Hurray chelle. Making great progresss!

Almost ready for pictures. Not quite, but almost. Next cloudy day probably...

I take pictures in the sun or clouds!

My potted yard long beans are getting more leaves and look like they may be ready to start climbing. I had better fix them up a teepee.


Besides these I also have yard longs in my 7 foot square veggie garden I call Tower Square.


Ichiban Eggplant. I am pleased to see the eggplants are really getting growing.

>> I can't dig yet in any areas that aren't raised beds...still too wet.

I know I'm totally over-obsessed with drainage, but sometimes, if the grade favors you , a fairly short, narrow slit trench could drain some sunny spot much faster than it would drain on its own.

Suppose you have a slightly raised patch with a nearby lower spot to drain TOO. Say it looks like it WOULD drain, but the soil is too dense. Possibly cutting a narrow trench along the down-slope edge of the raised spot, and extending the trench down to the low spot would make that whole patch of soil much "earlier".

If it drains faster, it will also warm up faster.

My yard was 100% dense clay, downslope from several neighbors, and has several small slopes. So it's a natural playground for the Corey Corps of Engineers..

No zucchini ready to pick today, not tomorrow either!

Besides my zucchini I am obsessing over my eggplants, waiting for them to flower. Tomatoes are already flowering although not each and every plant. But I have 62 plants so that is ok. I have green tomatoes already set on my Sugery and Sungold tomatoes.

Ok, folks --- don't laugh at the small size of my veggie garden - I can't physically do a whole lot and so I try to grow what I can...

First the zucchini. One on the right is a green zucchini, one on left is yellow summer but I don't remember what variety off hand. Odd, they were the same size when I bought them.

Peas - all are sugar pod. I think the one on the right is Mammoth Melting Sugar (has yarrow in the background) and the other two I can't remember without looking for the seed packets. The one on the left is only supposed to get 16" and it seems to be right on the money. I think I will have to stand on my head to pick it. Won't grow that again. I prefer to stand up while picking them.
I use scrap "field fence" that I get from a local fence company to make my cages for peas, cukes, tomatoes. I trade them scrap fence, normally used for horses and cows, for some of the produce when it comes in.


Along the bottom of the wire of the fence with the wooden cross bar, I planted seed that a kind soul on this thread sent me. Some Yard long beans, small melons and a cucumber I have not grown before. I had to kick the old daffodil foliage down and under the fence before I could plant the seed, but I did it. I have very limited space, and was not anticipating needing the added space to plant these additional seeds --- but I am glad I have them!


I don't think my problem with the lettuce is because of the potting mix (also mixed with my compost and bark mulch) because here is the same mix, with a mixed beet seed planted at the same time


This container of lettuce seed did really well


These two boxes had a few plants come up, and you can see another container with the same potting mix that I planted fingerling carrots in - they seem to be doing fine.


and this box has nothing. Same seed, same mix, same light, same water.


Another mystery. My favorite cucumber, Sweet Success. Planted an entire packet - maybe 15 seeds. Granted, there are a couple weeds in there. There is one "major" plant and two tiny ones.


Tried a few new ones since Sweet Success has been a bit disappointing in the last few years - in availability and germination...
Green Dragon - 3 feet away - planted no more than 3 days later. Look at the difference in germination and vigor. So many, I think I might need to thin them.

Juli, you have a nice assortment of veggies and it is great to see your veggie area. Where are your tomatoes?

Since the Sweet Sucess mostly did not come up (I wonder why?) maybe you can transplant any of your Green Dragon that you want to thin to the spot the Sweet Sucess was in.

Beets in the container look really good. Carrots too. I have never tried anything like beets or carrots in a container. Do they do ok pushing down into the soil? Have enough room to do so?

Peas are looking very good for you. They obviously like the way you are growing them. And maybe the yellow summer squash just makes bigger plants than the green zucchini. But I don't really know, just useless guessing on my part.

Beans are another veggie that I think every veggie lover should grow. Green beans are so easy to grow. And Yard long beans even easier to grow.

That's not a shabby veggie garden by any means! Looks great!

Tomatoes are around back in another area - behind the old deck. Forgot to take their photos.

daylily said:Tomatoes are around back in another area - behind the old deck. Forgot to take their photos.

Hurray for tomatoes!

Looking good, Juli!



