It doesn't necessarily make them stronger, but it gives them a bit more room to spread, and 1 extra covers 2 plants.

I did get to pick my cucumbers today and then was picking some tomatoes when it started to rain. Had to hussle and get myself and my veggies inside.

We had a nice rain last night as well. My morning visit to the veggie patch revealed a rather large hornworm outbreak on my tomatoes and peppers.

Here's one carrying parasitic wasp larvae.


I'll leave that one be.



Brought in a huge handful of red noodle beans, some zucchini, tomatoes, cucumbers and greens...just enough for lunch and part of dinner. I can eat a bunch of those beans all by myself!


Rita, do you have any baby pea pods yet? Mine are still there, but it's hot here again so I'm starting to wonder for how much longer. Do you think I should shade them a tiny bit if it's near 90 and sunny?

Oh yes, definatly shade them if you can. Hot weather is bad news for peas!

I have blooms on one of the pea varieties I planted, Norli. No blooms yet on any of the others and that is good as it is still early. But not that hot here lately which again is very good. I would take a picture but it is raining so maybe tomorrow.

I did plant my half pound of Cascadia sugar snap peas on August 22 and those are coming up already. I never got to plant those seeds earlier and finially had room because of a while bunch of Tall Beared Iris I moved just recently to make the iris area into a veggie garden. I wanted to get that bed ready for veggies sooner but just got to it recently so what can you do. I know it is late here for planting peas but we will see.

Hate hornworms. Fortunatly the backyard birds here have quickly taken care of any that showed up around here.

Oh yumm on your veggie harvest for today. What are you making for lunch?

I almost forgot I had these planted in one of my terraces among the flowers.
These are Golden Berries, Physalis peruviana, and they taste somewhat like pineapple. They are related to tomatillos.

I see that they have the husks the way tomatillos do.

I have some friends from Mexico who say that they have some red ones down there that are really sweet and good. They also have black ones that when you eat 5 or 6 you become like your drunk. Guess they must have some type of drug in them. Tabby, have you ever canned them in a light sauce? They are good that way and you can enjoy them all winter. My tomatillos are just about ready to start harvesting. Now I need a good salsa recipe.

This is the first year I've grown them so I haven't done anything other than eat them. I didn't really think they would produce, but they're producing like crazy!

I used to grow tomatillos and make green salsa. I just loved that green salsa but I was the only one in my family. No one else would eat it.

Mmmm. Lunch ran rather late today but it was so good!

I should have taken a picture of the plates, they were so pretty!

All skins retained - thick chunks of zucchini and red noodle beans steamed with a drizzle of butter and a sprinkle of Parmesan and Romano cheese; a few small cucumbers dipped in sun-dried tomato dressing, and two slices of garlic toast. Dessert was a few sprigs of chocolate mint.

Yumm, yumm.

Some of these tomato plants I have this year are really, really ratty looking. Can't believe last year I did not have to spray at all with the Daconil Fungicide. This year had to spray all season to try and keep ahead of the fungus deseases. Oh well. I should not be compaining as my tomato harvest has been fabulous. Has really slowed down just lately so I just fed them with the BLOOM BOSTER to try and get them flowering more again.

We haven't had disease here but then again, we've had very little rain to instigate it.

I gave my plants some more compost/manure tea today...yummy. At least this batch was past the odoriferous stage.

Most years I don't even spray. I remember the plants were nice and green last year without spraying. But this year seems to be a year for all sorts of tomato fungus deseases to get going. Daconil does not cure anything. It just keeps the healthy leaves healthy by coating the leaf and not allowing new fungus spores to attach. Some plants look really ratty here and others look really nice and clean. But it is the very end of August so I guess I had not compain too much. Still eating lots and lots of tomatoes each day.

Viva Italia paste tomatoes


and cucumbers picked


Some of my fall peas are already blooming.


others are not blooming but taller growing.


And still other peas are just coming up because they were planted late.


malabar spinach

Still have broccoli, beans, corn, peppers and tomatoes that need to be picked.

Yesterday I picked a lot of what we call huckleberries, but are actually an annual that is called Sun berry or Wonder berry. It is similar to what is sold as Garden Huckleberry, but is smaller and has better flavor. They're pretty bland when raw, but cook up really nice with a bit of lemon and sugar.

I think I used to grow those berries but stopped because I didn't like the flavor. But they self seeded for quite a few years after that. I do remember the birds going and eating them.

We grew ones from seeds that came from some seed catalogs that really were pretty nasty - you couldn't eat them raw and they took a lot of lemon juice and sugar to make them any good cooked.

Then one year a guy gave me some seeds that he said came from Russia with his family. These were much better. You could actually eat them raw. They were a bit bland, but still quite edible and cooked up quite nicely. I've been careful with these so I don't lose them. They make an awsome pie. Most people seem to think it's blueberry. It sure stains like blueberry!

Gotta go make a zuke, broccoli, cheese, onion quiche.

Probably the nasty variety were the ones I had. No matter. I have lots of blueberries now and also serviceberries so I like those much much better anyway. Interesting to know that there is a much better strain out there.

Yumm, yumm. Beefmaster tomato sandwiches for dinner. Nice big slices cover a slice of bread. Also some cucumber and tomato salad I just made in the fridge for later. Love cucumber and tomato salad.