Lucky I have the giant sunflowers and big purple hyacinth beans this year, because right now, there's not much else going on in my garden plot.
Well I do have a big patch of basil, a patch of sweet potatoes that I really have high hopes for, and nice chiles. But not much else. The beans all succumbed to the beetles. It was a terrible year for beans in all plots at our community garden. I have empty pole bean tepees and empty shell bean beds where I had to pull plants before they produced anything.
And the dry hot weather has been brutal for those of us who didn't come down daily to water. I have especially had trouble with fall carrots and lettuce sprouts drying out. I've lost many sowings of these in the past months. I finally have big seedlings from indoor seeding, but its so late now that I will put them into my cold frame soon. Only a couple weeks now until we get a frost. I heard that not far west of here they have already had light frosts.
Cucumbers, tomatoes and chile peppers in my home garden are still doing good. They have the luxury of an automatic sprinkler. I hardly used this at all last year. Today's harvest was a bunch of North Carolina pickling cukes, a couple Cherokee purple tomatoes, and two pretty chiles: numex and poblano.
Wow, those are impressive sunflowers! Are they a particular variety? I don't think I've seen tall ones with so many heads before.
ReplyDeleteI think it is Multiflora Single Yellow from Sand Hill Preservation Center.
ReplyDeletewe had a little frost nip near the concord river in carlisle this week - enough to kill my sweet potato vines, a few bean leaves, and most of the squashes. i'm putting row covers out for my beans. fyi - my sweet potatoes are also phenomenal this year.
ReplyDeleteWow - that's not far from here. Its amazing how cold its gettgin at night and so hot in the day.
ReplyDeleteYou are lucky to have beans! I can't wait to dig my sweets. I guess the hot weather was perfect for them.
I'm thinking of digging my regular potatoes this afternoon. Maybe its a good day to get dirty.
Hi there, your sunflowers are great. Our beans have been few and far between this year. Last year we were giving them away alongwith tomatoes but this year's weather has been difficult. Our weather forecast is for cooler and damp conditions there seems to have been no transition from summer to autumn, I am picking tomatoes that are huge but not ripening. Shame I had visions of vats of tomato sauce and such like. Well there you go.
ReplyDeleteMother nature!
Marian (London UK)
Beautiful!
ReplyDeletePlanting really needs attention that's why most gardeners devote themselves taking care of their crops, and they sometimes even speak with the plants.
ReplyDelete