June Garden Update

Here's a quick update on the garden....

The Good.
We have more zucchini & yellow squash than we know what to do with. The plants have really taken over their bed. We already have multiple loaves of zucchini bread in the freezer. Feel free to pass along your summer squash recipes. I'm harvesting cukes and peppers (both sweet and hot). The lettuce is growing tall and will likely bolt before we can pick and eat it all. 2 rows of lettuce is definitely enough! Beets continue to grow, I've picked a few and made some yummy pickled beets...Mmmmm. Lots of green tomatoes! I'll keep them on the vine as opposed to frying them

The Bad.
The green beans got hit hard by the late freeze. Only a few plants survived so I decided to let them go and produce some seeds I can plant later on this fall (and not have to buy them later too). They're next to the summer squash so they are being pushed over and crowded out a bit. I hope I'll be able to save enough seeds for a few rows. Some of the onions have been hit hard by the hot weather so I harvested the ones without green tops. They'll make great pearl onion for chicken pot pie! There are a few onions left that I hope will grow fat and taste great on a hamburger.

The Ugly.
I pulled the cabbages out. The cabbage worms had bellied up to the buffet and were having their way. I didn't want to use insecticides so I just pulled them. Cabbages grow great over the winter here so I figured I would just delay planting new ones until this fall. I replaced them with some Japanese eggplants. They're doing much better! The garlic also got hit hard by the scorching heat. Without soaker hoses where I planted them, they just didn't get enough water. Chalk it up as experience but in only a few short months I'll be planting more.

I hope your garden is doing as well as mine. I think the key this year had been then soaker hoses in the beds and the fresh compost courtesy of the City of Columbia.