Training Wheels: Bike Wheel Trellis With Espalier Apple Tree

Repurposed bike wheels reclaimed from a dump on Orcas Island, riveted together then buried a few inches in a newly terraced garden. Surrounded by rocks, framed by lavender and dwarf blueberries and some strawberry plants to help control erosion. Four varieties of apples on one espaliered trunk are lightly wired to the wheels to be trained to grow in a delicious semi-circular formation.

The bike wheel trellis (pic 1) is part of an ongoing effort to eliminate the expanses of grass in the yard of my new house and create an urban farm.

The garden with the brick path used to be a rectangle of grass that looked just like the right side of the yard, where the orange adirondack chairs are sitting. Grass torn up, straight line adjusted to a gentle curve, terrace level lowered a bit. Brick path built out of reclaimed bricks from a torn-down chimney. Stone stairs in the foreground built from reclaimed cinder blocks and stone slabs already on the property. Bird bath scored at an estate sale. (pic 2)

The garden is completely usable, with the exception of three specimen plants that provide depth and color. Nine kinds of berries (raspberries, blueberries, strawberries, marionberry, tayberry, boysenberry, current, elderberry, huckleberry) maximize food productivity in the shadier part of the yard. (pic 3) Raised boxes behind the orange chairs are for vegetable production. Ground cover to control erosion on the upper part of the terrace is formed with runner-producing strawberries, four kinds of mint, lemon tyme, lime tyme, oregano, lemon balm, catnip (yay neighborhood kitties coming to visit), and stevia. The rest of the grass has its days numbered....