Little Garden Helper's Beans

Last week after the garlic was harvested and compost was added to the bed. My "Little Garden Helper" planted the dry beans. This is the first time that he actually planted the seeds. He planted some Great Northern and Jacob's Cattle on Friday. This is what we found today!

I think that he will be a Master Gardener by the age of 5

"HOT" Harvest Monday

With all this HOT weather we had. It was a very good week in the garden. We picked the first large tomatoes....2 Cherokee Purples. We had "The Great Garlic Harvest". The second wave of Snow Peas is complete and 3 nice heads of Cauliflower were harvested as well.

  

Taking center stage

 The first Cherokee Purple, weighing in at 8 oz.

 CP #2 weighed 9 oz.

 "The Italian" slicing the tomatoes

 Oops...I wasn't fast enough...the sandwiches are gone!

Three nice heads of cauliflower.

Due to our ridiculously hot weather. Two of the three heads could not be left in the garden long enough to bleach out

 "The Great Garlic Harvest of 2010"

Pictured here are some of the 85 heads harvested.

It was too darn hot for me to move all of them for the picture!

Harvest Total: 13.0625 lbs.

Cauliflower: 1 lb. 13 oz.
Garlic: 9 lbs.
Peas: 1 oz.
Snow Peas: 1 lb. 2 oz.
Tomatoes: 1 lb. 1 oz.

Visit Daphnes Dandelions to see more garden harvests.

Talk about potato failures

Potaotes have always been the easiest crop for me to grow. You put them in them ground, mulch with straw a few times and you have lots of fresh potatoes! Not this year! As a lot of you know, I didn't have the bed available to plant the potatoes in this year...so, I made bags to plant them in. Then the voles attacked...so, we moved what was left. They seemed OK, not great. Yesterday I noticed one plant was drooping. I reached in and it was broken. I had no other choice then to dig down and see if there was anything below. Here's what I got.

3 oz. of red potatoes...that equals 4 bites...since I shared them with "The Italian" for dinner last night.

Hopefully, the remaining plants will do much better. I'm keeping a close eye on them. We don't eat a lot of potatoes and I really dislike store boughten potatoes...but, this is ridiculous!  Next year, they are going back in the ground! I have already laid out a place for another bed in my son's yard.

Garden Update

I harvested all of the garlic two days ago from the bed pictured below. We have 85 heads of garlic for the year. Last year I had 65 heads and we had 6 left as of yesterday. Since we have an abundance of garlic this year. I will be able to give some of the garlic to my son. Thanks to Debbie at Connecting the Dots in My Garden Spot. I made garlic powder from about half of the garlic that was left from last year. I used the cloves that were getting soft. It turned out really nice!

It looks like the celery in this bed will be ready pretty soon. I have been harvesting some of the outer stalks and they have been used in cooking and salads. Around the perimeter of the bed are the cucumbers. They are growing quite well due to the tremendous heat we have been having.

I really wanted to plant my fall broccoli, cauliflower and cabbage in this bed. However, it doesn't look like the potato onions will be ready in the other bed in time for me to plant them there. So, I guess I will plant my dry beans here as soon as the seeds arrive.

#1 bed in back garden

Cucumber

The cantaloupe are flowering and growing quite well. I need to go out and check the blossoms today at some point......when it's not so hot!!

The eggplants were planted in between the early broccoli, cauliflower and cabbage. There are only a few plants left in this bed now. So, the eggplants are finally taking off.

The purple pole beans survived the attack of the pill bugs. Some of the plants are over 5 feet tall already! I think that they are now growing a foot or two a day!

I RAN back out to the garden.................

this morning after reading EG's post....and did this......................................

put a tomato cage over the spaghetti squash..............then.........

I ran over here and  put a tomato cage over my "Little Helper's" pumpkin.........then

I walked by the side perennial bed and saw this...............then............

I waltzed over to stalk the peppers and saw these................then..............

I meandered out back to check the tomatoes for bugs.............and found THIS!!!!

Then I saw a cloud of dust!!! The car was gone!!! I think that "The Italian" went to the store to get bread and Miracle Whip for his first tomato sandwich!!!!

I think that he will be waiting a couple of days for that though :)

Harvest Monday

This week I harvested the first two heads of cauliflower. They weren't that big. One head was 9oz. and the other 13oz. They are big enough for "The Italian" and I for dinner though. Considering the weather we have had, I am happy that they were as big as they are. I also harvested my first carrots. Three small ones, just enough for our Father's Day salad. The balance of the spring lettuce was harvested. I have planted some more lettuce. However, we will be a few weeks without lettuce. The snow peas seem to be having a second wave of production and the English peas are slowing down.

I managed to pull twenty more heads of garlic. Most of the garlic harvested was the Spanish Roja. I will be able to harvest the sixty plus heads remaining this week.

First two heads of cauliflower

The largest strawberry so far this year, 1 oz.

A lot of the strawberry plants have slowed down in production. Hopefully the Alpines will pick up as the season moves forward!

20 heads of garlic.

Harvest Total: 7.8125 lbs.

Carrots: 2 oz.

Cauliflower: 1 lb. 6 oz.

Garlic: 3 lbs. 7 oz.

Herbs: 6 oz.

Lettuce: 1 lb.

Peas: 8 oz.

Snow Peas: 8 oz.

Scallions: 4 oz.

Strawberries: 12 oz.

Tomatoes............One little itty bitty cherry tomato :)

Please stop by Daphne's Dandelions, the host of Harvest Monday, to see more harvests!

