What A Month It Has Been...The Case of the Spaghetti Squash Monster

Sorry for the lack of updates on the garden! For those true detectives from the last post, my garden was planted at my new house. Patti (who was referenced in the last post) was our WONDERFUL seller, who not only offered to let me plant my garden -- but even had it tilled for me.

So, a couple things have prevented me from posting about the garden (or even getting into the garden). We moved. Two houses. And, it just keeps raining. Poor Ryan hasn't even been able to mow very much.

This week I finally had to stop ignoring the garden. I did snap some photos before we finished weeding, so these photos look TERRIBLE!

First up - Spaghetti Squash

I've never planted spaghetti squash. I had no idea its ability to completely take over my garden. I thought I had spaced things out appropriately. I THOUGHT WRONG. It just kept growing and covering everything else. I've heard similar things about cucumbers, I should have done my research. The solution was to just chop off the ends and pray for the best. So far, it looks like it has decided to flower instead of continue to grow - Yay!

Zucchini

The zucchini has the biggest leaves I've ever seen on a plant. It has remained pretty contained to its space, but there are a million flowers. I see a lot of zucchini bread in the future, along with a bunch of new recipes that I make with zucchini. I really love zucchini, so I'm looking forward to having some. I anticipate it will be ready within the next week or so!

Cantaloupe

Cantaloupe was a late addition to the garden. I wasn't sure how it would react. The plants are pretty small, but it's already flowering. We'll see what happens!

Tomatoes

Our tomatoes were an interesting situation. We were only able to cage two plants prior to our moves. So, this is one of the ones that was caged early. They are doing great and I think they will produce abundantly. However, the other 4 plants are a different story. We've had some pretty strong storms and were only able to cage them this week. Hopefully they will recover and be able to support themselves, but I'm not sure what to think right now.

Peppers

The peppers have been caught in spaghetti squash's quest to conquer the garden. They seem to be ok, but I worry about their strength since they've been shaded by the monster zucchini and spaghetti squash leaves.

Watermelon

Ryan's watermelon. We thought early on that it would not do anything. Now, it is going quite well. We should see some things later this summer.

Three nights of working in the garden made it look quite pretty this week. Hopefully we can keep up on the maintenance and it won't take as much work in coming weeks :) Is it time to eat this stuff, yet?!?!

Fall = Winding Down The Garden

The garden is winding down. It's been a good year for some things (zucchini, lettuce, snow peas) and not so good for others (peppers, eggplant, tomatoes). The last month was slow. We had a lot of cantaloupe and watermelon, but really - that's boring.

Because the zucchini plants died, the cantaloupes over-ripened and the eggplants just weren't right - we had a surplus of rotten produce. What can you do with rotten produce? Shoot it of course!

Ryan and I used the leftover produce as target practice for his new .22. It was completely random and totally awesome at the same time.

A cantaloupe was the first victim:



Mid-way through the experiment:



We wanted to make sure the cantaloupe was completely destroyed:




The mini-sized eggplants may have been terrible to eat, but they were great target practice:



I think I nailed this thing about 20 times!



I also took A LOT of video - but I realized it's not as exciting as I expected. I tried to upload a file, but it didn't work. Oh well!

Happy fall!

Growing Gardens Need Water

I knew I would be saying this eventually - but I think we could use some rain! Oh well, if we don't get it early next week, I will be forced to water, water, water. As far as weather goes, HOT is the only way to describe the last few weeks.

I heard recently that I am "quite the gardener" or from others they heard I "love gardening". I'm here to set the record straight on this, or at least provide some clarity. I like planting and watching things grow. I LOVE eating what comes out of the garden. The process of weeding, however, is my LEAST favorite thing to do. And, I'm terrible at it (you'll see as this post goes on). So, I think that would make me a B- gardener, at best. I guess this post somewhat falls in the "not an expert" area again. I just want to say that I'm not "quite the gardener." I think its about 80 percent luck!

A few things have transpired this week, so let's take a look at them...Some of the tomatoes are ripening! Please note: none of the early girls are ripening or close to ripening. What a joke! I won't waste my time/space with them in the future. This small picture really doesn't give you a full idea, but it does show some orange amongst the green.



We still see the results of earlier flooding. The tomatoes are a bit stunted, I would say. Aside from large areas of dead plant, the fruit that is producing is smaller than average when it is ripening. I see this with the surviving green peppers as well. Of course, this doesn't stop the appeal or taste. In the case of this tomato, size does not matter. It was FANTASTIC!



