End of July

This is the Year of the Shovel.  Speaking for myself of course.  First there was the levee repair.  12 cubic yards of soil delivered, loaded onto the cart, towed by the garden tractor out to the levee and put into the gash.   Then wire was run from the house to the pole barn.  To do that a two foot deep trench was dug from the house to the barn, about 80 feet.  I still need to get another truckload of soil (I'm trying not to call it dirt), about 6 more yards, to do some finishing work on the levee.  One of these days.

My main occupation in the garden at this time is removing foliage.  There's been plenty of rain so far and I've only needed to water a few times.  The Kentucky Wonder pole beans never stop growing.  On Thursday I got the first small picking of beans from them.  While picking the beans I kept snipping out new vines, any leaves damaged by Japanese beetles or rust.  I had to do that just to find the beans.

The Honey Bear acorn squash has quite simply gone nuts.  Last year it would not grow and this year it takes up about 25 square feet.  A compact bush habit?  Hah.  I've been removing vines when they escape the bed.  And it's doing a real good job of keeping the lone summer squash plant under control by crowding it.  Come to think of it I may always plant summer squash after the winter squash to keep those zucchinis in their place.

For reference the pole beans on the left are a bit over 6 feet high.  The acorn squash is in the center and the summer squash occupies a corner on the right.  Then I took a picture from the other side of the bed.

This plant covers a bed about 5 feet wide.  It comes up to my chest.  I can only hope that the borer hasn't gotten to it.  I was spraying the main stem with Bt once a week, but now I can't even find the main stem.  Here's a nice "acorn" hanging over the edge of the bed:

The butternut squash is free to ramble out over the "barrens" near the pond. Now it's setting some butternuts.

The Teksukabotu squash is growing from the same bed.  This squash has the largest flowers I've ever seen on a squash.  Here's a fruit growing on the trellis:

l want to make some chili powder this year.  I made a small batch last year and it is much better than the storebought powder.  This is the ancho pepper plant.  The anchos are sizing up very nicely this year.

The Holy Mole pepper plant has set out 7 or 8 nice peppers, some of them nearly a foot long.  It's a Pasilla pepper.  I'll have to buy some New Mexico chiles.  Next year I'll grow some Anaheims and use those instead of the store bought chiles.

Soon I'll get a bunch of tomatoes, enough to make salsa.  There's plenty of Jalapeno's for that.  There will be some San Marzano tomatoes, but if there's not enough of them I'll use the Supersonic tomatoes.  This tomato is also very meaty, with few watery seed cavities.  This is one that I picked a few days ago and sliced open: