Garden Tour

honeybee on red poppy

Wow there is so much going on in the garden lately! Things are just growing, blooming and going crazy I can't hardly keep up with it all! While harvesting is a bit slim at the moment, it's coming to a tipping point, where I will be over run with things in a very short time.

There are still a few oriental poppies blooming, the bees love them and come get all the pollen as soon as they open in the morning.

All Blue potato blossoms

The potatoes are really blooming now, except the German Butterballs which haven't started yet.

squash & cantaloupe on compost pile

This compost pile, made mostly of horse manure and wood chips was made on the terrace garden to kill a tree stump. In the four corners are Baby Blue Hubbard squash and in the center under the Victorian style cloche (just love that thing!) are sprouting some cantaloupes from Italy. Yes, that's going to be crowded, but I figure over a cubic yard of manure should be able to feed them well.

mushrooms on compost

The other compost pile, built to kill an oleander bush next to the rabbit cages has sprouted a great lot of mushrooms. I think they are inky caps, but I'm not trying them. I don't know enough about fungi to risk killing myself.

squash and ground cherry on top of compost pile

On the top of that pile are three Tromboncinno squash to grow up the fence and shade the rabbits and in the foreground an Aunt Molly's ground cherry which I'm growing for the first time. I suspect it will be much like the wild ground cherries in TX which were sweet and tart at the same time.

Tromboncinno in a tub

This Tromboncinno in the old washing machine tub on the patio is beginning to take off. Keep in mind the house roof here is only about 6 feet off the ground.

1st Princepe

1st Currant tomato

Which tomatoes will be ready first? Princepe or Currants?

back garden overview

The back garden is becoming a jungle, the beds on the left, from front to back, Red Pontiac potatoes, then corn with squash and the bolting Purple Dragon carrots, the next bed is the lettuce and turnips, with hollyhocks on the edge, the next one is Red Burgundy amaranth with bolting lettuce, then the bed of peas across the back. On the right, from front to back, you can see the asparagus fronds that are growing by the apple on the fence, the bed with trellis has bolting lettuce, the next one are the Italian paste tomatoes, then the onions and parsnips and then the bed I just planted with quinoa, beans and amaranth. Remember you can click on any picture to see it larger.

turnip and lettuce bed

This is the lettuce and turnip bed which you last saw in this post. (it's the picture labeled 'new lettuce bed'.)  The lettuce was getting bitter, especially those plants in this now mostly bare area where they got a lot of sun and dried out quickly. So I pulled them out along with some weeds, leaving some volunteer pepper and tomato plants and planted 5 yellow zucchini seedlings. In the back are the turnips along with a bit of lettuce now being over run by volunteer tomatoes. In the front and along the right are volunteer hollyhocks.

tomatoes & basil

The bed of Italian paste tomatoes got 6 basil plants along the sunny end.

Hales Best Jumbo Cantaloupe/Muskmelon

In the greenhouse bed the Hale's Best Jumbo is taking off and beginning to run. I've used strips of old cotton sheets to tie it up. Around it are some nasturtiums, on the left is a Florence Red Bottle onion going to seed. On the right is a patch of Rainbow chard seedlings, on each side of the Rainbow chard are patches of Perpetual Spinach chard which are older. Oh I checked the seed packet, they are labeled Hale's Best Jumbo Muskmelon. Because actually, what we call cantaloupes are actually supposed to be called muskmelons. cantaloupes are a similar but different thing. Americans have a lot of things backwards from the rest of the world. Netted melons are muskmelons and smooth ones are cantaloupes.

squash in the new greenhouse bed

In the newest section of the greenhouse bed are more squash, from front to back, 2 Tromboncinno, 5 Buttercup, 1 Baby Blue Hubbard.

I'm sure you are wondering why so many squash plants? (And I have more seedlings underway, they are in those soil blocks in the tray in this pic). Because first I will be selling at the farmer's market this summer and because second squash, especially winter keepers will make good food for me and the chickens this winter. I'm hoping that by next year perhaps I will not have to buy any feed for them at all. We shall see!