Vegetable Garden Update

Overall, I have been quite pleased with the garden so far this year.

Bunnies have stayed away--not sure if it's the neighborhood cat who makes a pass through twice a day, or the garlic cloves I cut and stuck into the squash mounds.

Either way, I'm glad we have not anything munched yet--by animals, that is.

 

Bottom Terrace

 

Tomatoes and tomatillo growing slowly.

My tomatoes are all looking rather shrivelled.

They did get frost-nipped early in spring, and I'm wondering if that's effecting them now. I've been making an effort to water them extra deeply, but their leaves are still mostly curled up rather than flat. However, some have green tomatoes on, and most have blossoms.

We'll see how much it affects the harvest. 

 

The tomatillo has been loaded with blossoms ever since I planted it, but I haven't seen any fruit forming yet.

 

 The big bush on the left is oregano.

I whacked it off by about half a month ago, and then dried all the leaves in my dehydrator. (Couldn't let them go to waste!) After they were dry, we crumbled them up into a bowl.

We ended up with about 3/4 of a quart jar full of home grown oregano.

It's even organic!

My husband said the price for organic oregano is $144/lb (he looked it up.)

Now we want to weigh our finished product and see if we can become rich!

 

The beans (in back) are about to take over the basil in front.

I may need to transplant the basil for it to survive.

 

Not pictured: the 2 rosemary plants behind the oregano.

They are still alive and seem to be growing fine.

Holding their own, anyway.

 



 Peas!

So, my pea trellis hideout didn't quite work out the way I was hoping. There's no space for the kids in there! That's okay. They still go out several times a day to pick the fat ones.

Or sorta fat ones. Or whichever ones they can find.

With a week of picking behind us, nary a pea has made it into the house.

 

Even the baby has learned how to pick peas.

He toddles over, grabs the first pea he sees, and gives it a good yank.

It's a little hard to teach him which ones are ready, since he can't even talk yet.

At least he's getting some fresh vegetables in his diet.

It's all good.

 

Several of the ones on the left side of the trellis have a disease of some sort, which makes the pod fill with a white substance, and many of the pods are deformed and small.

I used some old seed this time, but I will definitely have to start with all new next year. 

On the right, the sugar snaps are just starting to come on. I had to replant them, so they're a few weeks behind their fellows.

 

 The onions.

I cut off all the flowers this year, in hopes that the onions themselves will grow larger.

They're looking pretty good.

Haven't picked any yet to bring in, but I probably could.

 

Middle Terrace

 



The potato patch is doing much better than it did last year.

I probably need to mound up more dirt under all those bushy leaves.

 

Spinach and beets have all been yanked out.

We didn't harvest any beets this year. The leaves were all shrivelled and dead about the same time the spinach started to look ragged. Not sure what happened there.

 

Carrots are getting big and crowding the broccoli.

(Or is it the broccoli crowding the carrots?)

By the way, I really like the contrasting leaf shapes and colors.

 

This was the broccoli we had for dinner tonight.

It was tender and sweet.

We have harvested one other bowlful about this size, as well.

 

The plants that we cut off the first broccoli heads from are now producing lots of little heads on side shoots. So I'm hoping we'll continue to get a harvest for the next few weeks, at least.

 

This being my first year growing broccoli, I'm impressed.

It's has been hardy, easy, and tasty.

Like with most things in my garden, I'm already scheming to put more in next year!

 

 Cucumber making a start.

I'm going to train this one away from the giant broccoli patch, once it starts to spread.

Otherwise, we may never find the cucumbers!

 

There was a second hill in back, but it has not survived.

The ones in front are the 'Bush Pickle' variety.

Likewise, my zucchini has had a really slow start this year.

Hey, at least it's growing.

Last year I couldn't even get it to come up.

I'm wondering if I need to give it some extra compost or something.

This is zucchini we're talking about here--usually it has garden takeover plans.

I'm hoping these next few weeks of consistently warm weather will give it a jumpstart.

 

Top Terrace is the berry patch now, so I'll have to make separate report on that.

 

Last but not least:

 



Pea patch in the weeds.

I gave the kids the extra pea seeds that didn't fit in my garden this year, and they planted them in the dirt mound/weed patch next to the garden.

Well, would you look at that!

Their little plants are loaded!

They were so excited to have their own plants to pick from.

I'm amazed that the plants even survived right there.

Yay peas!