The Big GardenTour!

We were honored to be one of 6 gardens highlighted  on  the Tour With the Masters, Rochester's Annual Master Garden tour at the end of July. We have been working so hard this summer making the gardens look extra beautiful, there hasn't been time to post photos on the blog until now!

In case you weren't able to be on the actual tour, here is a virtual tour of some of may favorite garden highlights this summer. The driveway is a corridor of blooms.

To your right as you walk up the driveway is our veggie garden, which provides  a wide variety of vegetables and berries for us, for our 7-family CSA, and ingredients for our Farmers Market baking and wood-fired pizza.

Being named "Squash Blossom Farm" we grow a lot of squash, of course, and use the squash blossoms on some of our pizzas.

Gordita, our gourd-headed scarecrow, guards the  garden. Her old clothes were faded and tattered, so she got a new thrift store outfit for the tour.

 The Greens Mandala.

Lettuces.

Onions.

This garden has produced our best broccoli ever.

 Last summer I planted two Contender peaches, supposed to be  hardy in our Zone 4 growing area. Maybe we'll score a couple of peaches next year!

A Little Library stands at the  entrance to the farmyard, flanked by Black-Eyed Susans.

Hops growing on the Granary pergola. Last year, Forager Brewery made the most delicious Sage IPA from these hops and our herb garden sage--hope they will do that  again this fall!

The pollinator garden is through this gate--note the freshly painted fence!  John Shonyo from the Bee Shed had an observation hive of honey bees
here as part of the garden tour.

 Coneflower and Rudbeckia riot in the pollinator garden,

 Bumblebees LOVE the beebalm. My favorite is a dark  magenta monarda, but their favorite seems to be this native variety.

Raspberry lily has been flourishing in this garden since the first year we moved here.

Heliotrope, sprinkled with petals from its neighbor the beebalm, has a heavenly vanilla fragrance.

The butterfly bench is a fun spot to hang out and watch the bees, butterflies and hummingbirds.

The huge perennial hibiscus were not  blooming in time for the garden tour, but they have been blossoming every day since! Of course.

The rugosa rose has hips the size of wild plums! I am going to try these for  making rosehip jam - should be much faster than wild rose hips.

The patio fountain, aka the world's fanciest dog water dish.

The greenhouse was open, but it is too hot for much to grow in there right now. A Meyer lemon, Key lime, orange and fig tree are pretty happy  inside. I will have a few figs and limes one of these days!

People were pretty curious about the  aquaponics fish gazebo,

Many of of the garden tourists walked down  to the fairy garden at the edge of the woods.

There is so much more, but I won't subject you to any more photos except this one, the awesome SBF ninja gardeners, Willow,Denise and Ari. There is no way these gardens would be so spectacular without all their hard work all summer! Thank you dear gardeners!