2018 Garden Planner
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- Weather: Seasonably hot and humid days broken by thunderstorms, producing locally heavy downpours and followed by milder and less humid pleasant days.
- Cucumbers: Plants are all healthy and climbing upon the chicken wire fence. I harvested about a dozen fruit. I sprayed with a diluted mix of 1 tbsp of neem oil and 1 tbsp of potassium bicarbonate to prevent powdery mildew.
- Asian pole beans: Growing healthy and vertically up the chicken wire. Saw the first kidney shaped flower today.
- Tomatoes: One of the Fourth-Of-July plants produced two small tomatoes which were ripe by independence day. Many other green fruits are still maturing. Big Beefs are nearing five feet tall with many flowers and maturing fruits. Cherry tomato varieties are also showing vigor with numerous flowers and quickly maturing fruit.
- Okra: Plants are between two and three feet tall. Starting to flower and produce pods.
- Onions: Candy plants started to get yellow tips about a week ago and tops started to fall this weekend. Size is just a bit underwhelming considering the ample rain we have had. Curing now under the shade of the patio table. Red Ace varieties continue to grow and are beginning to bulb. I am considering adding bone meal to stimulate bulb growth.
- Broccoli and Kale: Plant growth is vigorous. The majority of the broccoli plants produced primary heads larger than four inches in diameter. I filled two gallon Ziploc bags after trimming. Side shoot production began almost immediately thereafter.
- Brussels sprouts: Three groupings have produced specimens large enough to be thinned to one plant. Growth of another four was lagging. An eighth and ninth grouping has been destroyed by vermin.
- Spinach and shelling beans: The spinach has finished flowering for the most part and plants are now beginning to yellow and dry providing upright support to the bean plants which have flowered.
- Bush green beans: Flowered and producing prolifically. Collected four gallons so far.
- Popcorn: Plants are around four feet tall.
- Sunflowers: Plants are between five and six feet tall. Flower heads are beginning to form.
- Summer squash: Plant vigor is healthy despite a few leaves having powdery mildew. I sprayed with fungicide. Yellow squash plant has produced two fruits. All plants have recently flowered prolifically.
- Potato: I found three adult Colorado Potato Beetles feeding on foliage along with many grubs in different stages of growth and several clusters of eggs. Drowned all in soapy water. Plant vigor is kind of floppy.
- Garlic: I have harvested all but two of the plants’ scapes for cooking. Plants are healthy and five feet tall. I hope there are bulbs growing.
- Strawberries: I pulled all of the Jewel plants as they are showing little resistance to the leaf spot fungus. I renovated the Earlyglow and Sparkle varieties, pulling much of last year’s runner spawned growth out of the beds. I saved several and transplanted these to where the Jewel plants were. I sprayed all plants with the home made
fungicide to inhibit leaf spot. Albion everbearing plants have started to produce new flowers.
- Raspberries: The few flouricanes of the Killarney plants have produced fruits. First year cane growth is prolific. One Anne floricane is also producing fruit. I sprayed all growth with the fungicide although I am not sure that what is killing the floricanes prematurely is a fungal problem I fear that I may have raspberry root rot.
- Ambience: Dragonflies are numerous. Bumblebees feed on the purple flowers of the vetch which grows upon drying stalks of rye whose full heads droop and bob in the breeze. Cicadas have begun to sing in the afternoons. Fireflies are dazzling abundantly after dusk.
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