The eggplants, which are actually in the same row as the tomatoes and one row over from the green peppers, look just fine (another mystery)! I predict eggplant fries in our near future!



Oh look! The watermelon is getting bigger! We now counted 13. "Sharing is caring" will be our motto in a few weeks I'm sure.



I received feedback on my last melon post suggesting my cantaloupe didn't look like cantaloupe. They were still pretty young at the last post. Here is one that is maturing and OH NO! it looks like a cantaloupe to me! (This is also the same exact cantaloupe from the last post):



I researched the cantaloupe life cycle online and they appear to be normal at this stage. I grew cantaloupe last year, but I never even noticed them until they were yellowed and ready to be picked!

In other news, the green beans produced well and the zucchini keep on ticking. I didn't take any pictures, but they're good to go - trust me.

Melon Monday

Yesterday was a great day to get out and check out the garden. It was also a weeding day, but I hate weeding - let's focus of the fun stuff. Most of the exciting stuff is happening with the melons. However, first things first. Do you see what I see?



Yep. It's a red tomato! YES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I will return in a couple days. If it makes it to the house, I may even slice it. :)

And, now back to the melons! The watermelon keep growing wonderfully and vary in size. For the ones we can see, we counted 11 melons yesterday.

Some look like this (or even smaller):



Others look like this:



The watermelon are the most popular garden topic for my husband. He cannot wait for them to ripen!

In other melon news, we also see cantaloupe forming (on the other side of the garden). These are not as exciting for my husband, but they are incredibly exciting for me! I love cantaloupe. They look weird, but I think will eventually plump and round out a little.

Small cantaloupe:



Probably the biggest one we have right now:



There will be no entries on "What To Do" with watermelon or cantaloupe. The simple answer is "eat it"!

The Good, The Bad, The Ugly

We spent time in the garden yesterday. After a few days of dry weather, things are finally drying out. The future looks better than it did last week.

The Good

Watermelon



Eggplant



Other things of note: The peppers that did survive look to be rebounding quite nicely. The tomatoes have more fruit this week than last, so they must still be producing. Their leaves look normal and have left the drooping behind!


The Bad

Onions



The onions probably should have been done now, as their tops have died off. Unfortunately, this is as big as they are. I will replant bulbs soon. We also tilled up the snow peas and lettuce, they had run their course! I plan to replant the lettuce, I have really enjoyed having fresh salads all the time. We are also adding some pumpkins to the garden soon.


The Ugly

Broccoli



Cauliflower



Aside from the broccoli and cauliflower, I think some of the plants can bounce back from the water torture. I'm going to wait it out before digging them up.

Lots and Lots of Rain

We went out of town this weekend and returned to standing water. The corn field next to our house looks like it suffered some wind or hard rain damage, so we went out to see the garden.

I snapped a few pictures of the current status. Unfortunately, we are expecting more rain this week.

Green beans, cauliflower, broccoli, zucchini:



Onions, peppers and a tomato in the corner:



Watermelon area (it has been neglected, it was on the list for "weeding" this week):



On a positive note, I am starting to see growth throughout the garden. The broccoli has mini-crowns on it! This picture isn't great, but I was trying to not get muddy. The "crown" is right in between the big leaves.

It's The Little Things

Little things make me smile. The garden tends to do that often! I've picked lots of snow peas in the last week and there are even more out there now! The lettuce just keeps on growing! We've been eating lots of salads and sharing bags of lettuce with friends!

The discovery of the week goes to....



It's a little tomato! Surprisingly, these are on the beefsteak tomatoes! Just a little longer and we should have the long awaited first tomato of the summer!

The watermelon are also taking off. Or, I should say they are ready to take over their allotted space (and more). Maybe we'll have watermelon by the fourth of July? That would be awesome!



The zucchini are growing the most! This picture does not do the monstrosity that is this zucchini plant justice!



The only issues in the garden right now are little worms. Here is a great example of why I don't do organic. Broccoli:



I laughed as all the worms tried to escape my Sevin dusting! BWAHAHAHAHAHA

The Weedy Wonder

Ok, I'll admit I've been reluctant to post pictures because the garden had been over taken by weeds. I used Preen for most of the garden, but I was afraid of stunted growth with the plants that were starting from seed. The result? Lots of weeds, but strong plants! I spent this morning trying to control some of the weed problem. I even hurt my finger while weeding!

