sir archely

So I said I probably wouldn't post about the boring middle of the road stuff where the plants just grow, and I just tend them, and that's all there is.

Well...... recently I went away for a week to California for vacation. During my time away, I fretted like a new parent over the state of my garden. Was it raining in Buffalo today? How about tomorrow? Is there a way I can look up past rainfall for my area rather than predicted future? (As an aside, you'd think it'd be much easier to find the historic certainty of how much rain fell, but apparently we are far more concerned with our guesses for tomorrow.) Well, I should have known not to worry, and that the plants are far smarter than I am about growing. Nature had things covered.



The first pic is just one of some marigolds that decided to bloom like crazy while I was gone. Hopefully they will continue blooming well through the summer. Marigolds are apparently quite friendly flowers, and have all kinds of benefits for vegetable gardens, especially if you plant them next to the potatoes. Well, the marigolds are doing wonderfully, but only three of the potatoes survived. I'll cover in the area where they were supposed to go with either more marigolds or some nasturtium (also a beneficial flower).

The other pic is... dun dun dunnnnn... Food!!! from my garden! I returned from vacation at about 12:30 am and wasn't settled in until 1, at which time I decided I just could not wait until morning to check things out in the beds. I went out with a flashlight and found pea pods hanging from my peas. Hooray! This is a small plate of them that I brought in and washed and stuck in the fridge. Quite a number were also mysteriously eaten on the way into the house. These past few days have brought more peas ripening... and somehow they never make it into the house. I have yet to add to the bag in the fridge, but I've been having a great time eating straight from the plants.

I've also got quite a few heads of lettuce which will be about ready to harvest in not too many days, and the zuchini are starting to form fruits. This morning I planted my spare tomato plants in the spot left by vanishing spinach (and gave the extra one to our neighbor). Also added in my spare eggplant to the space left by disappearing mesclun mix, and put in an extra celery where one had perished, strangled by the reaching fingers of the peas.

Just a few days ago I thinned out the carrots, bush beans, and onions to the proper distance from one another. Some of the tomato plants are likely too close to one another or the peppers I mixed them up with, but oh well. The tomatillos are also coming along quite nicely, flowering already, so I should see something starting on those as well.

Hooray for a real (mini)harvest!