EMERGENCE!

Ok, it's been almost a week since my last post - SORRY! It rained A LOT last weekend, so there isn't anything I could do in the garden...but the plants had plenty to do!

I went out today and planted zucchini. I removed the asparagus plants (RIP) and using their row for the zucchini. I'm looking forward to the assortment of squash this summer (zucchini and eggplant.)

Here is a picture of the freshly planted and watered zucchini. Please note, it's incredibly windy today. Check out the emergence of the corn next to my garden!



As a part of my blog, I plan to give regular updates on each of vegetables on a semi-regular basis. Here is your first progress report:

Tomatoes - all plants are growing, looking strong

Eggplants - great leaf growth in these plants, they really strive in our soil type

Green Peppers and Jalapenos - looking good, growing

Banana Peppers - all plants growing well

Onions - some have taken off quicker than others - hopefully this will result in a spread out growing season

Snow Peas - I fear a repeat of last year's sugar snap pea disaster, I see nothing........

Green Beans - EMERGENCE. They look great coming out of the ground!



Lettuce - I had no idea how to plant the lettuce, so I may have not spread it out enough. But, more emergence!



Radishes - The last thing planted from seed, the radishes seem to be flourishing! Glad I have a lot of friends who like Radishes!



I'm still looking for a good selection of watermelon and cantaloupe plants. I plan to check out the Macon County Extension's plant sale this weekend and see what I can find.

The Saga Continues....

After my asparagus post the other day, lots of friends volunteered information regarding the process. The conclusion? My roots aren't going to produce anything this year. *sigh*

The new plan is to dig up the asparagus roots and plant zucchini over them. The zucchini wasn't in the original plan and was brought up by a blog commenter. I do have some great zucchini recipes and would love to try zucchini bread - so here you go!

I would have added a row of zucchini earlier, but I was concerned about cross-pollination between the zucchini plants and the cantaloupe I plan to add soon. With the open spot in the middle of the garden, I have an opportunity for Zucchini! YAY!

Not much is happening in the garden at the moment, but we do have some volunteer green onions that grow by the cave in our yard. They are always fresh and yummy! They are really prospering this year too! Soo exciting.

Green onions:

Rain is a Good Thing!

Wednesday evening I went out to add the other banana pepper to the garden. I had some VERY sad looking plants. I knew it was supposed to rain a little that evening, but our weather people aren't exactly the most accurate folks...so I decided to water them anyhow.

The hose:



Here is where it needs to go (taken from the hose's point of view):



I dont have a problem watering the garden, but it takes two really long hoses to even get there! LOL.

When I went out today, I had VERY happy plants. They were standing tall and loving the sunlight.

Happy Plant!



Mother Nature is scheduled to take care of the watering this weekend. Rain is a good thing!

Green Thumb

A blog follower has already complained about the lack of pictures. She will remain nameless, but she's a little photo obsessed *hint* *hint*.

So here's a picture of my green thumb!



*Slaps knee* Har Har Har!

Confusion in Gardening

We finally found a single banana pepper plant at Farm and Fleet. It was much bigger than the one I planted Sunday, but I really wanted to get another one in the ground.

I went to plant it and realized this is a sweet banana pepper plant. The previous plant was a "hot" banana pepper plant. Variety is the spice of life, right? I had no idea there were differences in banana peppers considering the "hot" ones are only mildly hot!

After a quick google search, I'm still equally confused - it appears there may be no difference between these plants! A lot of websites use a general "banana pepper" term.

While I'm on the topic of confusion, I would like to talk about my asparagus. My mom told me it takes awhile (like years) for asparagus to grow. She said it would take more than one season for it to produce anything. I listened but disregarded her comments when my package of asparagus roots mentioned nothing of the sort!

Monday, I found aspargus plants at Farm and Fleet. Their package said they would not produce asparagus this year. FRUSTRATION. So, I turned to my friend, Google. My research concluded that asparagus does take three years to mature and grow to the vegetable we see in the stores. No wonder it is so expensive! Sorry, Mom

This research left nothing but questions for me. How old are my roots? Are they on their third year? Is that why their package didn't mention waiting years for a product?

I'm hoping that I purchased three year old roots and I will be pleasantly surprised in 72 days! I'll keep you posted.

Adding to the Garden....

Once I planted the garden last week, I realized I had some room for additional plants. This week has been an adventure in finding the additional plants.

I needed about 4 more tomatoes, so I ended up purchasing a 9pk of Beefsteak tomatoes. I only planted 4 of them though! We now have three varieties of tomatoes in the garden (Early Girl, Better Boy and Beefsteak), totalling 15 plants! I apparently didn't get enough tomatoes to eat or give away last year...so we're trying for more.

We also had space for about 1/2 row of something, an additional eggplant and one more banana pepper plant. These proved to be an adventure.

I found nothing of interest at Lowe's while I was buying the tomato plants, so my next stop was Farm and Fleet. They had nothing in their plant area, but I was able to pick up some radishes. Note to self: Mondays are not a good time for plant shopping. My partner in crime, Ryan, searched some stores and found an eggplant, but still no banana peppers.

One Day Behind the Farmer's Almanac - TIME TO PLANT

Today was the day. I planted my heart out. It must be the farmer's daughter in me, but I'm really particular about straight rows. As if ANYONE cares if my garden has straight rows!!! I replanted a few plants to align properly, but as the day went on - I stopped caring.

I estimate that I planted 80 percent of the garden today. I still need watermelon and cantaloupe plants, plus I'm planning on adding another banana pepper plant, another eggplant, and four more tomato plants. I would still have room for maybe one more vegetable, if I can think of something I would like. Ha!

Here are some pictures from today....the full garden goes back to the flags:


Random plant shot (Early Girl Tomato)