SQUASH AND SPOTS

I love how this picture looks like I'm just guerilla gardening in a random field.

Anyways, exciting day today as I picked my first poquito squash!

Ain't she a beaut?

And there are plenty more on the way too!

The massive poquito squash plant

The other squashes are coming along too:

Some regular green zucchinis

And a yellow crookneck summerpac squash - can you see it in there? It's super tiny! Notice how lovely this plant is... the cucumber beetles seem to be avoiding it entirely. There's not a single trace of bug damage on it. Amazing!

I had to give the tomatoes a massive haircut today because I noticed THIS - looks like tomato leaf spot, aka sceptoria, a fungus!!! So I chopped off all the infected leaves and plan to spray the plants with some sort of baking soda fungicide to stop it from spreading...

No more leaves... 

Lots of roma tomatoes though!

This big ugly heirloom tomato just keeps getting bigger and uglier every day!

Just waiting for the tumbling toms to start ripening now...

So much lettuce!!!

Still trying to get those melons to grow UP the trellis...

And my favourite pepper patch <3

IN FULL BLOOM

The nasturtiums have finally bloomed!

Aren't the gorgeous? They're edible but I think they're too pretty to pick!

It seems the entire garden has kicked into high gear since my last post. Peppers and tomatoes are growing, peas are blooming, even the melons seem to be on their way!

Roma tomatoes hanging on the vine

One of the heirloom tomatoes. Big Rainbow? Cherokee Purple?

The tomato bed is looking great. The dinosaur kale is growing well on either end, the marigolds just keep on blooming, and the basil is getting bigger too. Not to mention the 9 tomato plants that are either blooming or have tomatoes growing! The little green spikes in the bottom left of the bed are zinnias, but I'm not sure they're going to get big enough to flower this season. I planted them a bit late and they seem to be growing very slowly. 

Next to the tomato bed is a raspberry bee balm that I was hoping would attract some pollinators to the garden. It has finally bloomed too! (It will get much bigger than this)

And check out the peppers!

There might be more jalapenos than leaves on this one!

The first garden salsa peppers!

Not sure what this is - maybe a Sahuaro?

The beans are getting bigger and have started to wrap themselves up the string trellis. The nearby lettuce is growing well too. (Rhubarb in the bottom right, the last tumbling tom is literally hanging in there too!)

I finally weeded the lettuce bed enough to make it look half decent! The onions are still out of control and the lettuce is doing well. The Tiny Tim tomatoes planted in between the marigolds have the cutest little tomatoes growing on them as too, but I forgot to take a picture of them. Next time!

The achochas are getting taller and sending out multiple branches now - I think next year I might let these guys grow up the gazebo. They seem to be growing much faster than the morning glories.

Yep, I basically planted these in a pile of dirt

My first yellow summerpac squash flower!

The poquito squash is getting a bit ridiculous. It also has some powdery mildew on its leaves (those white patches) - I might spray it if it gets any worse but for now I'm too lazy...

Next door to the squash are the melons, they seem much happier these days. I think they thrive in the hot weather. The cucumber beetles have snacked on them quite a bit but they seem to be doing OK. 

I promised a cucamelon update last time, so here it is. They have started growing again but are all bunched up in a cucmelony-clump at the base of the trellis. I'm trying to train them up the netting but they kind of have a mind of their own!

Here's something I haven't posted before - beets!

I don't have very many of them growing, I had planted a few rows in between the pea tepees but only a few sprouted. So this is my haphazard beet patch:

And last but not least, the peas are halfway up the tepees now and have a few blooms:

And one single solitary pea! He's cute.

That's it that's all, stay tuned for more!

Hmm looks like I need to add more wood chips to these pathways...

AN OVERDUE UPDATE

Hello folks!

Sorry for the large time gap since my last post - I broke my laptop cord and haven't been able to use my computer at home. This post is being brought to you from work! (After hours, of course)

I have a great update today...

First of all, everything has dried out since my last post, yay!

And as for the veggies, the tomatoes are doing awesommmmmme!

The peppers have made a FULL recovery from their black days and are getting MUCH bigger! Most are also putting out a few flowers now, as you'll see below.

 

 

The peas seem to be growing REALLY slowly, but they're making their way up the tepees. Next year I'll start my peas much earlier! My neighbours' peas are already taller than me and have peas all over them! Jealous.

 

 

 

 

Here we have some nasturtiums, a squash plant in the tomato cage, and behind that some melons. Again, the melons seem to be growing slowly and are fending off cucumber beetles, so not sure I will get any melons this year. I started the melons way too early this year and stunted them when I planted them outside - they don't like to sit in pots for too long. Next year I'll pay more attention to when I plant things instead of getting too excited and planting everything in March!!!

 

 

A better look at the melons

Here's a picture of my poquito squash, it's big! I had the white fabric covering it to protect it from the cucumber beetles but I took it off so that the flowers could get pollinated.

 

 

 

It has 3 tiny squash on it! Not sure they all got pollinated and/or will grow into full squash, but still exciting!

 

 

The kale is doing great ever since I put down eggshells... maybe it was slugs eating it before?

 

 



 

Oh here's something new I haven't given an update on yet... remember the spiny cucumber seeds that Natasha sent to me from the UK? Here's how the achochas are doing! (or the achachachachas as I like to call them). There are 2 of these growing at the front of the garden in front of the tomato bed.

 

Also covered with fabric to protect from cucumber beetles







 

What else what else...

 

Ah yes, finally a morning glory has started to wrap it's way around the gazebo! This also seems to be growing SUPER slowly, but I'm hoping it will take off now...  I did have two moonflowers ready to be planted out as well, but I accidentally left them in my car the other day and they dried out to a crisp (confession - it wasn't really an accident, I did it on purpose, I didn't realize they would get THAT dry though. Stupid me)! You can also get a glimpse of the cucamelons on the netting in this photo. I've avoided updating on them because they look like craaaaaaap. But they're sort of making a comeback so maybe we will get cucamelons after all/I will post on them next time.

 

 

 

 

And last but not least... the beans! Also slow, but hopefully they make something of themselves soon. You can also see all the random lettuces and the onions in the front bed. One of the onions is actually flowering right now. Anyone know what I'm supposed to do about that? Help me Google.

 

 

My neighbour is growing a field of corn across the road. I hope they will share :)



 

That's about it for this time! Not sure when I'm going to get a new power cord for my computer, but hopefully I don't procrastinate as much between now and the next post. Oh wait I almost forgot! One more thing!

 

Check out the over-wintered jalapeno! He's winning Best in Show in the garden right now - I counted 37 peppers on him the other day! YIPPEEE! He's a jalapeno MACHINE.

 

 

 

 

I'll leave you now with a shot of the whole garden to date. Happy gardening!