Random Garden Pics

Well, the two weeks off work due to a periappendiceal abscess and appendectomy have given me way more free time than I really know what to do with. I'm not supposed to "work in the yard" while recovering. The JP drain sticking out of my old c-section scar for the past week has sucked the fun out of most activities anyways (as well as 150 cc's per day of infected fluid out of my abdominal cavity). This morning said buh-bye to the 2' of tubing and attached squeezie bottle and look out world! (I have my 5-year old convinced my JP drain is a special "juice box" the doctor wants me to keep attached to my belt).

It is so nice to have a garden to come home to:

Pencil-sized purple passion asparagus spear

Potatoes have been hilled up-Green Mountain on the right, and Tom Wagner's selections in the two left rows

Yacon from an ebay seller in California


Garlic, Shallots and Potato Onions 8 months after planting

2" tall okra seedlings seem to be struggling a bit. They were planted out about 2 weeks ago, just as all the cloudy rainy weather started. I suspect they will take off as soon as we get some clear hot dry days.

Finally the first strawberry flower! Time to break out the bird netting.

Lettuce looking cool and crisp in the east bed, which is up against the house in afternoon shadow.

Pole beans of various makes and models prepare to send their first tendrils skyward

Wall O'Peas. To date, all pods have been eaten in situ.

Baker Creek's Topaz

These tomatoes are grown from a seed I saved from a Yellow Pear tomato which I crossed with Cherokee Purple pollen last summer. I know the cross took, because the shape is definitely not pear-like, and the one is already much larger than its Yellow Pear parent. I was actually hoping for a small purple pear yielding the rich Cherokee Purple taste; looks like I may get a beefsteak type instead--keeping fingers crossed for taste genes inherited from pollen parent.

Do not adjust your color settings-yes Virginia, there is a Blue Tomato.
These are currently smaller than golf balls. Very excited to see how this one progresses.

More later. Right now, I have to get back to "not working in the yard".

The Cake Garden

I knew I was saving those flimsy plastic cake domes from supermarket-bought birthday cakes for a reason.

Though nights are still below freezing here in early April, the bed against the house, warmed by radiant heat from the foundation and dotted with plastic cake domes, becomes a microclimate for early salad fixins.

Slugs prefer pak choi 10 to 1 over spinach.



Legend has it that a circle of copper deters slugs. The science behind that claim is that copper produces a mild electric charge when in contact with moisture, and slugs find that most irritating. Unraveled copper scouring pads twisted into collars for baby pac choi look like weird plant jewelry.

What the heck is erba stella anyway? I hope it's not like arugula.

Dog days

I just got done tearing out most of the cucumber vines from the trellis. They didn't even grow halfway up, and were mostly decimated by powdery mildew and probably 5 other unnamed and exotic maladies. Also threw out 6 "gigante" kolrabi that had begun to elongate and therefore were past their prime. Tomorrow probably will be the melon trellis' turn, they look almost as bad as the cucumbers, and the pole bean trellis, which are being mercilessly shredded by bean beatles. Probably 50% of the sweet peppers we pick have pepper maggots. Mainly the Tequila Sunrise, which are thin-walled and not very tasty at all anyway, and the chocolate pepper, which makes me kind of sad. Purple bells, Giant Aconcagua and sweet cream peppers seem less affected. Every turnip, beet and radish I pull has little brown tunnels in it. The tomatoes, overall, are doing fairly well, all things considered. We have way more than we can eat, but that's mostly because after it rains I have to pluck the most badly cracked ones before they rot on the vine, and there have been alot of those. Lots of crackd half-ripe toms this year. The first round of corn was exciting, and pretty good, but a small harvest considering the 50 plants. The "2nd tier" ears that were left on the stalks to continue maturing are small, misshapen and now bugs have discovered them. Okras are finally producing, about a dozen pods every other day...the only problem with them is minor aphid infestation.

Ah, August. Time for the gardener to shift gears for the first time in the season, away from planting and weeding and nurturing, to pause and take stock of the overall situation, and begin making judgements, adjustments and plans for next year. I have already decided not to even try to grow broccoli, cauliflower or brussels sprouts. On the other hand, an entire 3x8 box dedicated to nothing but carrots is looking mighty appealing. I never will grow Coyote tomatoes again even if somebody paid me to. Sucrine is the only lettuce variety I have grown so far that is not rendered inedible by my summer heat. And the list goes on...

No pictures this time, just picture in your mind's eye diseased plants being thrown into one of those brown paper yard-waste bags.

Squash pollination update: not good

See how it is yellowing? Not a good sign. It seemed to grow at first, it's about an inch and a half long, but it has not grown any in the past several days. I fear it will shrivel and fall off soon. The reason may be because the vine "upstream" from it is actually supporting several very large squashes already, and those have grown surprisingly quickly in the past few days. Perhaps the plant is getting maxed out, the squashes that have already set are approaching maturity and are sending out chemical signals that actually slow/inhibit the newly set fruits. Remember what they say about cucumbers, not to let any of them get ripe on the vine, because then the plant stops producing new ones? Seems to apply to squash too.

I also hand-pollinated another of my squashes, and it took right away and is growing nicely. It was actually the first fruit to set on it's vine. I started out thinking I was pollinating a "Type 1" of the Georgian Chestnuts ("Type 1" is growing on a trellis, apart from the "tangled mound"), but on closer inspection, we might actually be in for a "Type 4". There are actually 3 separate vines growing on the trellis, and the female blossom I pollenated was on a third vine, apparently the latest-maturing of the lot. I used pollen from the "Type 1" plant, though. Hmm. Maybe it's getting kind of late in the season to be doing this.

On a happier note, corn has silked!!! Luther Hill on the 24th, Ruby Queen on the 26th. I think now it's only 15-20 days to wait for fresh corn on the cob.

Good News/ Bad News

Good news! I found seed balls forming on 2 of my potato varieties: Skagit Beets and Nordic October. I'm going to save them and plant the "true potato seed" or "TPS" next spring, so I can discover the next great and most unique potato cultivar....the bad news is, I think most of my plants have that Late Blight disease that everyone's been talking about :

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Good news! Even though it is barely 3' tall, some of my sweet corn, the Luther Hill variety, is going to tassel in a few days and I can see the shoots forming as well, (circled in red), where the silks will form, to recieve pollen falling from the tassel at the top of the plant.
See the new little leaf sneaking out of the craw formed by the main leaf? That is actually the start of the female flower. A close-up of the circled area:

...the bad news is that although my 2' tall (!) Baby Blue Jade sweet corn is currently tasseling and actively shedding pollen, it shows no sign of any shoots or silks.

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Good news! The Georgian Chestnut (moschata) and the Upper Ground Sweet Potato squash (also a moschata) that I planted on a whim on the sod heap at the back of the yard are going absolutely nuts, with vines completely obscuring the pile and tons of baby squash forming under dark green leaves which measure more than 12" across:

...the bad news is that the same varieties planted in the garden "proper" on the same day, in carefully prepared raised beds with purchased topsoil/compost blend and trained on a trellis, are kind of well, disappointing, underwhelming and a sorry joke in comparison:

I would guess that the compost was of the extremely low nitrogen variety, which rest assured will be diligently corrected in the Fall.
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Good news! I was delighted to stumble upon a rare, pure white (albino?) Borage blossom the other day in my prolific Borage patch:

...the bad news is for all the blue Borage plants around it, that are going to get mowed down so I can isolate this mutant and try to save some pure seed of this rare strain for next year.

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Good news! My lettuce continues to look awesome despite the heat!

...the bad news is that the heat has made it too bitter to eat.

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Good news! It is the middle of July and the cauliflower has not bolted.

...the bad news is its the middle of July and not one of my cauliflower plants show any sign of ever forming a head.

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Good news! The Danubiana eggplant, which I had completely written off to frost months ago, has actually flowered and is now (gasp!) forming fruit!

the bad news is...well, finally, there is no more bad news!

Random garden pics

Above is the Maize Morado, about 2 and a half feet tall now. In front are some Baby Blue Jade, and beyond is some Stowell's Evergreen and Luther Hill, all about 4 to 6 inches tall. Next year I think I will start all my corn as I did the Morado: in cells 4 weeks before plant-out.

So this is what has been turning my Roma pole beans into swiss cheese. They seem to love the romas, as my other bean varieties dont have nearly as much beetle damage.

Silver Queen Okra still in the two-leaf stage. Looking rather unhappy. Wonder what is the problem. Maybe all the rain and cloudy days around 70 degrees?

First blossom on the Lebanese Bush Marrow.

Cherokee Purple tomato blossom with a very exerted stigma.

A Green Giant bloom that appears to have exploded...?

A Hillbilly tomato bloom. It is surprisingly tiny, and seems to be a compound or fused blossom. These tiny and/or mutant blooms seem to be appearing on those frost damaged plants, whose primary growth was killed and are now re-growing. I'll be following these more closely.

And the first Borage blossom. I grew these specifically because I read that the blossoms are edible and you can put them in salads or freeze them in ice cubes. Blue flowers in my salad. How cool is that.

What a Difference a Month Makes

You all remember that dreadful morning when I woke up to a frozen garden and lost most of my tomatoes which had been planted out less than a week?

Here is how the White Beauty tomato looked that day. I left it in the ground, because it had one leaf that was not dead.


Can you believe that this is the same plant 4 weeks later. No sign of flower buds yet, but I'm not complaining.

Same with this Bolivian Rainbow pepper, it was the only seedling of this type I had, turned to total goo.

It looked very dead for quite awhile, but it is now leafing out! It's only 3 inches tall but I am overjoyed. Peppers are tropical perennials, you know. Come October, this plant will be overwintering in my finest pot, front and center in the dining room window.

Mr. Casper with frozen bud...

...now looks lush and healthy.

New developments in the garden:

Little Wonder peas planted way too late are slowly coming along.

These below are an unnamed blue-podded variety with brown-skinned peas:

And these below were planted from a bag of yellow split peas from the supermarket. I separated out a handful of pea halves that seemed to have enough of the germ still attached, and planted out the ones that germinated. Cool, free seeds. Compared to the two garden varieties above, the leaves on these are much smaller.

Also, get a load of those wacky tendrils! They should market this and call it "Medusa".

Love the diversity in garden peas. While we're at it, note the diversity in tomato blossoms:

Matt's Wild Cherry tomato above, and a Black Sea Man below.

By the way, we ate the first tomato yesterday for dinner. Boy it was good.