Anyone here from the Oregon Coast?

If anyone here lives or has lived and gardened on the Oregon Coast please let me know. I want to ask some questions and get your experience.

Thank you.

I grew up in the central Oregon coast. I always had a garden. We lived about a mile from the ocean.

Garden success varies a lot at the coast depending on your exact location. During the summer it is often foggy right along the beach. 3 miles inland it is usually sunny. A typical summer day starts out with some low clouds or fog. By about 9-10 it is sunny. By 1PM there will be wind from the north. By 4PM the wind can be fierce right on the beach, which is why the trees right along the beach look like this:



By 6PM the fog moves onto the beach.

So if you are inland a bit, or protected from the north winds, you will have better success. But you need to grow varieties that are tolerant of cool moist conditions, and tolerant of the creatures that live in cool moist conditions (e.g. slugs). Although I would like to point out that most of our garden slugs are not native. The native slugs mostly live in the woods and eat fungi.

We may be moving to lincoln county, probably in the hills. One of the areas we looked at online was Ottis.
I've done some research on what can be grown based off of the Sunset Zone, but I really prefer the experience of someone who has lived there.
It seems heat loving plants like Jujube, Asian Persimmon, and Pomegranate don't fruit there, is that true? What else should I expect?

Steve Flanagan wrote:We may be moving to lincoln county, probably in the hills. One of the areas we looked at online was Ottis.
I've done some research on what can be grown based off of the Sunset Zone, but I really prefer the experience of someone who has lived there.
It seems heat loving plants like Jujube, Asian Persimmon, and Pomegranate don't fruit there, is that true? What else should I expect?

I grew up in Newport, in Lincoln County. I doubt there are any heat-loving plants that would fruit well on the Oregon coast. Gardening at the coast can be a frustrating experience. But I think if you limit yourself to plants which "want" to live in those conditions, you will be fine. You should make sure that you can handle the rainy weather - that is frustrating for many people. It is basically a rain forest.

Did you know that the entire town of Otis is for sale? http://realestate.thekellygroup.net/idx/4778/details.php?idxID=037&listingID=12015192

Lol, if only we had 2 million...

The heat and poor air quality is hard on my wife. I think we will both welcome a change. Plus, we are both lovers of the rain.

I definitely will have to change the way I think as far as gardening techniques. I'm thinking about focusing on growing berries/small fruits, leafy greens, and mushrooms.

Steve Flanagan wrote:Lol, if only we had 2 million...

The heat and poor air quality is hard on my wife. I think we will both welcome a change. Plus, we are both lovers of the rain.

I definitely will have to change the way I think as far as gardening techniques. I'm thinking about focusing on growing berries/small fruits, leafy greens, and mushrooms.

I recommend that you take a long trip there sometime between November and April, to make sure you really, really like rain. We don't actually get that many inches of rain, it is just delivered very slowly & frequently. I think it would be hard on your psyche to go from one extreme to the other.

The plants you listed are very good choices. What I would do is just go out into some "wild" areas in Lincoln Co. and see what is growing there. Then research to find some food plants which are in the same family.

Dave Miller wrote:

Steve Flanagan wrote:Lol, if only we had 2 million...

The heat and poor air quality is hard on my wife. I think we will both welcome a change. Plus, we are both lovers of the rain.

I definitely will have to change the way I think as far as gardening techniques. I'm thinking about focusing on growing berries/small fruits, leafy greens, and mushrooms.

I recommend that you take a long trip there sometime between November and April, to make sure you really, really like rain. We don't actually get that many inches of rain, it is just delivered very slowly & frequently. I think it would be hard on your psyche to go from one extreme to the other.

The plants you listed are very good choices. What I would do is just go out into some "wild" areas in Lincoln Co. and see what is growing there. Then research to find some food plants which are in the same family.

Sounds like good advice to me.
Thank you so much for corresponding with me.

We have a garden in Toledo, Oregon. We have not raised Jujube, Asian Persimmon, and Pomegranate, but we are raising warm weather vegetables with our EarthBarrels and EarthBeds.

The Garden is a 7,500-square-foot plot at the old Toledo community garden west of the towns skateboard park. Toledo Oregon is 7 miles from the ocean east of Newport in Lincoln County.

The Garden has been producing tomatoes from our EarthBarrels since July 4, 2013. We have raised tomatoes in EarthBarrel 50 ft from the ocean in Depoe Bay, Oregon in pass years.

The bottom of an EarthBarrel is filled with water. The plants are watered by capillary wicking action – the same force you observe when you dip a piece of paper towel partially into a glass of water and watch the water climb the paper. The water will store heat. Tomatoes love warm feet. The water can be replenished by an automatic rain water collection system, so you never have to water them all summer

Our Garden is designed to be no work to maintain. We do this by building EarthBeds. An EarthBed is a self watering; self wicking, raised bed with a mini greenhouse on top.


To make one, first you make a box for a raised bed and outline the box on the ground where you plan to use it. Dig the width and length of the box between 5 to 11 inches deep. We dug ours 11 inches deep.



Line the bed with 6 mil plastic liner to make your water pan.
Fill the water pan with gravel.








Cover with a cloche. A cloche is a mini Greenhouse that allows planting early and harvesting late. An OSU study showed that water usage is a lot less with a cloche. With a cloche, gardeners can save upwards of 60% on their total water application. They can water once in 7-14 day cycles rather than every 4 days and still get comparable yields.



