Garden Update

(Or, How I learned To Stop Worrying And Love Zucchini)

The zucchini glut continues *sigh*,  but they are so neutral you can throw them in just about anything.  In addition to the usual suspects, I made a zucchini chocolate cake this week - be still my thighs!  There have been enough tomatoes to share a few with a tomato starved friend but, I'd like to see some more of the Early Girls ripen.

Everything is growing right along in their self-watering containers.

My garden-helper won't sit still for a picture, but always has a smile.

The melon vines are climbing/running everywhere.

They're lush and pretty with their bright yellow flowers.

Cantaloupe and Honeydew cousins growing side-by-side.

Big melon, little melon.

Two happy cantaloupes. 

A long, skinny one.

This baby is way ahead of the others, I fondle it daily looking for signs of ripening.  

 I like fondling my melons.

Sugar Baby watermelon vine.

Baby Sugar Baby.

I just love the Dusky eggplant plant, so full and robust.

Baby eggplant.

I'm pretty sure the mystery plants in with carrots are brocolli.  They seems to be co-existing well.

The lonely zucchini.

The hanging tomatoes want to grow upwards before they get heavy and droop down.  I support the thicker parts of the stems with a loop of garden tape so that they don't snap under their own weight.  Yes, I learned to do that from experience.

These two monster zucchinis are almost in the pool.

I've resorted to shredding and freezing the excess bounty.  

I can only cook and give away so much.

Weekend Harvest

It was a good garden weekend!

I picked a bunch of lettuce and beet greens for a salad and we had lots of cherry tomatoes to go with them.  The beet greens are so delicious with just a little vinaigrette, can't wait to eat the beets.

And-drum roll please-the first big tomatoes!

They were a little cracked from the (now corrected) inconsistent watering, but there was no blossom-end rot.

And they tasted fabulous!  You forget how wonderful that fresh off the vine taste is.  We made some BLT's ( real, not turkey bacon!) with avocado and some more garden greens.  Decadent and delicious.

Baby Melons

  They are just so cute, I had to take a picture.

The vines are loaded with flowers and little baby melons but, these two are the are far ahead of the rest.

The cantaloupe has such a pretty mottled green color and is now as big as softball.

The vines have a wonderful melon-y smell when you are up close.

This honeydew baby is bigger than his cousin-a softball on steriods!

The Daily Zucchini

   It's good thing we like zucchini, I mean REALLY like zucchini but, it is a challenge to use it all up.  This week we've had  zucchini frittatas,  grilled zucchini,  and stuffed zucchini.  There are still three more good-sized ones in the fridge and lurking under the leaves are four or five more that will need to picked before the weekend is over.   I've heard you can add shredded zucchini to brownie batter, hmmm......

Blossom-End Rot

The scourge of tomato growers everywhere can be especially troublesome in container-grown tomatoes.  If the uptake of calcium to the growing tomato is interrupted by dry (or unhealthy) soil the result is blossom-end rot. 

When these tomatoes where planted in early March, it was fairly cool and the three times weekly watering was fine.  But, when they started getting larger and the temperatures got higher, I allowed the soil to dry out one hot weekend.  BIG MISTAKE.   

Luckily, the first time I noticed some wilting on the plants I adjusted the watering timer so that they would not dry out, EVER, and the damage was contained to just a few of the developing tomatoes.  

I'm not saying that you want your plants to be soaked at all times.  You never want your plants to sit in soaking-wet ground for long periods, they will drown and die eventually.  What you want is evenly moist soil, and in containers with good drainage, that requires constant attention.

All this water draining out of the bottom of the container will leach nutrients out with it, so be sure to supplement with some kind fertilizer.  I use 1/2 strength Miracle Grow twice a week, but there are many other methods, use what works for you.

What We Did This Weekend

It is starting to get seriously hot here so, it was time to finally finish automating the watering system for the container garden.  

