Around the Garden

Things have been going pretty good lately in the garden, despite the lack of rain. Luckily, we have been getting some at the house, but regionally, we goin dry down here. I'm surrounded by high elevations near the state line, so we tend to get rain when no one else does, but not as much as we should be! The last of the first succession of broccoli has been harvested, along with the spinach that didn't bolt in the heat wave we had earlier this month. The onions are getting nice and thick bottoms and the carrots are growing well too.
The marigolds we planted around the garden are starting to bloom, unfortunately, the nostriums that we planted haven't started to bloom yet.

The cucumbers are blooming like mad and we have the first fruit starting to set, the second planting of lettuce is coming along nicely and we've been harvesting baby lettuce for the past two weeks. I gotta say, Cat and I have been eatin salads like there is no tomorrow. We're both lookin forward to being able add some other things to the plate soon. Should have gotten cucumbers and tomatoes started a little earlier!

The peppers are coming along nicely, lots of blooms and even a few are setting fruit. We planted two or three varieties, so far only the green have set, but the purple and yellow peppers are blooming nicely with the warmer evening temps. We have a LOT of squash and zucchini starting to ripen. I had my first fresh fried zucchini the other night. It was delicious! It's a good thing I really like squash and such because Cat and I planted way too much of it. Something like 11 crooknecks and 4 zucchini's germinated along with some assorted acorn and butternut squash. Lots of squash. Might only need a few of those next year. Although, that zucchini the other night got me to thinking about catchin some catfish or crappie sometime soon. Fry em both up in some cornmeal with a fresh salad. Mmmmmm....tasty!!!!


The tomatoes on the other hand are struggling right now. We've already lost one of the heirlooms, and some of the cherries are looking sad. They seem to be so particular about watering needs, disease transmission, and a whole list of other issues; Cat and I are planning to move them out of the garden and into containers somewhere else. That way we can give them a little more sun each day and keep better eye on their moisture levels. It's also the only way I can figure out not to water them overhead when that's how the rest of the garden is getting water until I can afford to put in a drip irrigation system. Oh how I want to have a tomato!!!


The corn is coming along nicely I would like to say. It's not ready for photos yet, but it should be soon. It's growing good enough that I'm expecting the bugs to descend on it soon. That or some wierd bacterial disease that will require me to dig up the whole bed and sterilize the dirt or something absurd like that. A lot of time has been spent weeding, which I don't really mind doing for some reason. I'm able to get in to a Zen like mind set when I'm goin at it. After weeding, all of it goes into the compost bin to be recycled into the garden to some point. The compost bin has been pissing me off lately. For some reason, I'm having a hard time keeping the temperature up on it, I think I'm going to try throwing some more leaves in it this week. Been putting a lot of green stuff and kitchen waste in it lately. The balance may have gotten out of whack on it.