Garden Update 14 weeks

I am a little bit nervous about what will happen to my garden while I'm on vacation for 2 weeks with the girls.  Jay has promised to water faithfully, but I just know that all of my tomatoes are going to ripen while I'm gone.  I think that I'll commit Jay to sending pictures of everything twice a week.  haha...

I thinned out one of my garden beds the other day.  One of my squash plants wasn't producing and was taking up a lot of room.  The bed was crowded.  I feel like my round zucchini plants might be on their way out and when I come home from vacation I might remove them and begin preparing the soil for peas and cauliflower.

Here are a few poorly organized pictures from the morning!

My first baby pumpkin

Pepper

Pepper leaf

What appears to be a new pepper plant that has mysteriously popped through the soil of my whiskey barrel (home to the other pepper plants).  This is the same barrel that Dancer kicked up when he was staying with us.  Is Dancer a secret farmer who was cultivating my crop?  This has yet to be seen.

Cardinal climbers, getting high.

One little watermelon plant is really outdoing itself.

There are only two big watermelon on this vine so far.  I'll take it.  They are getting really big.

Zucchini

Baby Cucumber (blurry and under the California Poppy)

This is actually thinned out.

Acorn Squash. Really growing.

Round zucchini.  But why is it yellow?

My corn is taller than my children now and up to my shoulders.  I'll bet that by the time I'm home on August 15th there will be silk and corn.

Crookneck squash plant that is now being devoured by snails and I don't care.

Tomatoes

Jalapeños 

More tomatoes.  So many there... but none are ripe

My Garden at 10 Weeks

Some days, like today, I take a step back and admire the chaos of my garden beds.  The control freak in me fought to pluck plants that got too big or seedlings that sprouted up from the soil after I thought I'd removed them all.  But my inner control freak lost the argument and I have just been letting it all grow.

And grow it has done!  Well, with the exception of the plants that I am growing in bags of compost.  

For example, here is a picture of the watermelon that I planted in the dirt by my walkway.  It is roughly five times larger than it was the day that I planted it.  I planted all of my watermelon on the same day, but used different methods and different spaces.

And this is one of the watermelon that I planted in a compost bag.  It is pretty much exactly the same size as it was the day that I planted it.  I have tried everything.  I have removed as much of the bag as possible.  I have watered more.  I have watered less.  I have used plant food.  Nothing happens.  

So, when I bought my tomatoes I was under the impression that they were all the same type of tomato.  I guess that I was misinformed.   I have three plants.  They should all be beefsteak tomatoes.  One of them just sprouted a few baby tomatoes, but the other two have been pretty prolific.  The thing is that one of my plants has large green tomatoes.  They are already about the size of my fist and are hard and green.  Yet, my other plant has little, itty, bitty cherry-looking tomatoes that are small but are already turning orange.  At what point do I pick them?

All of my peppers are growing especially large!  I am not certain how big my yellow peppers are supposed to get before they actually turn yellow. I have one that is getting quite large but is still dark green!  

I am really please with my jalapeno!  I have a few plants and I do believe that one of them has several that are ready to be stuffed with cheese and pineapple, wrapped in bacon and turned into poppers!  I give them one more week before I can pick them! 

Bunny's corn is looking good!  It's growing , but I imagine that it will be August of September before it has corn that we are able to eat!

Hey, have you ever seen anything like this before?  This was the only plant that I left in my garden from the previous people who lived here.  It started as a plant with long green leaves (same shape as corn but tougher and larger) and then grew yellow flowers and NOW this!!!!)  It looks like something from outer space.  

I have my first flower on an acorn squash plant!  And it comes with a little, baby acorn squash!  Isn't it cute?

Some of my round zucchini has started to grow in sort of yellowish!  It tastes the same.  I'm wondering if it's possible that there's some cross pollination happening between my round zucchini and my yellow squash.  I have read that this is possible but I don't' know very much about it.

My garlic are getting big and strong.  I have to admit that I was hoping the other four garlic that I planted would eventually sprout, but I think it's a safe bet that these are the only two that made it!  I am gratefully that they made it, so I'm not going to complain!  This bed is already overcrowded, so it's probably a blessing in disguise.  

The cucumbers that I planted in compost bags are doing pretty terribly, but the seeds that I thought I plucked out and missed are actually doing remarkably well.  I put small cages around them.  In part to give them something to climb and in part to protect the from the squash that is sprawling across that bed.

