I Said It Was a Jungle Before? What Is It Now?

Okay, I admit it.  I am horrible about starting projects like this blog and not finishing them. I left off blogging about my jungle of a garden last year in June.  Obviously, there was a lot more story to tell.  I just didn't get around to telling it.  This post was left in draft stage with just the pictures imported in August. They were taken August 12th. You can see that the jungle just got more amazingly huge as the months went on.  August and September last year were the hottest driest weeks I've ever had to nurse a garden through.  Every day was over 85, with over half the days in the upper 90's. The more sensitive plants were not happy about it.  The runner and pole beans, pretty much shut down. No matter how much I kept them watered, they wouldn't flower of set any beans. Many leaves on the afternoon sunny side even got fried in the hot sun. (see below)

You might notice in the above picture the squash vines have wilted.  This is mostly due to the squash bug feeding, but I am sure the heat didn't help.

The beans that I planted around the chicken coup did help the chickens to stay cool, and some of them actually made beans in the shade of the coup.

All of the pumpkin plants died.  I had the most overwhelming infestation of squash bugs you can imagine.  I am also wondering if they carry a disease. I read a journal article about yellow vine wilt, a plant disease that is carried by squash bugs, and is fatal to pumpkin plants. It has not been documented in our state.  I read it too late to be able to send them a sample of my vines. I don't think I will plant pumpkins this year. They take a lot of room and work, so if they are going to die like that, it really isn't worth it. The butternut squash and the unknown hybrid F2 revert shown below didn't succumb to the disease, and did make a few smallish fruit, despite the squash bugs.

The mammoth sunflowers did reach 12 feet.  Some of them fell over.  I think that is because I plated them underneath the roof overhang and they had to lean out to get the sun. Some of them just got too heavy on the top to be able to hold that slanted orientation. Despite the constant occupation of the flowers by longhorn bees, about half of the sunflower seeds were empty when it came time to shell and eat them.  That was kind of disappointing.  The seeds that weren't empty were large and delicious.

The sunflowers did shade Molly's windows pretty well, but I think this year I will plant the runner and pole beans here on strings connected to the eaves.  It seams like a good cool shadier place for them during the hottest days and they should grow thicker and provide better shade.

The strawberries didn't produce much in their first year, but next year they will make loads, hopefully.

You can just scroll down through the rest of the pictures....

Mostly Peppers

Rosa Blanc Eggplant - I am not a big fan.

Hansel Eggplant - Awesome!

Gourds and cucumber

We did end up getting several dried gourds.  They have just finished curing and Molly is looking forward to crafting some bird houses, water bottles and pots out of them.

We did end up getting quite a few cucumbers despite the fact that I crowded and shaded them pretty bad.

The nasturtiums and marigolds really got big, too big.

I planted too many tomatoes, but it didn't matter because they were a huge disappointment:

It was very hard to keep them consistently moist like they like, so many of them got end rot.

The rest of them were fed upon by stink bugs like this one above

and this one.

Pretty soon the tomatoes looked like this. Gross! You can't see the inside of the tomato, but each of those marks on the outside means there is a white pea-sized tough mass on the inside.  The taste is bitter and the skin is tough. Just not yummy at all.

I did get enough good tomatoes to can 14 quarts and 7 pints, but with the number of plants I planted it should have been much more.  I will only plant a few tomatoes this year and I will mulch them heavily.  I have also installed soaker house systems to make the watering more convenient and therefore more frequent and regular. It is bad to grow tomatoes, peppers or potatoes in the same place you did the year before.  That doesn't leave me many options for this year.  I will have to do a better job planning for rotations this year.

RIP poor little comise pear tree.  For some reason, it died over the winter this winter.  It gave me three pears last year and some grafting experience. I will not be replacing it this year.

The rhubarb did recover after the ants and earwigs were removed, and I look forward to being able to harvest it this year when the strawberries are ripe for strawberry rhubarb squares and Rhubarb pie. Yum.

Here is a picture of the last double yolker I got from my girls. They quit laying in November for about four weeks while they molted.  I got a bit worried when it was daytime highs of 18 degrees Fahrenheit and they were molting with some bald spots, so I knitted them some sweaters.  What a comedy that was.  They hated them and promptly got out of them, or mostly out of them after I had to struggle to get them on.  I settled for rubbing coconut oil on their combs, feet and exposed skin regularly.  They started laying slowly in December and then were up to full speed, about one egg per chicken per day, by the middle of February.

The Beans Are Finally Up.

Thank goodness I pre-soaked those bean seeds, or who knows how long that would have taken.  Most sources say that they take 4 to 5 days longer without soaking.  As it was it took 10 days for the first ones to show and they are still coming up today.  In their defense, it has been pretty cool out there these two weeks. I planted them on the second to last warm day before the cold snap we've been having.

The Scarlet Emperor Runner beans have come up the best.  They look really healthy and strong right out of the ground.

This picture shows both rows on either side of the trellis.  I see only two gaps.  I think I will need to thin these anyway.

This is where the rows of pole green beans should be.  They are definitely straggling behind. A few have had the leaves eaten off by birds or something.  You can see the bird netting I laid over one side.

This is what the pole green beans look like up close when they haven't been terrorized by birds or insects.

The cranberry beans have about half sprouted.  There are large gaps here, but new sprouts come out every day, so I think it will all fill in.

This is a close up shot of one of those.  They are a bush bean that is good as a green bean, or shelly bean or even as a dried bean.

This is what the okra sprouts look like up close.  They are hairy and cute.

Our french alpine strawberry sprouts are coming along.  They are still very small, but very cute.  They are actually starting to look like a strawberry.

This is the biggest of the celery plants.  It is starting to be recognizable, as well.

The whole row of cucumbers have their first true leaves.  I thinned them out a bit.  I may need to thin them more later.

This is the largest tomato I have so far.  It is about two inches wide now.  I think the first to ripen will be the sungold cherry tomatoes, but these won't be to far behind.

The eggplant I planted from seed is getting bigger and bigger.  When the warm weather comes back, this thing is really gonna take off.

The Cinderella pumpkins that I planted in the hills near the beans and three sisters garden area are finally up, also.  The other ones I planted earlier are much farther along:

You can just see the butternut squash

and the kabocha squash.

The 65 day cabbage is really coming along.  The head here is over 4 inches wide.

The red cabbages aren't even forming heads yet, but the plants are getting bigger and bigger.  I pulled out and stir fried all but three last week to make room for other things.

A few of the peppers are already budding.  This one is rather yellow.  I think I will add some calcium and compost to the soil in the pots.

This is a close up look at the brussel sprouts.  You can see where the actual brussel sprouts will form.  The buds are about a quarter inch in size.

The potato blossoms are about to open.  I can't wait.  They will be pretty.

This is how many tomato plants I have that are still waiting to go in.  There were 16 when I took this picture, but I have given one away now.  I have been trying to find homes for them, but I don't know what varieties they are, so it can be a hard sell. I will fit about four more in when the peas are done and perhaps some more when the fava beans are done, or I get tired of them and pull them out.  These tomatoes will be okay in these pots for a little longer.  Some of them are still quite small. I have fourteen planted in the garden now.

Still no sign of broccoli heads forming on the broccoli.  That is actually good.  The bigger the plants get before starting to bloom, the bigger the broccoli crowns you get. Or so they say.  Don't ask me who they are.  I'll quote my cousin, whom I have been spending entirely too much time with and tell you, "your mom!"

Have a wonderful day. Hope your Memorial day weekend was as awesome as mine. We spent ours with our family and friends, several of whom are retired or recently active duty military and we talked and reminisced about our grandpa who was a WWII veteran and has now left us.