First we picked up a couple more tomatoes, another Early Girl (right), because I suspect the first two we bought were mislabled.  They are larger than any Early Girls I have grown and don't show any signs of ripening yet.  Also a Better Boy (left) for variety.  

I made two more Home Depot bucket - self watering containers.  They look so tacky, next year they get painted white.

Everywhere we have tapped into the watering system, the line is right under the rocks.  Not here though.  It was at least eight inches down and under a PVC pipe.  With the constant water pressure, the hole we dug filled right up when we poked a hole into the water line,  so we had to put the connectors in by feel.

Our resident hole-digging expert, Daisy, checking out our work.

"Let me just adjust this line for you."

Once we passed inspection, we ran the line through the melons and spliced in a couple of bubblers.

 

The we went down the line splicing in T's and ran a line sraight down into the watering tubes.

This is the Dusky Eggplant looking very sturdy and healthy.  

Then some final inspections from supervisor Daisy,

and her partner, Dude.

The final, classy looking, results.

(click pic for bigger view)

Left to right:

Bush Bean "Contender"

(That green tub is also a self waterer.)

Tomato "Better Boy"

Red and golden beets (black pot)

Tomato "Early Girl"

Eggplant "Dusky"

"Baby Finger" carrots (white pot)

"Bush Star" melon

Honeydew and cantaloupe

Lemon cucumber

"Sugar Baby" watermelon

First Harvest

It is so gratifying to just walk out the door and pick some of the fruits of your labor.  Meager as they may be right now.

On May 12th we had our first harvest. 

 We grilled the zucchini and dressed the red romaine and beet greens with a little vinaigrette.  The zucchini flowers were just garnish.  Not enough to justify stuffing and frying them.   

The first tomatoes!  Yay!

The zucchini is producing like crazy!  Just one week after we picked the first one we are already tired of grilling it.

I made an eggless tempura batter and fried this batch up.  Since we don't do fried food much, it was a real treat.

Seeds Of Frustration

My attempts at growing from seed have not been very successful.  It was just too hot and dry outside to keep them evenly moist.  I'll try again with some cool season seeds in the fall.

Clockwise from the white bucket:  

Carrots (and mystery plants)

Green Onions

Red Leaf Lettuce 

Beets

Mesclun Mix

Watermelon "Sugar Baby"

Lemon Cucumbers

Bush Beans (not shown)

The red leaf lettuce is struggling in the heat but we have enjoyed the little bit we've had.

I've moved it to a semi-shady spot under the tomatoes.  It's stopped wilting (and growing). 

I sprinkled an entire packet of "Baby Finger" carrot seeds in here and they sprouted along with some mystery seedlings.  I thought they might have been radishes and was going to leave them but after a couple weeks it was pretty obvious they weren't so I pinched them all off except for two because I am curious what they will turn out to be.

The lemon cucumbers and watermelons are in self waterers and are doing great.  I wish everything were in those things, they are so carefree, just keep the bottom full of water and the soil stays evenly moist.  Next year!

So What Else Is Growing?

Honeydew Melon (rear) and Cantaloupe in another storage tub.

This pic was taken April 21.

This is May 2.  Spreading out nicely and there are several flowers blooming under the leaves.

I wonder if cross pollination will be a problem?  I am I going to get some kind of mutant melons?  Honeyloupes?  Cantadews?  Too late to worry about that now I guess.

Just one week later.  They completely fill the bin and are starting to climb whatever is near.  The wire shelf in the back of the picture works well to keep them out of the shrubs.  I'll put another trellis in front to keep the dogs from trampling on them.

A Note About Potting Soil

Most potting soils are very slow to absorb water the first time.  This seems to be especially true for this Miracle Grow Moisture Control.  The wet soil in the cups on the bottom of my containers just wasn't enough to start the wicking process upwards.   Once I gave a good watering from above it worked fine and the soil is staying evenly moist throughout the container.