By far, the most successful item has been the cherry tomatoes. I bought four small plants, and expected a modest haul. I don't actually eat tomatoes, and Dave goes easy on them.
But the plants ended up growing more than five feet tall and have branched out in every direction. They survived a crazy-pants wind storm and are producing fruit like there's no tomorrow. I get about 10-20 tomatoes every day and I'm giving them away to everyone I know - family, neighbours, coworkers. Next year, I think I'll stick to two plants.
Next up are the purple peppers. I bought two plants, just for fun (they were PURPLE!!!) and didn't expect much. We've never had much luck with peppers. I got one very small pepper back in June, and figured that was about it. Then all of a sudden, mid July the darn thing started flowering again.
This is the third pepper! I'm leaving this one for a few more days, just to see if it gets any bigger. The first two have been very small (no more than three or four inches long). I'm not complaining though - I didn't expect any peppers, really.
The strawberries have been surprising too. At first, it seemed like I was only going to get one measley berry or two. But then all of a sudden, come the end of July, these four plants perked right up and started blooming left and right.
The berries are tiny - but every day, I get a little delicious treat to munch on when I pick my tomatoes.
When I started planting, I figured the yellow beans were going to be the big winner. The plants were healthy, and blooming like crazy. Now the harvest hasn't been terrible, but it didn't really result in more than a couple of handfuls of beans (all of which Dave ate raw as soon as I picked them)
These are probably the last harvest (along with today's tomatoes!) Admittedly, the beans had it a bit harder than the rest of the plants in the garden. They were planted just under the overhang of the house eaves, so they didn't always get the same amount of rain as the rest of the plants. Half of them were also right beside the dryer vent, which may have provided a little too much heat for their liking.
Now savvy readers may be thinking... "hey you planted onions - what about the onions???"
Yeah... sorry friends, the onions were out of the game pretty early. I decided to thin them out in late June, and well.. they just weren't the same after that. They pretty much all withered and died. I'll try again next year.
And speaking of next year, do any of you gardeners out there have any tips on helping my strawberries to survive the winter? I think I'll get bigger berries next year, if I can just keep these plants going!
4 comments:
Yum! I really miss having buckets of cherry tomatoes warm from the sun to snack on. I forgot to plant them this year and the big ones did nothing but rot on the vine. I can't get my peppers to grow big either. I only get tiny versions of what you see in the stores and have no idea why.
As for your strawberries, I always covered mine with straw for the winter, but you are in Canada and I am way down here in Maryland. We barely get a decent freeze down here. I wonder if a layer of newspapers under some straw would do it?
I have no advice for the veggies, but the beans sure do look good.
Steve is growing hot, hot, HOT peppers this year. They are just getting started.
Summer is much too hot for veggie growing, but the fall and winter are nearly perfect.
Next year .....I'm doing PUMPKINS!
It all looks good to me. Happy harvesting!
Do you eat things with tomato sauce? One solution to your tomato excess would be roast the tomatoes, make them into sauce (roasting reduces the simmer time enormously by dewatering the tomatoes) and then have a nice pizza or pasta with your own homemade sauce.
I love fresh tomatoes- pity I can't help you out there! (But I have a neighbor with lots of tomatoes who shares, and lots of farm stands so I'm not deprived!)
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