today's harvest

just picked apples

This is my apple harvest this year. I'm so pleased. Five Liberty apples. Really tangy and crisp. I probably picked them a bit early, but they're fantastic in a martini!

what a glorius summer day!

fall seedlings

I've been starting up a bunch of fall seedlings this past week. I used tape for tags instead of pretty wood labels.

Looks like I'll be eating a lot of Bok Choi! The BoPak is a new experimental variety that I'm trialling, Mei Qing and Win Win are my old favorites. And then I found a package of Pechag that I couldn't resist buying. I love stir fried bok choi.

I'm hoping I can get a big crop of fall cucumbers for pickling. All my summer vines have died from wilt. I'm hoping that the beetles that carry the wilt (a bacterial disease) will have moved on by September. (I didn't want to use a beetle spray like spinosad because of my bees.)

I don't want gardeners to look at my list and think - "Oh this is safe to plant now." Some of these will likely not produce a harvest before frost. I am planning a winter tunnel, and will move slower plants into that.

I've added the time to harvest by each variety. It's about 65 days to frost here now. You should generally add two weeks when calculating fall planting times since, plant growth slows as light decreases. Also, some plants here are frost hardy (like escarole and broccoli) and some not  (cucumbers). Greens, like lettuce or bok choi, can easily be harvested early.

Variety list:

August 1
Happy Rich (55 days)
Bok Choi, BoPak, 2015 AAS winner (60 days)
Bok Choi, Mei Qing (45 days)
Bok Choi, Win Win (52 days)
Bok Choi, Pechay (60 days)
Escarole, Natacha (50 days)
Lettuce, Skyphos (47 days)
Lettuce, Oakleaf (47 days)
Lettuce, Sylvestra (52 days)

August 5
Broccoli, Bay Meadows (60 days)
Broccoli, Artwork, 2015 AAS winner (85 days)
Broccoli, Arcadia (63 days)
Cucumber, Miniature White (50 days)
Cucumber, North Carolina Pickling (60-65 days)
Cucumber, Salt and Pepper (49 days)
Endive, Tres Fine (45-70 days)
Endive, Dubuisson (50 days)
Radicchio, Indigo (65 days)
Napa Cabbage, Mini Kisaku (50-55 days)

today's harvest

Carrots: I'm just thinning them so for, but the little ones are tasty. The varieties from left are: Bolero, Mokum, Oxheart.

Beets: This is my first beet harvest. Four varieties from left: ???, Chiogga, Blankoma, Merlin.

And it's my first TOMATO of the season. Yippee, but WOW, really late. (A previous harvest photo had a couple tomatoes that another gardener gave me.) The tomato variety is Tiren. The seedling was grown by Jane, a friend of my mom's. It's a Roma type. A super looking plant with fruit hanging heavy.

Cukes: These are both Corinto cucumbers. My Corinto vine is producing best in spite of serious wilt issues. I don't really know if it's "wilt" per se, not having had experience with this before, but that's what's going on - beetle damage to leaves without seeing the beetles (cucumber beetles carry the wilt bacterium), the leaves wilt, then the plant dies. None of my cucumbers have wilt resistance.

todays harvest

fast and furious with the zucs!

seems like not a good year for cucumbers

Today I harvested a very nice cucumber. a pretty Corinto cuke. But Sadly, i don't think it'll be a great year (or even a good year) for cukes. Not sure what's going on but the leaves on most of my vines are shriveling and vines are dying. I have about 20 plants, 6 or 8 varieties, and they're in the back of three different beds, growing up the fence. A virus maybe? Some leaves have a lot of beetle-like damage, but I'm not seeing any beetles. I did see some grubs and wimpy roots when I pulled up one plant. I don't know. Last year, cucumbers were my over-and-above crop. I will look up when the farmers market is open and buy my picking cukes. Some other crop will have to excel this year.

today's harvest

I pulled 25 heads of garlic and cut most of my broccoli today. The upper photo is what I collected at my community plot. The lower one from, my home garden (and the chicken coop). I haven't been to my community plot in a while I guess as those zucchini are enormous! Fortunately another gardener was glad to take three of them.

no queen!

I checked my hives today. 3 weeks since I last looked inside. I didn't do a complete check because its 95F and 12 noon. I think not the best time to check. (more ... )

today's harvest

me first bee sting

I got stung by one of my bees last Saturday. Ouch. It really hurt. It made me hurry to finish the hive inspection. (more ...)

today's garden work

- Weeding! of course
- Removed suckers and added ties to tomatoes
- Set up the last of the tomato support strings
- Transplanted escarole and broccoli seedlings

honey bee flowers

Today my sister helped me fill and plant flowers in four big "honey bee pots" in my vegetable garden. These fit at the end of the rows between my raised beds. I want to attract my bees to my garden to pollinate the vegetables. So I selected flowers at the nursery that had honey bees on them.

I enjoyed walking through the nursery and noticing how different flowers attract different bees. The honey bee pots I ended up with are not a mix of flowers I would have selected otherwise. Sort of an unusual combination.

An amazing plant is Campanula takesimana "Elizabeth". It is both beautiful and was just covered with honey bees. I've never seen this plant before. I bought two of these. Also a large-flowered upright chamomile, a couple deep blue Veronicas, snapdragons and a small-flowered orange zinnia.

nothing like big pretty tomato plants

I hardly dared hope for great tomatoes as I planted my tomato seeds this spring. Last year, all my tomato plants had leaves that shriveled up, plants that grew spindly, and very few if any fruits on the plants. (Here's a link to the sad posts.)

But  - Yeah!! - I have beautiful tomato plants so far. Big uncurled leaves. I planted in beds that did not have the compost that seem to cause the problem last year.

garden work

My sister helped me in my garden today! What fun. In two hours we got so much done. We transplanted lots of little pots of seedlings that I grew from seed, petunias, dianthus. Also some purchased thymes and basils. Then we attended to my tomato plants: we removed suckers and lower leaves, and added support strings. We weeded several beds sparing a rogue tomato plant, as well as scattered cilantro and dill plants. Thanks Sis!