tomatoes,peppers, and cucumbers

Well!  The mean old robins did it again.  They pecked my little tomato plants right out of the ground, not only that but, they pecked the little plants to pieces.  The birds are looking for worms, grubs and other tasty treats, they don't really intend to destroy my plants.  These were just a couple of inches tall.  I started them indoors just a few weeks ago and they weren't even close to the size and vigor of the plants you buy from a greenhouse.

I went to the greenhouse today to get a few tomato and pepper plants.  I came home with 6 tomato plants that I don't have room for, a dozen and half pepper plants that I don't have room for and 4 cucumber plants that I never intended to add to the garden in the first place but they will find homes at the ends of my bean trellises LOL

2 of the tomato plants and a dozen pepper plants made it into the ground today and so far the birds haven't uprooted them. yaaayyy

There are three kinds of pepper plants, a red chilli pepper, a yellow Hungarian hot pepper, and a yellow sweet banana pepper.  I have never grown or used these types before.  I think there will be a lot of pickling going on in my kitchen this fall :)  I planted all 6 of the sweet banana pepper plants so I can use them, along with cucumbers, to make my bread and butter pickles.

I plan to make some salsa as well as pickling some peppers and cucumbers to make piccalilli, both hot and mild versions will be made.  I like making catsup also but hardly ever use it so do not plan to make any.

My reason for planting only two tomato plants is that last year I planted 4 of them and half of the crop was never harvested.  I canned a dozen quarts and almost as many pints plus I dehydrated and powdered even more than that and there are still jars of tomatoes in the cupboard so I think 2 plants will be quite enough for my purposes.

Flowers and onions

 As you can see there is more buck weed and crab grass in my lawn than anything else.  I think that is a very good reason to fill up most of the yard with plants :)  Above is a pic of the lilac bush I planted last year.  It is now around 30" tall.  Just look at the blooms on it :)

 This is a mum that my son and daughter-in-law gave me last year.  It was in full bloom and was gorgeous.  I planted it within a few days of receiving it.  I guess it likes the space it was given.  It looks large enough to be divided.  I will do that this fall so I can have 2 of them. 

This is the rose bush that I received from my son and daughter-in-law last year.  It had some very pretty white roses on it last year.  This year it is bushing out nicely.  I hope there are more blooms on it this year.

There are some irises that someone planted at the NW corner of the house.  They have not bloomed since I moved in here.  I want to move them to the area where I have the other flowers planted.  Maybe they will bloom next year if they are in the sun instead of the shade where they are now.

There has not been much going on in the garden the past few days.  I did manage to get carrots, beets, herbs, and onions in.  It was a bit late for the carrots, beets and onions but I am hopeful that enough of them will grow so I can get some canned.

I got the onion sets in very late but they were above the ground in less than a week.  Must be they were shocked into growing because I kept them in the fridge until I could get them planted.  The week they were planted, it was very warm.  I planted approximately 150 of them.  Am hoping they grow into nice sized onions instead of being just green onion size.  If the onions grow to a nice size, I will dehydrate and powder them for use in my garden veggie soup.

Now all I need are some lilies and a poppy plant :)

Late start in the garden 2013

Wow the weather has finally been gracious enough to warm up and dry up enough to get some stuff planted, although a bit late.

This week I have planted blueberry plants that replace the ones I planted a few weeks earlier.  The first ones were eaten by rabbits.  The new ones have chicken wire fences around them.  HaHaHaaaa


I just got in from finishing my planting of beets.  Carrots and onions were planted a week ago and the onions are peeking up over the surface now :)  They all went in late so I am not confident that they will grow well.  If the weather stays like it has been this past week, for a while, they will be fine but if we get that awful sweltering hot hot hot that we get here almost every summer, they will not do well at all.

I started some amish paste tomatoes and several kinds of herbs for planting out.  They have been outside this past week getting strong and healthy even though they are still very small.  Got a late start on them too.  

I think the garden might be a challenge to keep up this year since it is so  much larger than last year.  The hardest part is keeping up with the canning when harvest begins.

I have been using my grass clippings and slices from the hay bales to smother grass on either side of the garden fence.  I hope this turns out like I envision instead of being a big mess like it probably will be LOL