The Summer Bounty Begins!

It's early June now, and the heat has definitely arrived, along with the summer staples of the vegetable garden! This week we're eating cucumbers, tomatoes, and the first of the summer squash (finally!). We've got blooming flowers for the pollinators and herbs in full swing. Welcome to summer!

I have pulled up the bolted lettuce and the green peas, which were lovely while they lasted, and replaced them with glass gem corn and cow peas, both of which have already sprouted in their raised bed. I'll be planting more cow peas once the vine borers bring their usual doom to the squash beds, probably by early July. This will be my first time growing corn, and I have chosen glass gem just to do something really different and provide some support stalks for the black-eyed and purple hull peas.

The heat and rain have given the other summer vegetables their rocket fuel boost after the cold spring. So far the lemon cucumber is the champ of the garden. It's 8 feet tall and loaded with flowers and baby cukes. The dragon's egg plants are the slowpokes - will we actually get to eat dragon's egg cucumbers this year? We'll see! Both the DAR and Salad Slicer are producing, so we don't have a shortage even if the dragon's egg disappoints us. The lemon cucumbers are fun with their round shape but taste just like regular cucumbers. They're very mild and add a nice crunch to a dish.

Husky Cherry Red tomato plants are producing a slow but steady stream of fruit. It takes a few days to get enough to make a meal, but we do get there. The heirlooms are growing quickly; I hope by July they will be yielding. I love a big dish of different colored cherry tomatoes! Right now we are eating the red ones with pasta or in tomato cucumber salad, both summer standards at our house.

I was super excited this morning to pick the first of the lemon squash, two little beauties with gorgeous color. They look like Christmas ornaments. We'll be eating them tonight to find out how they taste. So far I have been hand pollinating the squash in an effort to ensure some yield. The zucchini is finally taking off, though, so I might soon have all the squash we can eat with just the pollinators taking care of it. I'm hopeful that the white scallop now has at least one pollinated blossom going, so maybe next week we'll get to harvest the first one.

The flower garden is also taking off, with more daylilies blooming and lots of color in the pollinator patch. Liatris is in bloom, too, and I am seeing a lot more pollinator activity during my daily garden checks. The flower areas are more chaotic this year than I had originally intended due to the pandemic, but we're letting it be a little wild with more clover and less mowing to help the pollinators while we consider the long range plan for the beds.

Next week I hope to check in with more cucumber and squash progress!

* Just this week found out about Baker Creek Seeds' crazy attempt to invite Cliven Bundy to be a speaker a while back. I'm not throwing away seeds I already bought but won't be linking to them or buying from them in the future. There are plenty of other places to buy seeds that are more in harmony with my values as a consumer!

2020 Planting Record: February 11

The first round of lettuce has sprouted in the raised bed, but the Lincoln green peas have not yet shown any signs of germination, so I ventured out this morning while it wasn't raining to get a few more cool crop seeds started.

Seeds planted on Tuesday, February 11, 2020:

Salad Bowl Lettuce (Burpee)
Little Gem Lettuce (Baker Creek)
Garden Sweet Green Peas (Burpee)
Parisienne Carrots (Baker Creek)
Little Finger Carrots (Baker Creek)

Except for the Little Gem Lettuce, all of these are seeds left over from last year, so I expect slightly lower germination rates. So far all three of my lettuce varieties are sprouting nicely, and I'd like to have at least a second round of lettuce before it gets too hot.

Last year the Garden Sweet Green Peas were a bit hit and grew readily, and I'm feeling impatient about the Lincoln peas not sprouting yet. We'll see if this new round of Garden Sweet takes off!

Garden Sweet Peas from 2019

I have yet to have any luck at all with carrots, but since I have the seeds I am giving them one more go. It's a bit early to sow them, but my garden is very sheltered with its narrow space and high privacy fence, and I've got more of the seeds in a large pot that can be moved if some truly terrible weather heads our way. I would really like to grow a few decent carrots!

The problem with cool weather crops here in North Alabama is that our winters are wildly variable and spring gets very warm very quickly. We can have 60-70 degree days throughout the winter and then rocket up to 90 degrees early in the spring and stay there through October. I often wonder if our planting schedules and general advice really take the effects of climate change into account. I'm experimenting with the carrot seeds to see if I have any better luck with them by planting them in weather that feels more like a typical old-fashioned spring than our actual spring feels like these days.

2020 Garden Update: February 10

We've had wet, warm weather much of the last week here in North Alabama, which means lots of plants are sprouting and growing outdoors. With a cold snap moving in this week, I'm hopeful that my sheltered backyard will be protected from the worst of any frost, but the only seeds already planted there (green peas and lettuces) are cold hardy, anyway. Still, there has been plenty to do whenever the sun comes out!

My indoor seeds are doing well, with the Purple Bumblebee tomatoes germinating really nicely in spite of being seeds left over from last year. The sunflower and cucumber seeds are also sprouting robustly. Hopefully the few stragglers will make an appearance soon. The zucchini, the Purple Russian tomatoes, and the straightneck yellow squash are the only seeds not to show any signs of life yet, and all of those are also leftovers from last year.

Outdoors we are slowly bringing in garden soil for the raised beds (always a big expense and a lot of work when you have to start from scratch!). We went back to the old house and divided some of the daylilies and irises already growing there and transplanted some babies to the front yard beds at the new house. There will be plenty growing for the new owners at the old place, but now they won't have to be divided as soon over there. Hopefully our transplants will spread and grow as well as they had in the old garden! If the cold snaps should kill any of our transplants it will be OK because we can replace them later.

The daffodils are coming along in the front and back beds, and we have our first flowers now, which is very exciting. I'm already wishing we had planted more bulbs back in the fall! This coming fall I will have a better sense of the new garden spaces and what I want them to include and look like through each season, but I expect to have 15-20 years with this garden to make it everything it can be.

While I'm at it, here's a reminder to novice gardeners not to plant mint in open areas or large beds. It will take over! The previous owner planted mint in the front beds, and I have been pulling it up nonstop ever since we moved in. I love mint, but I always grow it in a container because it's so opportunistic. Put your mint in a nice big pot and let it poke along through the winter. It is really hard to kill!

That's the garden update for February 10, 2020. I'll post a report on the progress again next week!

Welcome to Jenn's Kitchen Garden!

Summer 2019 in the old garden

Hello! My name is Jenn, and I'm an amateur backyard gardener in North Alabama (Zone 7). This blog is meant to serve as a record of my gardening journey and hopefully provide some insights and fun posts for friends, family, and anyone interested in growing vegetables and flowers in a small backyard space.

I'm starting this blog now - January 2020 - because I just moved to a new house with a completely blank space as far as the backyard garden is concerned. Over the next year or two I hope to make this space special! I'm moving from a much larger yard with two years of kitchen garden experience behind me, but I still have a lot to learn as a gardener and expect to make plenty of mistakes along the way.

I'll be letting you know about my successes and failures as I work to transform the new space into a small kitchen garden with lots of flowers for our pollinators and my own enjoyment. Please leave comments whenever you have questions or advice!