Rick, I have drainage aisles throughout the veggie patch and I've installed pipe at the low end to funnel extra water away. At the moment we're just trying to get over a 4" overnight deluge that caused minor flooding here. The sun shone all day today, so it shouldn't take long -if we don't get too much more rain in the next few days. The Lacinato kale is in a bed that isn't raised and it's doing okay, so I'm not too worried about the rest.

Astia container squash in a big tub -only one seed out of three sprouted, but that's all I needed in there anyway.


Peas and monster radishes!



This is where the bulk of the pumpkins will go.


I'm thinning kale and beets as I use the greens, but I think I need to use them faster. Second batch of broccoli struggling along in there too.


Carrots, blue kale, peppers and Brussels sprouts -with chard along the back row.


Long beans and mustard greens under their teepee, with twigs to try to dissuade the rabbits and turkeys -and banana melons, just getting started.


What's left of the first batch of broccoli -it looks like I could have planted these much closer together.


Greens in a big horse tank (out of rabbit range, but not groundhogs). There's dill in there too, and I usually put basil in it as well.



Tomatoes. I've marked them with little cages so I don't step on them, but I'll weave them or put up fence for the long haul. Those cages won't be nearly sturdy enough for most of those plants.


Bush cukes -thinned to two per hill so far. And three types of squash that I'll probably be stepping on but I'll try to train them over to the fence. Try being the operative word...

I was making roasted veggies for dinner tonight so I sent DH out to see if he could find any potatoes (Yukon Gold), hoping he could find a few to use. Wow! He came back with a gallon bucket full and four of them were big enough for baked potatoes! We had from the garden, carrots, red and gold beets, turnips, sweet potatoes and irish potatoes. All roasted and then steamed green beans and a nice meatloaf. Just loving that we are able to eat so well from the garden now.

>> I have drainage aisles throughout the veggie patch and I've installed pipe at the low end to funnel extra water away

Cool!

I keep wishing I could find narrow-diameter corrugated perforated drainage pipe. The big kind (5"? 6"?) is much bigger than I need. I could get by with 2-3" diameter.

Chelle, everything looks great! Hope you get some relief from the rain long enough to finish planting.

Arlene, dinner at your house sure must have been yummy!

chelle, lots and lots going on in your veggie patch.

Chelle, i forgot to ask, is that just tulle on your squash or a special kind of cover cloth? I use remay/agroribbon but I hate not being able to see what's going on under it!

abhege said:Chelle, i forgot to ask, is that just tulle on your squash or a special kind of cover cloth? I use remay/agroribbon but I hate not being able to see what's going on under it!

I tried row cover and hated it. It blocks your vision and it needs to be really wet before it lets water through, plus it's heavier than necessary. So yes, it's plain old Tulle for me now. I love it! This is last year's stuff too -it's not really strong past the first year, but it does last long enough for the money spent. I get whole bolts when it's on sale.

Seedling successes and failures.

My celery has not come up (back tray). The golden beets have come up sparsely in the front two trays. But I don't remember how many seeds I put. Maybe I only sowed a seed or two in each.


Wakefield cabbage on left. Michilhi on right.


Best success from this lot. Mustard greens, Turnips and Tatsoi greens.


Straight Eaight cucumber seedlings are just about big enought to plant out. Theses are replacement plants for the Straight Eight Cucumbers I planted earlier and some animal dug up and destroyed.


These are Camilla Cucumbers in ground for weeks now. Haven't grown much but then neither have any of the other cukes. I think they want warmer weather.


Sugar Cube melons I bought as seedlings. Slow to get going also.

These two here are my biggest tomato plants. Sungold on the left and Sugery on the right. I have green tomatoes on them both.


A bloom cluster on Sweet Million. Just look at all those flowers. No wonder they called it sweet million. I have some green tomatoes on these plants also.


I have a baby pepper set on some of my pepper plants too.


This is the biggest of my pepper plants.


Here is the biggest of the eggplants. It has lots of bud break branches starting.


One of the newest to be planted eggplants. Much smaller but doing really well.

Pea blossoms and pea pods! This is Sugar Lace II.


Meantime Mammoth Melting Snow peas still have only a very few blooms. But the vines are totally out of control.


Bush beans I started myself from seeds.


I have more beans here in the square veggie garden. Tomatoes and peppers around the square. Then on the inside I have the green fence posts and some netting. Baby Yard Long beans starting to grow but not climbing yet.