Garden Update: July

We’re just starting to really harvest the garden around here - planting the garden 3 weeks late means the harvest is 3 weeks later. The weather has been rather uncooperative too - too much rain, too much humidity. Mushrooms abound in our yard.

Tomatoes
It’s another rough year for tomatoes. There are tomatoes ripening,but not as many as I would have hoped. Even with the delay I would have expected more by now, especially with the cherry tomatoes. And there aren’t nearly as many green ones either. The blight is taking its toll on the plants lower halves, they are just decimated. I picked the diseased leaves off an left them pretty much bare on the bottom.

Cucumbers, Herbs, Radishes
The cucumber vines are long and climbing, the powdery mildew hasn’t set in yet (finger crossed). There are plenty of flowers but no cucumbers yet. The herbs like this hot wet weather. The radishes have been doing amazing up until the last heatwave, we were eating them several times a week. They are bolting now and taking over so their season is pretty much over... it's amazing how big they get so fast - there are only a few left and those greens are taking over.

Flowers
The Alyssum has turned into a beautiful carpet of white. There are two tomato plants blooming in the Alyssum and I’m just going to let them go. The impatiens are finally starting to grow too with pretty red flowers. The zinnias finally bloomed last week and I had my first (and second) harvest of flowers.

Elsewhere in the yard
The raspberries in their new location did so well this year, we were picking handfuls and bowlfuls daily. The blueberries had their first real crop as well, it was delightful. I barely ever got a picture of the berries because the boys would eat them right away. The blackberries are just starting to ripen as well. They are tart but sweeter than other years, Oliver loves the tartness. The citrus trees are full of green leaves but a horrible chipmunk took off all the baby lemons and limes.