Summer in the Garden

The forecast for end of July... hot, humid, muggy, in truth you can practically cut the moisture in the air with a knife. Enormous occasional summer cloudbursts don't really do anything. It feels as though the moisture barely makes it into the ground before the heat is pulling it back out again! In spite of repeated watering of the garden, the squashes are having a hard time thriving. They are starting to die back. I may need to look into the how's and why's of growing them in this region. Perhaps it would be better to start them sooner, or later in the season. Currently there is just one small pumpkin growing. We've had a few yellow squash, but no other squashes even though there were plenty of flowers, there have been no fruits developing.

It's not really affecting the cucumbers though! After eating dozens of them and putting up half a dozen quart jars of pickles, there are more coming out every day! Just this afternoon I pulled no less than 8 large ones out. The tomatoes are also loving the heat, they've begun ripening and daily I can pick at least a bushel of all different types: Roma, grape, cherry, and the huge sandwich tomatoes. The sunflowers have achieved their full height and blossomed. The heads aren't nearly as large as I'd been anticipating, but I've been able to observe the bees at work on them, so fingers crossed. Even the bean plants have managed to put out a few more flowers, even without their leaves. The new lettuce came up, though I probably should have waited a little longer to replant those, they aren't doing as well now as they would later in the season. The cantaloupe plants came up, but I'm fighting to keep the 2 watermelon plants alive, they too are not flourishing. We also aren't getting as many peppers as we did last year, which is a disappointment.

I did realize though that while I like the layout of this year's garden, I will need to make some modifications for next year. The stakes I used for the tomatoes just aren't strong enough to hold them up properly. Especially the larger fruiting varieties. Next year I will need to look into trying something else, I wonder if an arboretum would work for things like tomatoes. And I may move one of my fence panels next year and see about growing the cucumbers vertically instead of along the ground, it's sometimes difficult to locate the fruits before they are as large as my arm! And next year I plan on setting up a few 'scarecrows' to try and keep the wildlife at bay. We work way too hard on the garden to have the produce of our efforts stolen from us. I wouldn't mind sharing, but the business of consuming every last leaf or taking a bite out of every fruit is the pits!

Speaking of fruit, the apple tree has mysteriously lost all it's fruits. It's a moderately sized tree, but I'd have sworn I saw some apples earlier in the year. Hmmm The fig tree is loaded with fruit, those should begin to ripen within the next month or so. I may try preserving some of those this year.

The herb gardens out front have sprouted, or at least half of it has. The lavender and the sage have come out, but the fennel and the oregano are being stubborn. I'll give them a little while longer so I don't accidentally mistake a young plant for a weed, then I may just try re-planting.

That reminds me, 3 stalks of corn came up in the raised garden. They aren't very tall, but I left them and now there are a couple ears on each stalk! Interesting, isn't it what happens when you leave some things alone.