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!