Now add, rainwater harvesting into a black barrel placed higher than the EarthBeds





Attach the hose bid to a PVC piping with a float valve in the gravel part of the bed. When the EarthBed needs water, the float valve will open causing the rainwater that is stored in the black barrel to fill the EarthBed to the required limit. The reason for the black barrel is the earth is usually 50 - 58 degrees and the rainwater in the black barrel should be warmer and heats the feet of the plants.






We have built eight EarthBeds and collected the rainwater off from the building next door and are setting up our rainwater harvesting barrels.

Our Garden is being funded in part by a grant from the Oregon State University Youth Advocates for Health (YA4-H!) program. YA4-H has launched the Producing for the Future Project to support local organizations in creating youth-developed community gardens in partnership with supportive adults in limited resource communities. Not only are organic gardening practices a focus but also developing and implementing a micro-enterprise venture to market the produce grown.

When you visit Otis, come to Toledo and see what we are doing.

Coralee Palmer, that is really cool. I would love to check out what you're doing.

Thank you for your input, I really appreciate it.

I would love to hear more if anyone else has something to say.

Hey Steve,

It looks like the central Oregon coast is well represented around here. I spent six years living up North Beaver Creek which is about 7 miles south of Newport. My place was 3 miles off the coast as the crow flies, but 7 miles driving with the last 1/2 mile requiring 4 wheel drive (unless you didn't mind beating the crap out of your 2 wheel drive vehicle!) Anyway, far enough to be out of the fog zone.

I've never been much of a gardener, more of a gardener's helper. My neighbors always have a large veggie garden, and the greenhouse I built for them got a lot of use. They now have one of those huge plastic hoop-style greenhouses as well. The greenhouses make a huge difference in extending the season and making things like watermelons possible.

The garden would be considered pretty traditional: peas, corn, tomatoes, potatoes, onions, garlic, beans, lettuce, zucchini, squashes. I can't remember the results of various fruit trees and vines experiments, I moved to Eugene back in the '80's so this is all memories from 25 years ago.

Bottom line: greenhouse!

Oh, and what Dave said . . . live with the rain for a full winter to see if that's the kind of rain you like. Then multiply that by many years. It's quite beautiful, especially when the storms blow through. And you see the sun almost every day, but usually just for a few seconds between squalls. And it's not the rain so much that bothers some people, it's the long months of overhanging gray. It can feel like it's sitting on your head. But if you're happy spending hours reading books while sitting on the bench of your rocket mass heater then you'll have lots to enjoy.

The other bottom line: lots of great people all over those hills. Don't forget to seek out the old-timers. Quite a few 4th and 5th generation folks still around.

You might consider becoming a member of the Oceana food co-op in Newport. That will be a quick way to meet folks that lean the permaculture direction.

Welcome to the Oregon Coast.

Sincerely,
Charlie Magee

Coralee, that's very impressive work you're doing in Toledo! Congratulations. I'll try to stop by the next time I head to the coast.

Charlie

Just to add to Charlie's good info on the "gray blanket" that covers us here. There is a saying around here "there is no such thing as bad weather - just wrong clothing". i.e. I think you will be happiest if you invest in some quality cool/wet weather clothing, and get outside no matter what the weather. Days with pouring rain are actually pretty rare. But so are days with no rain.

Thank you.

One of the reasons why we chose to try and move to the oregon coast is because of the cool moderate temperatures and wet climate. My wife is heat, chemical, and smoke sensitive, which makes living where we are tough. Wildfires are common here, and the summer highs are in the upper 90s and sometimes triple digits. We both enjoy rainy and overcast days, although I really cant say how we would handle nearly year round weather that's like that. I am as comfortable in doors as outdoors, I love being in the garden, or out foraging. I also don't mind being inside if I am forced to.

I will definitely build a greenhouse if we move there. I really appreciate all the input. Thank you.

Do Greenhouses still work well on the coast? I don't know much about greenhouses except that they trap solar radiation in the form of heat.
Theoretically could I grow bananas or papayas in a greenhouse on the Oregon coast?

I'm also reasonably new to the Oregon Coast, but quite a bit south from the other answers. I also don't live there year round (am looking for caretakers right now.) It is 5 miles as the crow flies from the coast itself and up at between 1400-1800 ft elevation. The entire property is beautifully southfacing. We benefit from the ocean effect in that it rarely gets that cold (any snow melts reasonably quickly and we don't get really hard freezes; I'm from east of the cascades, so it is all relative.) But we are also above the fog line, so get beautifully hot Augusts (though nights always cool down.) January can be 70 degrees and sunny or cloudy and drizzly.

The previous owner had a vegetable and egg business, into Brookings, right at the California border and about 20 or so miles south. I have olives planted and have seen citrus fruiting, large in the ground citrus, in Brookings. There is a 30+ foot fig tree in a neighbors cattle pasture!

While our last frost free date is probably fairly early (can't quite believe anything published because the nearest weather stations are in the towns at sea levels), it still doesn't make sense to put out heat loving seeds/plants without something like 'quick hoops' because the nights cool down so much. I'm thinking of building a tall earthbag wall into the fence at the north side of the garden as a micro-climate for citrus.

anyway best of luck further up the coast!

Hi, I'm new here but posts are 5 years old. Anyone still following this? I live in Tillamook and grow tomatoes.

Yes, we are still doing TomatoBarrels in Lincoln City facing the Ocean.   We now have working sessions Wed & Sun 1-5 PM  at our Sustainable Living Center.  We research and develop sustainable systems for food, energy, water, and shelter.  

www.SustainableLivingCenterOregon.com

Call Carl if you want to visit
541-765-2109

That is an impressive system you have, Coralee. Mine is neither large or involved yet I get good crop of late slicers, mostly heirloom. A 12 x 16 greenhouse (unheated) helps.