Yesterday afternoon, I dug in and did some 'maintenance' in the garden.
First, I picked all the tomatoes that were close to ripe. I also removed a lot of the bad fruits and tossed them into the compost heap. The good ones were put on a table on the back porch. We'll be 'saucing' them.
The green beans were basically a failure this year. We were able to get a couple of good messes to eat, but weren't able to grow enough to can. The drought was just too much for them. So, I took down the short poultry netting fence I had erected around the beans to keep the rabbits out. I rolled it up and put it away, along with the electric fence posts I had hung the wire on. I then pulled all the drying plants, stripped the vines off the bean poles and piled all the vegetation in a heap. Then I pulled up all the beanpoles and stacked them up off the ground next to the shed for use next year.
Next, I pulled back the straw mulch all along the rows and also down along where I'd pulled all the onions a few weeks ago. I hoed up a nice long row and sowed turnip seed. If they germinate well, there should be plenty to store and use. We don't use a whole lot of turnips, but they are good once in a while, cooked along with mashed potatoes. Of course, they're good raw too!
I pulled a few turnips from an earlier planting and picked a few bell peppers. So now, the garden is caught up and we're just waiting to see the turnip seed sprout.
here in n.e.mississippi, i also pulled up what was left of the pole beans and the cucumber vines. have already taken care of the carrot bed. i have cabbage, bell peppers, winter squashes, eggplant, and brussel sprouts still left and still producing....but it wont be long i will be cleaning up the patch, covering it up good for the winter. i had some success with the beans, tomatoes, eggplant, bell peppers, carrots and winter squashes. my failures were the summer squashes, beets, cabbages. the tobacco and the brussel sprouts are still undecided. we are about through with the dog days of summer and entering indian summer/harvesting time. the nights are now hitting the low sixties and the days are now in the low eighties. i think i am gonna go find my extra beet seed and maybe give them another try.
ReplyDeleteSounds like a great effort and a great garden! I'm thinking, too, about sowing a row of beets. Thanks for checking in.
ReplyDeletemy garden experience this summer was unique that is for sure. i grew only what i would be putting up and preserving for two adults in their middle years. i had a good variety but only a few plants of each...4 brussel sprout plants, six tomatoe plants, four bell pepper and eggplants, a window box full of carrots, four cabbages, a whole winter squash bed full of six varieties incl. pumpkin with only two to three vines of each. one giant pot of cucumber vine..and three teepees of pole beans. i had to water most everything twice a day through the worse of this summer. no weeding though..everything is mulched well in woodchips and pine straw. my garden was made up of old tires, large sunken planters and old landscape timbers we had piled up. nothing fancy but looked real nice once things started growing and producing. i remember as a kid helping with the veg. garden my dad always had...big enough to feed twelve people through the year. and we had lots of bees all summer long-i think it was the bees that made my gardening experience so unique this year. i dont have bee hives but maybe i should.
ReplyDeleteI feel your pain on the green beans. My beans were doomed from the start. I couldn't keep enough water on them and then the grasshopper came in and stripped everything in garden. All you can do is clean it up and wait for another year to fight. With any luck at all next year will be better.
ReplyDeleteWe were fortunate in that we had a couple dozen quarts left from last year. I added a case of the big "V-8 Juice" sized cans from our local stocking up store, and will add another in the next few weeks. Those should tide us over, as you say, until next year, when we'll be planting again!! Thanks for checking in.
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