Is it just me, or has summer sped by for you as well? Phew!
We have been busy with… everything. My mom was here to visit, then we had lots of hot days, and a few rainy days, and ok, we were tired and didn’t get out to the garden as much as we should have. That is lesson #1 – if you have a garden as large as ours, missing one day of picking and/or weeding is bad. Missing a week or more of weeding? Catastrophic. And, to think some people believe that weeding is bad for plant growth.
A curious thing started to happen with our squash and pumpkin plants – white spots. And, I ignored it, thinking it was “normal-ish”? Lesson #2… if it is any color other than green on the leaves, it is not normal. I waited too long, and the damage has been done, so there is not other recourse than to harvest what we can, and hope for the best outcome with what isn’t ready.
We pulled the pea plants last week, which is a really good thing – now we could lower the pole bean crane over to make it easier to harvest…
The zucchini are coming along well, and we are beginning to get a great harvest of ripe tomatoes. Our peppers (sweet, and HABANERO!) are coming in pretty good, finally. Our cucumbers are at the end of their life cycle, too. Tomorrow, we are going to be harvesting the remaining bush beans (Hi, Mom!) and then pulling those plants.
Other lessons we’ve learned? Too many to count, but for next year, we are:
- NOT planting lettuce – we don’t use it.
- If we can afford it, black plastic will become our best friend.
- So will homemade irrigation as apparently overhead watering can contribute to all sorts of problems.
- Roundup before the season is also going to be our friend.
- Child Labor Laws are going out the window, and our precious little children will be driven until their fingers bleed. Or, they whine enough.
- Build more trellises as they seem to provide a healthier growing environment (exhibit A: Pole Beans taller than Paul Bunyan).
- Weeding. Every. Day.
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