Harvest Monday 07-09-12

It was a great week in the garden. I think this has been my largest harvest ever! This with extremely dry conditions. Yesterday and today we have received a good rain and my garden looks so happy.

I didn't get pictures of everything but here are some...

The Juliet Tomatoes are happy even with the heat and dry conditions.

The Juliets above were harvested in one day.

Lots of tomatoes make my boys and their mom happy!

I was down one day and my sweet husband harvest this for me.

The heat is causing me problems with the peppers.

I can't figure out how to rotate this picture of my Louisiana Purple Beans (which I had to shell because they stayed too long on the vine) and my Florida Speckled Butter Beans.

This was my first year to grow yellow onions. I am pleased. 

They are drying in the garage and will be weighed later.

Harvest Week of 7-3-12 to 7-9-12

Okra 51.9 oz

Tomatoes 162.9 oz

Bell Peppers 17.8

Zucchini 16.2 oz

Beans 15 oz.

TOTAL 263.8 oz = 16.49 lbs

YTD Harvest 44.82 lbs

Check out what others are harvesting in their gardens at Harvest Monday at Daphne's Dandelions.

Debbie

It Rained and Rained Some More!

Well, Tuesday we received a good rain. Wednesday morning I woke to a nice soft relaxing rain that stopped about noon. Then... around 5:00 it started to rain again VERY HARD AND HEAVY!! Soon there were tiny rivers flowing everywhere. I wish that I had thought to get a picture of the little river that flowed through my backyard. I had been potting plants on the back deck and had used the wheelbarrow to haul bags of potting soil over to the deck. Well, typical for me, my day was busy and I forgot about the wheelbarrow. Here is a picture of the wheelbarrow and all the water that was collected in a period of about 28 hours.

When I went out to the garden yesterday morning, I thought it would be just a quick visit to harvest a few veggies since I didn't need to water the plants. WRONG!!! I am not sure if it was because of all the rain but I found caterpillars everywhere. I lost count of how many that I killed on the tomato plants. I was not happy.

 I discovered something strange. On the tomatoes that were turning red, the caterpillars only ate the outer layer of the tomato. It look like someone had "peeled" the tomato.

With the green tomatoes, the caterpillar went deep and made a hole in the tomato. Maybe someone who knows more about the habits of caterpillars can explain this to me!! Look at this guy. He is was working hard!!

I also decided to pull up the pole green beans. Something was eating them and they just didn't look healthy. They had flowers and tiny beans but they just weren't growing. So out of the garden they went!! As I was cleaning, I found a few of these little green worms.

Hopefully today, I will be planting these little guys - Jack Be Littles. My kids love to use these to decorate the front porch for fall. Pumpkins are a first in my garden!!

I hope all of your gardens are going strong!!

Blessings,

Debbie

Taking the Plunge!

My daughters, Heather @ Snapshots of My Life and Ashley @ Ashley's Spoonfuls of Sugar, have been telling me for a long time that I need to blog. But where do I start? LIFE, homeschooling, my garden,...????


I decided to take the plunge and write about my garden. I started a square foot garden last May (2009). I have wanted to use this method for a long time. My precious husband Larry told me to just tell him what I wanted and he would build it. (So thankful for this man God has given me!)


We started with a small box last year that was 2 x 8. I grew tomatoes, okra, carrots (fail!), and green beans. We were very pleased with the outcome, added more boxes and currently I have 120 sq feet. I currently have tomatoes, okra, cantelope, bell peppers, bush beans, pole beans, zucchini, strawberries, and corn growing in my raised beds.

Earlier this week I harvested a little over 2 pounds of bush beans (left) from the original 8 squares that I planted. I also planted 3 more squares of bush beans about 2 weeks after the first bunch.

I have 4 squares of Kentucky Wonder Pole Beans. Larry and I built a trellis for them earlier this week. We should have gotten the trellis built earlier but we spent a week with our high school youth choir Chi Alpha in New Orleans, LA. While we were gone, we had several good rain showers and the garden (and weeds) grew like crazy. I think I have all the weeds from my garden now and almost all of the garden tasks are caught up.

I also harvested elephant garlic earlier this week and I think I will do a seperate post on them.

I have enjoyed reading other blogs about square foot gardens/container gardening such as Our Engineered Garden and Annie's Kitchen Garden. I also recently discovered Daphne's Dandelions.

I hope this blog will be a place where I can share what I am learning on this journey.

Debbie