Although we thought we had lost all of Sara's fancy melons, one hardy Moon and Stars watermelon survive being repeatedly dug up by chickens and replanted by us. It finally has flowers, so maybe we will get a melon or two... 
The beautiful tomatillos are hanging on the plants like little Chinese lanterns. Cadence was pretty exuberant about planting tomatillo plants - we will have a ton of tomatillos. 
The Ichiban Eggplants are looking look lovely, but this morning we discovered that some chickens had been taste-testing our first eggplant fruit. Apparently they didn't like it enough to eat all the evidence. 
One artichoke plant is already boasting three fruits! But the other has none yet.
If all our baby pumpkins grow to full size we will have a bumper crop of jack-o-lanterns.
Cadence's Three Sisters (Corn with beans climbing up and squash growing throughout) suffered the worst damage of all from the dang chickens. But now that we have the critters effectively fenced out, they have recovered enough so that the Cherokee Trail of Tears Beans are properly climbing the Oaxacan Green Cornstalks and have begun blooming. Winter squash are rambling between the cornstalks - hope they feel inspired to blossom soon. 
Figuring out how to stake 98 tomato plants effectively and affordably has been a challenge. My friend Dana sent me a great link showing how to prune tomatoes and weave tomato supports. (I didn't know that pruning indeterminate tomatoes will double the yield!)We had the fence posts already, so all I needed was a few rolls of twine. I splurged and got pretty red polyester cord, which I figure I can re-use for years. My tomatoes are about belly-tall and this system is working well so far.
The tomatoes are pretty wellcontained in navigable rows, not sprawling all over.
Most of my tomatoes are loaded with fruit, still green. In a few weeks we might have to begin a steady diet of my favorite summer meal, BLTS, featuring tomatoes from our garden. This variety is Tigerella, I believe, and will be red and yellow striped.
4 comments:
might that tomato be a "green zebra"? -- moon and stars melons are tasty as well as cool looking! sweet/pink flesh/huge dark seeds . . .
Hi MArie,
Well, I didn't plant any green zebras this year, so I still expect this variety to turn red and yellow.
If you ever happen to come to Rochester when your melons are ready, I'd love to special order some from you! Especially Moon and Stars.
i think my next trek is the 10th of August -- 1:30 appt at Mayo -- so it may not work -- they'll be running late ... but I'll need an attitude adjustment Sat during the season -- I'll be down!
M
Wow, look at all those tomatoes! They look great!
Post a Comment