It's Time for the Veggie Report

My veggies seem to be doing fairly well. Last year, I built the beds over my summer vacation, which was in June, and then a friend with a Bobcat very kindly offered to help me fill the beds with the topsoil I had ordered and to lay down the rock between the beds (whew!). By the time all that was done, it was July, and I just started planting. Most of my vegetables did well last year except the peas, which apparently like being cold. Who knew? But, if you're from my zone or nearby, at least you know you can still plant veggies from seed in early July and still get a decent crop.

I'm anxious to see the difference in the harvest - both in terms of quantity and timing - between this year and last. Last year was the first year I put in a big garden by myself. In 2007, I just put in tomatoes, cukes, and zucchini. In 2006, it was still my Dad's garden.

Kentucky Wonder pole beans (green snap beans) are just starting to climb my handstrung trellis; and Royal Burgundy bush beans. I imagine next year I can get in two rows of bush beans in this bed.

Sugar Snap peas climbing the trellis and Detroit Dark Red beets. The broad-leaf plants are borage which has been self-seeding in the yard forever. Never know where it will turn up and I didn't want to pull them until I knew there were other borage plants around (there are, so these should go).

In the top photo of this post, you can see my raised flower beds on the far left. They've got sweet peas, morning glories, mini sunflowers, and marigolds. Still pretty small. They should really get going by mid-July.

National Pickling cucumbers and you bet I'll be putting up dill pickles in August!

Tomatoes. The four plants in the foreground are Lemon Boy; and the four plants in the background are Super Fantastic. I also have one Green Tiger tomato and one Sweet Millions. And, oooh, I forgot to take a picture of my early Jalepenos. They are in barrels just across the sidewalk from the tomatoes.

Dark Green Zucchini. These have really taken off in the last week.

This is my saddest bed :-( I wanted to try growing garlic because almost all garlic in our supermarkets come from China. I've been buying processed garlic in the jars because these are products of Canada, and the only preservative is oil. I wanted to try preserving my own garlic, but it didn't come up. Apparently garlic is best planted in fall, but I don't know if that holds true for our zone, which is basically sub-Arctic. I might try putting in a batch in the fall, just to see what happens. In the meantime, my onions and dill are doing well. Those sad little yellow plants are squashes (Honey Bear and Butternut) that I picked up at Canadian Tire. Hoping they'll still take. And, you can see row of tiny little plants to the left of centre - more Detroit Dark Red beets. In August, I will make a big batch of bortsch (last year, 4 gallons worth) and freeze it for the winter. The beets in the beet bed looked pretty thin, so I thought I would put in an extra row here.

And my herb garden is doing well - the Scarlet Runner Beans are up and should start climbing the trellis this week.

The saskatoons are coming along nicely, but I may have to cover them with netting to protect them from the birds. I had a flock of them playing in my yard today.

My Auntie Mary - my mom's sister - stopped by this morning and said that my garden looks better than hers (that's a once in a lifetime occurence, trust me!) and that she is proud of me for all my hard work. That was very nice to hear.