Here Come the Veg!

[Aggie]

After a couple of months of sponging off the weeds and last year's crops, I've finally moved onto the early summer veg. Tonight I'm having snow peas and garlic scapes fresh from the garden.

[Opsa]

Hey! Thread revived nearly a year later, thanks Aggie!

We've been enjoying some super awesome lettuce from our garden for the past two weeks or so. We have some butterhead and salad bowl, and all the rain has made them very sweet and succulent. I never thought I'd rave about lettuce, but this stuff is tremendous this year.

I also have some butter crunch just getting to the picking point, now.

I got an heirloom tomato plant from a friend that has quite a few fruit, but it's still too small and green. I also have a hybrid called "Cherokee Purple" which has blossomed and only just started to fruit.

I have three sweet pepper plants which may be any color, and the suspense is killing me, but they have been dropping blossom. Too much rain, maybe? Or maybe the temps have not been consistently warm enough yet.

[Aggie]

Hey, the veg came back after nearly a year!

I think I actually was without fresh garden produce only for about 4 months this year, and will likely aim to extend the season further this year.

My lettuce self-seeded last year, so there's plenty of it around.  The baby slugs are enjoying it immensely.

I've put a few of my peppers and tomatoes out, and they are doing fine, so I should really finish planting ASAP.

[Opsa]

Howzit going? Didja get them all in?

I'm putting in two photos taken from the fronts of the raised veg beds.

The first is from the south bed (rabbits), where the lettuces are. Behind them you can see the warm toned cosmos, which are just starting to bud.

The second is from the east bed (dragon) where the tomatoes and peppers are in cages, plus basil and white sage. The peppers are now keeping their fruit, so they must be happier with the warm weather.

The spiky things at the back of each bed are red gladioli, but they haven't budded yet.

Ooh! Editing to tell Aggie that the sacred tobacco seeds he sent last year finally germinated in some window boxes where I had planted geraniums this year. All kinds of things appeared in those boxes, like portulaca, feverfew, lemon balm and mullein. Even geraniums (who knew?)! But I know that I sowed the nicotiana rustica in there last year, and I can tell by the leaves that that's what they are. I'm thrilled to see them!

[pieces o nine]

Those gardens look great.

[Opsa]

They have really taken off now and are going into the mid-summer overdrive.

I took the photos below this morning. The first one is of the East Bed again, but taken from just behind the South bed. The glads have just started to bloom, but look beyond them and the golden cosmos, and you can see that the tomatoes and peppers have grown quite a lot in the past two weeks or so. We have harvested just two tomatoes and two peppers so far, but there are loads more coming along. The Cherokee purple tomatoes are huje but have not rosied up yet.

The photo below that is of a sacred tobacco flowering.

[pieces o nine]

lovely!

[Aggie]

Your tobacco is far ahead of mine.  I've decided to grow it in a pot this year, and need to thin more aggressively soon.

[Opsa]

All the recent rain here has made everything grow rapidly here. Including the mildew! 

I have sunflower plants that are probably seven feet tall with no sign of flowering, yet.

[Opsa]

Those beds, which looked so tidy then, have now overgrown.

Today I tried something new for me. I cleared out the old lettuce plants and sowed new lettuce and spinach seeds. I am hoping for a fall harvest.

[Aggie]

I've let much of last year's garden run to seed, so I need to start harvesting and scattering those seeds soon.  I intend to make it so that half my weeds are vegetables by next year.

[Opsa]

Good plan!



I have seeds to harvest, too. The sacred tobacco did really well this year, and there are lots of fat pods on them that need collecting. I like to collect the spent leaves from them rather than clip and dry them. For some reason I like to think that they that ripened on the vine goodness. I haven't tried any yet, but previous tiny crops that were vine ripened were made very sweet smoke with none of the harshness that some people complain about. I do not smoke them in a pipe or cigarette, but have been known to sneak/share some sips of smoke with the Great Everything just by holding a shriveled brown leaf in my hand and lighting one end. It burns slowly and does not make one stoned, but I definitely get a sense of natural communion with it. But of course, I have to smudge first and make sure I am in a fabulous frame of mind to do this, as this is not meant for recreation, but contemplation. Haven't made a smudge in a while, though.

[Opsa]

:UPDATE:

Heyo! I have spinach sprouts! Now all they have to do is survive the rest of summer. I hope they make it!

I may have some lettuce as well, but it's hard to say, since they are so small.

I have collected seeds from the gold cosmos and the purple larkspur. I noticed pods on the columbine out front, which I should gather soon.

[Opsa]

Only three of those previous spinach sprouts remain. I think high temps we had here killed them in the interim. Last week I tried another couple of rows, and again have sprouts. Maybe these will stay!

[Aggie]

I've got daikon radish and another brassica sprouting in my winter garden bed. Presumably it's cherry belle radishes or kale, although I also planted wasabi greens and another kale variety, plus chard, in the same general area.  Definitely not the chard yet, though.