FINALLY............THEY ARE STARTING!!!

I am so excited!! The first almost ripe tomato of the season.....a cherry! This is my grandson's tomato plant. He will be able to pick and eat it tomorrow.......and I can stop complaining!

Daylilies Part 1

I have many varieties of daylilies in the perennial beds that I just love and wanted to share. I think that there are about 20 different varieties. As they bloom I will post more pictures, most likely in 3 parts. Many of the lilies have been split and added to gardens at my son's home and in the perennial bed between our houses. Now that I have the time I am going to take pictures of them and try to identify them. A few of the lilies I brought here with me and others were purchased here and there. At one time many of the lilies did have tags on them. However, all of the tags have seemed to disappear. If anyone can identify any of them......please let me know.

I have had this daylily for many years. It is medium/tall in height.

Pandora's Box

I have also had this daylily for years. It is quite tall.

Medium height

Medium height

Medium height

Medium/Tall in height

Stella Dora

Tomatoes, Cauliflower, Peppers & Garlic

All of the tomato plants have an abundance of fruit except for two. These two are from the seeds I received from Italy at the end of April. Below is a picture of my "Little Helper" helping with the planting of the last tomato plant. He is a big help. He always puts the eggshells in the hole and the ID tag next to the plant. We ran out of room in the garden.......so, the last plant had to go in to a pot. Do you believe that I only paid $9. for that big beautiful flower pot?

That's one big pot for one special tomato!!

These cherry tomatoes have been on the vine for almost a month now......PLEASE GET RIPE!!

This is a cauliflower plant. I break the leaves over the head when it is about ready to be harvested. This bleaches the cauliflower to a nicer white.

This is cauliflower from one of the two plants that really really bolted. I had to pull the plant. As you can see, it was not going to produce a real head of cauliflower, just this button. I did harvest one really nice head of cauliflower so far this week. That picture will be posted on Harvest Monday.

The Paprika pepper plant has nice size peppers on it. This is my first time planting this variety. I plant cayenne peppers, dry them and grind them for cooking. I thought, why not plant paprika and dry and grind that too. I can't wait to see how it turns out. 

The garlic bed.

It looks like the balance of the Spanish Roja will be harvested this week. I dug some up this morning. It seems to be a little ahead of the other varieties.

Another Bug Identification....PLEASE

My husband and I went over to my neighbor's to look at his quince tree this morning. We noticed these bugs all over the door to his studio. He leaves the country every summer for a few months and I keep an eye on the house. This door is directly across the alley behind my vegetable garden....so, I want to know if they are BAD bugs. I don't need any more bug problems this season. I really need to get a good bug book!

In-Laws Balcony Garden Update #2

Sunday afternoon we went over to my In-Laws home for corretto. I really wanted to check on the plants..... since I haven't been able to install a "Nanny Cam" as of yet :) Everything is growing very well. All of the tomato plants have little tomatoes on them. A few of the pepper plants have peppers also. The eggplants & peppers in the swc are blossoming and growing nicely.

Tomato Plants on balcony

Tiny Tomato

Cucumbers

Eggplants and Peppers (plants purchased) in swc

Bug Identification....Please...Good or BAD??

I found these bugs on one leaf of one of my tomato plants this morning. I have no idea what they are and if they are good or bad bugs. I'm not real good in the bug department.

Harvest Monday

This week I harvested the last of the broccoli. The plants were so big and weren't producing side shoots...so, I pulled the plants also. The snow peas have come to a halt. I only harvested 2 oz. of them this past week. The "Little Marvel" peas are producing very well though. I hope that they produce longer then the snow peas.

We are still enjoying a lot of Spring lettuce. Our weather was so so hot over the weekend that I'm sure that it will bolt soon. I did start some more varieties of lettuce this week. I am hoping that they will germinate quickly and we won't be too long without fresh greens.

All of the garlic is almost ready. I harvested two of the heads this week that looked like they were ready. They are a nice size. Hopefully, some of the tomatoes will start to ripen soon. I've had tomatoes on the plants for several weeks now....can't wait!

Two small heads of Broccoli

Nice fresh mixed lettuce salad

First two heads of Garlic

Harvest Total: 5.94 lbs

Broccoli - 9 oz.

Garlic - 7 oz.

Herbs - 4 oz

Lettuce - 14 oz.

Peas - 2 lbs. 2 oz.

Snow Peas - 2 oz.

Strawberries - 1 lb. 9 oz.

Around the Garden

The cauliflower seems to be doing well.The heads are growing nicely. I harvested the remaining broccoli heads. I had left a few of the plants in the ground for side shoots. They really weren't producing any shoots. So, I pulled the plants out. The cabbage is not doing very well. It looks like only two of the plants are going to form a head. We had such erratic weather and they really bolted. I will plant more later in the season  for a fall crop.

Largest head of cauliflower is about 5"

The beans are growing and survived their pill bug encounter.

The cucumbers are developing their true leaves.

We finally took the bay leaf tree outside. I purchased this tree 5 years ago. It was only about 3" high when I got it. It is much happier outside and is producing new shoots.

I dug up two of the garlic plants to see how the heads are forming. They are almost ready to dig up. I think that I will give them about two more weeks. Unless the leaves turn completely brown before that. I could really use the room. I have an entire 4 x 10 bed planted with garlic.

This is an Asiatic Lily planted in one of the perennial beds. I am going to start taking pictures of all of the different daylilies that I have planted and do a post on them. I believe that there are at least 20 different varieties. The tags have some how disappeared...so, I don't know how many names I will have with the photos.