Mid-August Crop Report

Considering we've had a very yucky summer--weather wise--our gardens have had a wonderful season.  From the perennials to the annuals to our crops.  After the horrific hail storm in late June, we were afraid we'd lose most of our veggies, but Mother Nature is strong, and all of them (even the heirloom tomato seedlings) rebounded magnificently.  (This little guy is the biggest of 11--I'm hoping some of them will ripen before the end of the season (I started them reallllllllly late.))  I can't quite remember what a ripe one looks like.  (I bought one at the farmer's market and saved the seeds.)  It'll either be purple with green stripes, or green with purple stripes.

We've been enjoying home-grown beans for a little over a week now, and there's nothing like it.  I bought some (bush) beans at the farmer's market, but they were nothing like the pole beans I've grown right in my own back yard.  I love going out there every day and finding more to pick.  This was what we had for dinner last night.  (Yeah, I know--it's a lot for two people, but I could make a meal on just these beans.)

The potato plants are starting to shrivel up, which means that in a week or two, I can harvest my crop.  Okay, usually my crop is extremely small--in both size and number of potatoes.  Still, I enjoy growing them.  I usually do them in a tub (as pictured), but this year I also planted some in the ground.  Those never came up, so whatever we get--we get to eat.

Wouldn't you know, I got a stomach bug in early July, and since then, anything with acid (think spaghetti sauce, anything with vinegar) has given me heartburn.  So I'm wondering if I'll be able to eat any of our tomatoes, and we're going to have a bumper crop this year.  I lost count in the 40s (don't count your tomatoes until they've ripened?)  There's nothing like the smell of a fresh-picked tomato.  It will break my heart if I don't get to eat these beauties.  (We're picking this one later today.)

Our broccoli didn't do well.  From five plants, we got enough for one meal before it started going to seed.  The Brussels sprouts are just starting to form and the plants are getting huge.  Hard to believe they were plants with only two or three leaves when we planted them.  One of my parsley plants didn't make it, but the other has been fantastic and we've eaten a lot of parsley potatoes this summer.  Of the four pepper plants, only three have one pepper each.  One of them is HUGE, the other two are tiny.  I'm thinking of trying jalapeno peppers next year -- maybe from seed, as the pepper plants I've bought for the last couple of years have not done well.

As I mentioned above, the flowers have done really well.  Back in June, my Dad remembered he had a bag of glad bulbs in his garage he'd forgotten to plant--TWO YEARS AGO.  A very BIG bag of glad bulbs.  We picked through them and I planted at least 60-70 of them.   Not many came up, but the ones that did are magnificent.  Yesterday I picked a red one (which I neglected to photograph) that is scarlet red with white in the center.

Here's a longer shot of the garden at the end of the pool.

And how does your garden grow?