I’ll go row by row from the back:
- Garlic harvested and curing. I haven’t done anything else with that bed.
- Flower row. Healthy sunflowers and goldenrod. A few daisies. Sacred tobacco blooming. Poppies are done, but I’ll collect the seeds. Dahlias seem out of place there. I want to add New England asters very badly!
- Three sisters row. I have to pick green beans every day and already have a lot in the freezer and six pints of dilly beans. Show no signs of stopping. The squash are dying back a bit but I haven’t been able to see what all is growing there. Definitely some pumpkins and buttercup. Corn is always dicey here. I could skip it if it weren’t a traditional “sister.” The horseradish is huge and spreading. Volunteer potatoes left from last year in this row suffered from uncontrolled potato beetle.
- Broccoli row. Still eating side shoots. They are small but there’s enough planted to make a meal. The few cauliflower plants in here never headed up properly.
- Fava bean row. Fava beans were harvested August 11 and shucked by an enthusiastic group of volunteers (we fed them). I replaced them with peas to be grown on a trellis, spinach, cilantro and broccoli rabe, direct seeded. This row also has blue kale, green onions and an artichoke. The kale was bothered by flea beetle and should have been covered. The green onions are from last year and just self seeded prolifically so I have a jillion sprouts and a jar of saved seed. We are not gobbling the artichokes but they have been fun to grow.
- Root veg 1. The second year parsnip is huge. I’ll have to deal with the seeds. The first year parsnips look great, trouble free. We do not eat turnips, it turns out. We like beets but they are so finicky. I haven’t perfected my ability to grow them although I keep trying. Top of this row is a succession planting of carrots which are about two inches tall.
- Mixed greens. I planted most things too close together, especially escarole which grows into a huge plant. We really enjoyed Salanova lettuce (red butter variety). The radicchio has been very interesting and is still forming solid heads. A beautiful plant. The tatsoi suffered badly from flea beetle and was too unsightly to enjoy. The red orach is a cool plant, an interesting tall accent, but we honestly didn’t eat much of it. The chard from Chuck’s seedlings is big and awesome and we’re eating it!
- Soy beans and root veg 2. The soybeans were an experiment. The plants are turning yellow. We’ll see if we eat the beans. The fingerlings were brutally attacked by potato beetle and we didn’t really deal with it. Nevertheless we are enjoying a nice crop. One of my favorite garden veggies. The carrots are doing well, I’ve harvested a few. They suffer from being planted too thickly- my thinning is inadequate. I’ll try to improve.
- Tomato row. Doing well. Have eaten a few of them. We have a deep hunger for garden tomatoes and I’m not sure this will be enough.
- Lastly, summer squash, Chinese cabbage and sunflowers. Plus a huge rudbeckia lacinata “Wild Goldenglow” and scarlet runner beans on the fence. A happy row. The squash has not been prolific, just sulking along. Too much cabbage – they are huge. The flowers make me happy.
Okay, a photo break:
Just a few more notes for now. The corner trellis is producing kale and cucumbers, a little bit of arugula. I reseeded lettuce but it’s not germinated yet, probably due to scanty watering. We will have dry scarlet runner beans to eat this winter. And there are a lot of squash growing up the side of the chicken run.
There’s more – the herb garden, the hoophouse, the community garden plots, the fruit yard, the orchard (peaches!). But too much to cover in this post so I’ll wait for another day.
A definite sense that the season is on the wane. Thankful for this year’s bounty.
