Visitor

Stole a picture of this helpful garden friend as she sipped nectar from Scarlet Runner blossoms. In addition to bees and other insects, hummingbirds play an important role in flower pollination. They are particularly attracted to flowers on the red side of the color spectrum (red, orange, pink), which is something I didn't consider at all when I planted the seeds. What an unexpected surprise.

Weeding

Summer's just officially begun and already the days grow shorter. A depressing thought I'll try to ignore as long as the garden's growing green and vibrantly. The pea harvest is in full effect; the plants have grown so large so quickly they're actually causing the trellis to sag! Today Aaron helped me tie the plants back to prevent them from leaning onto the row of beans, which are also growing rather fanatically. The northwest end of the garden has become a bit of a struggle to navigate through, in spite of (what I thought was) ample spacing. This is partly due to my reluctance to pull a volunteer pumpkin vine that sprouted near the end of the bean row.

From here on out we'll have all the peas we can eat and then some.

Aaron and I spent a little time managing the garden this afternoon. We piled some compost around the potatoes to encourage them to fill out with more spuds underground. The spinach and broccoli were also pulled from the garden. In the next few weeks I will be seeding the area where those plants were with crops that I intend to overwinter, perhaps leeks or kale, or some other hardy overwintering variety.

An important aspect of garden maintenance I haven't spent any time discussing is weeding. With proper upkeep this task will take only 1-2 hours a week. It's usually only when the task is neglected that it's a real chore. The main reason to weed is to avoid competition between your vegetables and the weeds. Weeds will use water and minerals from the surrounding soil that would otherwise go to your plants.

I try to break it up to about two times a week. The weeds are given little chance to reach any appreciable size, and the task takes less time. A regular garden hoe works best between rows, and saves your back. Last year I did all my weeding by hand, and definitely made the work much harder on myself and my back. A good hoe is definitely a must have for in-ground gardening. I still pull weeds growing near the plants by hand to avoid damaging them, but by doing this frequently it is a much less tedious endeavor. Here's Aaron demonstrating his technique:


Using the hoe allows you to keep your back straight and exert minimal effort.

And just for fun, a picture of the first eggplant blossom:

Rain

Soft drum of rain this morning, lullaby in the cool gray dawn. Twin Peaks playing tricks on my mind. Thanks for all the weird dreams Mr. Lynch. And the memories. At least I don't have to water the garden today.

Dry days

Today the Seattle area tied the previous record for consecutive days without rain for this time of the year (May-June), with 29 straight days without so much as an isolated sprinkle. For the garden, it's a blessing and a curse. The long hot days have rocketed my plants into top form, with most blossoming or at least showing buds or getting ready to flower. It's only a curse in the sense that the water table is being continually lowered without the usual rain to recharge it. And really, it's not a curse, it just means I have to be adamant about watering. For once I'm actually hoping it will rain! Some pictures of the plants' progress in recent days:

These peas will be ready to pick tomorrow or the next day.

The quinoa is doing great! This is one experiment I'm glad I undertook. The plants are nearly two feet tall already. They should reach a height of about four feet and then will begin to produce seed clusters. According to the research I've done they won't be ready to harvest until after the first frost, at which time I'll cut them down and hang somewhere cool to dry.

The tomatoes inside the cloche are nearly to the top of it already, and readily blooming. Their cages are nearly hidden by the abundant foliage. The slightly hotter temperature the enclosure creates seems to be doing the trick.

Another cloche success story: black eggplant. This is definitely the largest I've ever got an eggplant to grow before, and it trumps the ones I grew last year (which hardly grew more than 8" tall and didn't fruit whatsoever). This one is over a foot tall.

A casualty of the consistently hot weather has been the spinach. I should have planted this crop much earlier than I did, as the high temps have prompted it to bolt (grow spindly and go to seed). I have been able to harvest a sizable amount of the leaves, however, and have been chopping off the tops of the plants in hopes that it will force the plant to shoot out more vegetation and cease flowering.

Buds & Blooms

Thought I'd go easy on the words today and just post a bunch of pictures of the flowering plants in the garden.

Scarlet Runner Bean Buds

Sugar Snap Pea Flowers

Pear Tomato

Black Eggplant Bud (in cloche)

Strawberries growing from containers near the garden.

Cold frame reappropriation

Now that the growing season is in full swing I no longer need the cold frame to acclimatize seedlings, so have decided to conduct a little experiment involving peppers and eggplants. On the tall side of the frame (the back) I planted two peppers (of which are either jalapeno or lady bells, they weren't labled), a black eggplant, and an eggplant hybrid directly into the ground. The plants are spaced approximately 12-15" apart. Since we've had spectacular late spring weather these past few weeks I intend to keep the windows placed on top of the frame in a way such that they allow adequate ventilation but still help to transmit extra heat directly into the soil and the plants. Leaving the frame shut completely would surely spell disaster, as I would be unable to regulate the temperature at all and the plants would most likely get fried.

A picture of the newly planted peppers (left) and eggplants (right). As the plants grow I will probably have to remove the windows entirely to allow them to keep growing skyward, but for now they should reap the benefits of the additional heat that plants in the solanum family love so much.

There is a space between the windows about 8" wide and a strip along the entire front face of the frame to allow ventilation.

A caged fruit yet grows

Finally got around to buying tomato cages today. Couldn't find any that weren't made in China, oh well. A lesson well learned: place cages over tomatoes when they are freshly transplanted, before they have a chance to really take off. I made the mistake of procrastinating and letting the plants get bushy, thus making the process of getting them within the confines of the cage needlessly difficult. It required much patience and careful, deliberate movement of the plants' many branches, but in the end all turned out well. Both the tomatoes inside and outside the cloche are now caged and will have the support they require to hold up fruit.

I also took the opportunity to plant three squash seedlings my Dad gave me, two of which I believe are zucchini, and one I think is a yellow squash. He didn't label them so I won't know for sure until they fruit. Keeps it a little more interesting I suppose. Here's one of the plants after a good soaking:

Similar to potatoes, squash appreciate growing from a mounded hill of soil.

The peas have dominated the trellises, and are nearly four feet tall already:

Today I noticed their first blossoms , which means a bounty of snap and snow peas is just around the corner!

Fresh greens

The weather these last weeks has been unbelievably good. Too good to be true, almost. Only the garden seems to appreciate it more than me. Had a fresh picked salad today with the first broccoli head, spinach, chives, cilantro and the spicy greens that grew of their own volition (probably from the compost Aaron and I spread).

Nothing but good eating from here on out. Before long it will mostly be a matter of keeping up with it all. A pic of the garden from today.

Also planted a row of peppers, as well as several inside the cloche. A special thanks to my friend Erik for all the different pepper seedlings: ancho, jalapeno, golden bell, purple bell and poppers.