July Garden Tour

July debuted with temps in the mid-90s F (mid-30s C), and another two weeks of no rain on top of the rainless week we had at the end of June. I can't tell you how many times I lamented not getting all my mulching done earlier, but now with picking and putting up, there's little time to do more mulching. Or weeding for that matter. Sigh. I'll have to chalk that up as a hard lesson learned for next year.

That lament aside, are you ready to take a tour of my garden in July?

Starting at the top of the garden, I'm pleased to say that my cucumbers (National Pickling) did get mulched. This is good because they wilt terrible during mid-afternoon, and so need all the help they can get. Fortunately, they always bounce back in the evening. We're just starting to get cucumbers for eating, and I'm hoping for a goodly harvest for pickles and relish. I'm happy to tell you that these plants are grown from last year's saved seed.

My sweet pepper plants also suffer in the heat. However, they're hanging in there and just beginning to produce peppers. These are an open pollinated variety I hadn't heard of before, Chinese Giant. I hope they live up to their name. The plants are ones I started myself, early indoors.

My Roma tomatoes and companion marigolds. The two rows in the background are recently cut Swiss chard (Fordhook giant). I've canned quite a bit of the Swiss chard, and will let this bolt so I can collect the seed.

Of those tomatoes, I made the mistake of not staking them. Dumb, I know, but I read they are determinate, meaning they only grow so tall. I figured I might be able to get away with not staking, but alas, they are heavy with fruit and tending to lie rather prostate. Another lesson learned for next year.

Both tomatoes and green peppers started out with blossom end rot. Fortunately this is easily resolved with a calcium spray.

These are my black turtle beans, which will all be allowed to dry for food storage. They seem to brave the heat pretty well.

The real surprise is that in spite of the heat, my pathetically drooping broccoli plants (Di Cicco) are still producing!

The Sugar Baby watermelons have been invading the okra (Clemson Spineless, also from saved seed). I did manage to mulch most of the watermelon patch early on, with large sheets of cardboard, now covered with vines and leaves.

My Prolific Yellow Straightneck summer squash is another that tends to wilt during the day. These are from saved seed too. We love them sliced and sautéed with onion and fresh sweet basil. The overgrown ones can be stuffed and baked (recipe at the bottom of this post. Scroll down to get there.) The surplus we can't eat, is being put up in the freezer.

The sweet potato plants (also new for me) seem to be doing well. These are a bush type called Porto Rico. You can see the cardboard mulch on one side, no mulch on the other. The cardboard isn't very aesthetic, but neither are the weeds growing on the unmulched side!

Sunflowers in the left corner, buttercup winter squash behind.

That's fennel growing on the left. Or maybe it's dill, I'm not sure. I planted them both in the same row but they are so similar that I don't know which is which! There's a little garlic planted in with them as well. Fennel is something new for me.

Ebenezer onions (from sets) on the right are nearing harvest time. I have some seed too, to plant this fall to make my own sets.

This is amaranth, also a new crop for me. The tallest plants are about 5 feet and growing. I will collect and save the seed heads for the chickens this winter.

Not everything is doing so well however. My potatoes (Red Pontiac), have been attacked by blight....

And some of my sweet corn (Stowell's Evergreen) took a dive after a brief, but high wind rain storm the other day....

This falling over of the stalks is called lodging.

My Japanese hulless popcorn is doing fine though ...

Those are comfrey plants in the foreground. Growing with the popcorn are my Kentucky Wonder pole beans...

... parented by last year's crop.

Of my culinary herb bed in the front yard, I'm harvesting, using, and drying rosemary (bush in back), oregano (spreading out in front), and thyme in the middle. The pink petunias don't count.

What you don't see is the sage, which is coming along, and the lavender, which isn't growing very well. Or maybe it's just growing slowly.

My other herb bed is finally sporting flowers! There are Rudbeckia (Black-eyed Susans) at top right; Calendula (Pot Marigold), also yellow, to the right of those and a little shorter; and orange Butterfly Weed at the bottom. The pink zinnias on the left are volunteers. Behind them are growing yarrow plants (no blooms there yet.)

I have done some watering. In fact I had to switch from soaker hoses, which take too long, to a sprinkler, which can cover more ground in the same time.

Now, about that sprinkler. I thought I was doing a good deed by buying the higher priced metal rotary type one rather than the cheap plastic model. Was I ever annoyed then, when the metal was so cheap that it bent within the first week and broke about a week later.

Anyway, harvest is obviously shifting into high gear this month. I only wish my garden helpers were willing to expand their job descriptions....

Katy

Riley

Questions for the tour guide?
(Or the tour guide's helpers?)

July Garden Tour text & photos copyright July 2010 by Leigh at http://my5acredream.blogspot.com/