.
Four ducks are standing in a fenced-in outdoor pen in front of a wooden duck house painted with rainbow stripes. The floor is covered with straw, and the enclosure is shaded by wooden beams and wire mesh.