Garden Journal - June 15, 2016

Things are finally taking off in the garden....well, most things. It pains me to admit this, but I "gave up" on my ancho pepper (poblano) plants, which I grew from seed. They barely budged in growth and they had leaves spotted yellow. They should be much bigger by now and I've declared this "The Year of Pepper Success" (after years of "Pepper Failure") in the garden. So, I hung my head in shame and marched on over to one of the local nurseries and bought four ancho pepper plants. Tearing out my old plants tore out my heart....but gardening involves lots of failure. It's just the nature of things, I suppose.

See the latest garden tour in the video below.

This phase of the gardening season is filled with so much anticipation and a little anxiety. It feels good to see how things are starting to grow and bloom and bear fruit, but in the back of my mind I know that my garden is only as good as my ability to handle the next garden pest or disease. Being observant and acting quickly to address issues can be the difference between a mediocre harvest and a great one.

A couple of issues in the garden came up recently - leaf miners and slugs. The leaf miners have been digging tunnels in my beets, sorrel and nasturtium leaves. They're nasty. I wrote a post about how to get rid of them. They're pretty persistent though, and I still have them to some degree in my nasturtium. 

The slugs were having a ball with my basil, sunflowers and a couple of pepper plants. Just chewing and chewing holes. What did I do? I got them drunk and threw up barricades of eggshells. Thankfully, it worked! I haven't seen them since I did this, and I hope to not see them return.

I'm happy that in both cases, I was able to use organic/natural methods to deter pests. It's an important part of producing food. For me, if I can't do it this way, I don't want to do it at all.

Garden Highlights

• Caiman, Monica and Sun Gold tomatoes have fruit on them.
• My sad-looking lettuce that I grew from seed indoors is actually flourishing. I've had a couple of harvests of that and my beet microgreens so far.
• Bell peppers are starting to show signs of fruit.
• I replaced my previous ancho peppers with new transplants and while I was at it, made an impulse buy of banana pepper plants.
• The celery root that I grew from seed and wasn't hopeful about because they were so small for so long are looking fabulous.
• Leaf miner and slugs have been plaguing me, but I'm managing the issues.
• Cucumbers are really looking good. Please let this be the year my cucumbers are successful!!
• Squash is blooming - mostly with male flowers. Hoping some of the ladies start to show up to the party so we can have some great zucchini and yellow squash soon.

Tour the garden as it looks on June 15th

Potatoes growing in sacks

Raised beds are coming along.

That's it for now. Happy Gardening! Let me know how your garden is growing.