The Fall produce is producing

On my way from the farmer's market this morning, I stopped by the plot to see how things are doing and to do a little weeding.

The first sight wasn't a pretty one.  The post for the hose reel had rotted at the ground level and fallen over.  That post will need to be replaced.

Thankfully, the lettuce bed on the other side of the bench wasn't harmed when the hose reel fell.  The lettuce is looking great.  We'll be having some salads this week, I suspect.

Similarly the two beds (each) of the daikon and kale are also growing nicely.  I think we should be able to start harvesting the kale this week.  The daikon is still a ways off despite the nice greenery.

It's been a long time since I've rock and rolled....

An entire growing season has come and gone since I've posted last.  What a shame.

Three big things occurred that led to that.

1. We had a lot of illness in the family this year.  Hobbies tend to get put on the back burner when that's the case.
2. When I felt like doing hobby stuff, I spent a fair amount of time doing woodworking instead of gardening.
3. I decided I wasn't going to track the harvests this year as I did last year.  That led to a lack of attention on the blog as well as general garden upkeep.  For much of the summer, I had a hard time getting out there more than once a week.

Some reflections

• We had a huge crop of beans this year.  I planted two crops.  That worked pretty well.  It would have done better had I trellised the 2nd crop effectively.

• Tomatoes did okay, but suffered because I didn't do a good job staking/caging them up.  The bell peppers did better this year than last.  The hot peppers didn't do much, though.
   
• We had three okra plants that survived.  Twice that would allow for more frequent picking.

• Kale was very happy.

• The cucumbers grew reasonably well.  It took a while for female flowers to appear for some reason, but we did get some good cucumbers.  They were oddly-colored, too.  Yellow/orange.  They did taste good, though. 

• For the last month of the summer growing season, I allowed beans that I wasn't able to harvest (read: they got bulbous before I could pick them) stay on the vine and dry naturally.  I've harvested a lot of green beans as well as some scarlet runners and shelled them for next year.

Where we are now

I have lettuce, daikon, and kale growing in the garden now.  The walking onions in both beds are still quite happy.  I've cleaned out a few beds to prepare for planting garlic which needs to be done this weekend.