Ryan caged the tomatoes earlier this week:



Watermelon growing, slowly but surely:



Zucchini is flowering:



Snow peas (freshly weeded). I should have taken a before picture!:



This lettuce has been weeded and there are still a ton of weeds!:



The weekend plans involve a lot more weeding and probably some additional radish harvests!

Time Flies!

Today, I went to the garden for the first time in almost a week! I wasn't too busy for the garden, but we made a short trip out of state last week, so no time to blog or even check on the garden.

While we were gone, we received a good amount of rain (1.3 in) and some hot weather! It's 80 today and HUMID. The garden is growing well, with a few exceptions.

Watermelon - we left the hotcaps on from a couple weeks ago to encourage growth. We have successful growth for 10 of them, but we lost a few plants along the way.

Cantaloupe - these were planted after the freeze threat, but have really struggled getting their roots established. I have three plants that are ok, but I will be planting more soon.

Cayenne pepper - I think an animal may have bit the top of this plant. It looks terrible! I will likely need to plant another.

As previously mentioned, everything else is looks pretty good. We staked part of the tomatoes today and spread some sevin to take care of pest pressure.

The surprise of the day was the radishes. They are ready! Here is the bucket full of the day:



They tasted delicious!

Full Garden Pictures

It's been awhile since I posted full garden pictures, mostly because there was nothing to show. I didn't get the whole garden in a picture so I will show them in two stages......

The "North Side":



Hotcaps (Rows 1 and 2) are the watermelon. They were planted in hard conditions, so I left the hotcaps on this week to give them a chance.

Row 3: All Tomatoes

Row 4: First three plants are Eggplants, the rest are Tomatoes

Rows 5 & 6: Green Peppers and Jalapenos, respectively

Row 7: Banana and Chili Peppers, Onions

(See next picture for rest)

The "South Side"




Row 1: Same as Row 7 in first picture

Row 2: Zucchini

Row 3: Broccoli

Row 4: Cauliflower

Row 5: Snow Peas

Row 6: Green Beans

Row 7: Lettuce/Radishes

"Open space" Rows 8 & 9: Cantaloupe

I never counted the rows. 15 rows of fine, fresh, farm-raised produce growing! I know we will really enjoy the "fruits" of our labor this summer. It's hard to imagine right now!

The Great Freeze? More Like A False Alarm

I went out this morning to check my losses...everything is alive. By everything - I mean the plants that weren't covered and the ones that were. Sigh. Oh well, at least they are all still alive!

I left the hotcaps on the watermelon (at least for today). It is supposed to rain this week, I don't want them to miss that - but I think they may need some extra time to bake after yesterday's wind.

The cantaloupe is in the ground. My garden is finished in terms of planting! YAY! I planted 12 cantaloupe plants. I have a feeling we are going to have WAY too many melons. Oh well! More to share with friends. Maybe my preservation classes will provide some insight on what to do with them.

Wind, Watermelon and Aliens

Aliens have invaded my garden.

I started the day with ambitious plans. Ryan brought the tiller out, taking care of the remaining soil and also weed maintenance. I picked weeds in the rows and also checked on plant progress.

I have a full row of snow peas! The mild weather this week helped them emerge quickly and they were looking good. The wind was blowing like crazy today, but most of the plants were holding their own.

I picked up Crimson Sweet watermelon plants last night, along with cantaloupe. I planted the watermelon (a total of 12 plants from 4 pots), only to find out some not so great news. Shortly after planting, Ryan decided to tell me what he heard on the radio this morning: a chance of frost. Ouch. Thanks, honey!

We wanted to make sure they were talking to US, so we waited for the 6 p.m. news. They were.

Ryan and I collected our hot caps and some buckets and got to work. We ran out of buckets and hot caps. So for the peas, beans and lettuce...we had to improvise.

Alien invasion (watermelon, tomatoes, peppers, eggplant, broccoli, cauliflower):



By improvise, we mean: sheets, plastic, cones and our old bags from our "bags" game:



We also threw in a Zook Zone towel for good measure. This one covers some radishes (yes, Heath..this was for you!):



Hopefully that will save the bulk of the plants, we couldn't cover them all. Cantaloupe to be planted sometime next week.