There hasn't been much change in my pumpkins this week, but know the road to having pumpkins on vines will be long and winding.  

Here's something interesting.  In this picture you'll see my cardinal climbers in front of the bench.  On top of the bench are my mimosa plants, which are not doing so hot.  I think that I need to water them more.  To the right you'll see my old peppermint patch that has been covered with cardboard, mulch, compost, watermelon and cucumbers.  And then, between the old patch and the cardinal climbers you'll see a bunch of green coming up through the cracks in the concrete.  Guess what that is?  PEPPERMINT!  It's found a way to survive!!!!!!!

I realized that I haven't given any updates on my fruit trees lately!  I will post about them specifically later, but for now, my peaches are starting to plump up and turn, well, peach!  

Garden Update-just about 9 weeks in the making

I am so proud of my little garden, though I worry about what the neighbors must think!  Hopefully people know that I am growing vegetables and not giant weeds.  Because a lot of my backyard is stone and roses, much of my growing takes place in the front yard.  As far as my peppermint patch reformation, the watermelon and especially the cucumbers look a little bit peeked.  I'm running out to buy them a healthy dose of plant food in a bit!  Hopefully they are just low on nutrients and I can supplement with a plant vitamin of some sort. 

Here's my progress at 9 weeks!

LEFT GARDEN BED

This is where I grow my tomatoes, jalapeno peppers, yellow bell peppers and crookneck squash.

This tomato plant needs a new cage.  It's become a little bit unruly.  That said, it has more tomatoes than my other plants and I'm excited for them to grow!

This is the inside of my crookneck squash plant.  In the past day or two I have seen many squash ripen.  Looks like dinner to me!

These jalapenos are plentiful and nearly ripe!

At what point will my peppers turn yellow?  One of them is already quite large!

 I had to stake this pepper plant.  It is pretty small and has around 6 big peppers on it.

Giant crookneck squash plant.  For as huge as this is, I have clipped it back about three times.  It doesn't have vines.  So though it is taller and more massive than my other squash, the plants with vines looks crazier because they stretch out across my entire yard!  

INDIVIDUAL PLANTS

These are plants that I have put in containers or in single garden spaces throughout my yard.

Sadly, I have never discussed this flower.  When we moved here this was just dead sticks.  There was practically no green on it at all, but there was ONE little white flower at the end of what appeared to be a dead stick.  I had several plants that looked dead and plucked most of them out, but I really wanted to see if I could bring this one back.  I wish that I had kept a photo journal of its progress because it is doing beautifully.

 Here is an acorn squash that I think it doing very well.  I hope to eat the squash it produces on Thanksgiving!

 This mimosa was doing well but I worry that it needs some help these days.

 My cardinal climbers are really thriving and growing now.

The cardinal climbers has started its assent to the top of my pergola!  I can't wait until it blossoms and blooms!  It's going to be so beautiful.

 These peppers are being grown in a whisky barrel

And this is the whisky barrel.  I am just starting to see some nice, big peppers forming.

 My pumpkins are what impress me most.  Though, this is the only seed that I planted that actually took and grew, it is doing quite well and I am so excited to have our own pumpkins this year.  Hopefully it will create at least four pumpkins so that we can all pick one!

This is the best watermelon that I've got, which totally stinks because I ran it over with my garden hose yesterday.  Hopefully it is well established enough to survive the trauma.  

FRONT RIGHT GARDEN BED

This is the home to a whole bunch of things with no room to grow!  Yikes!  I overdid this bed and before long it will just be a mess of green.  I can't bring myself to pluck anything out, so we'll just see how it goes.

 Two of my garlic plants have finally sprung through the ground.  Just when I gave up on them, they appeared!

 Here we have three acorn squash and one zucchini.  All are thriving.

 My california poppies are fighters!  They are doing well dispute being taken over my squash.

Inside a summer squash plant.

 Huge round zucchini that is ready to eat!

BEFORE AND AFTER OF MY SUMMER SQUASH, GROWN FROM SEEDS.

CORN 

I have to admit, it's looking good!!!  Bunny's corn has grown quite a bit this week!

BACKYARD PEPPERMINT PATCH 

This is in desperate need of help.  It really deserves its own post, which I will write at a later time.  Let me give it a bit of food and take a few days to see what happens.  :(