In the Garden

 Since I've been spending so much of my free time in the garden I might as well take you on the grand tour.   I've tried a few new ideas this year for the garden.  A few years ago we fenced in the main garden due to the deer using it for a stomping ground.  In order to maximize our planting space a few things have been planted on the fence, allowing them to vine up, or just for support.  But in the corners I've planted some sunflowers for my viewing pleasure.

The main bed has heirloom tomatoes, turnips, beets, onions, sweet potatoes, cucumbers, several varieties of peppers and green beans.  The three arrows show the three new rows planted today with my late crop of beets and green beans.  In early spring these three rows were for the cold weather crops lettuce, spinach, radishes, and early beets.

Look at my new to me purple Green Beans.  Supposedly these don't toughen  if you pick them late and they turn green when cooked.  This is a first for me, so we'll see if they are all they claim to be.  

Peppers...

Peppers....

Peppers...

Cucumbers!  We might be selling some this year because we over planted after our first planting was destroyed by the moles, voles, and chipmunks.

While I was weeding this morning I kept hearing buzzing.  It took awhile for me to figure out that our honey bees like cucumber blossoms.  Humm....I wonder if the honey will taste like cukes?  Oh yes my friends what a bee gets its pollen from makes a difference in the taste of the honey.  My favorite is wildflower honey, you can taste the flowers.  There's a really dark honey that comes from up north it tastes like sorghum, not sure what that bee is eating but if I want sorghum I'll buy sorghum....YUK!  

We're also new to growing sweet potatoes.   So we're doing a soil test this year to see if it makes a difference in the crop.  We've one patch of potatoes in the main garden and then we've this raised bed with a soil mixture that is supposedly better for sweet potatoes.  Next year we'll amend the soil and plant Yukon gold potatoes in the patch that the sweet potatoes don't like.  I love raised beds, so much easier to maintain and with vining plants it keeps them contained, well for the most part.  

Here's our zucchini and squash patch below.  They are not allowed in my main garden due to the bugs they draw in.  They also grow better over here where they can soak up the dew off the grass.

Last year the squash bugs destroyed my tomatoes.  And since we don't use chemicals on the garden we couldn't do anything about it but cry.  I've been researching DIY organic mixtures for bugs and fungus, but the reviews aren't all that great.  It's easier to plant smart.  Did you know certain plants don't get along well together?

Here's another experiment,  gone bad.    This is a lesson learned about the internet.  Not everything you read on the internet is true.  The soil mixture was all wrong for garlic.  Our garlic did much better with nothing fancy about the soil.   We'll be amending it at the end of the season.

 And the last stop on our tour is  hybrid tomatoes, and green peppers.  Mr. Podunk likes big juicy tomatoes up by the house so he can pick'em and eat'em right off the vine.

Well that's what keeps me from sewing in the warmer months.  But I'm all caught up on weeding and canning...for now.  So I'm headed to the Studio!  Whoohoo!  Mr. Podunk can eat leftovers tonight. 

~ Lea Anne ~

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