Harvest, 5/30-5/31

The harvest season is picking up in my garden, and there is much to be pulled up and picked. On Monday I dug up 14 garlic bulbs to make way for the tomatoes. It's a bit early for a full garlic harvest, as only one leaf layer has dried and they haven't yet bloomed, but there are still lots more left. 'Shandong' is also an early variety of hardneck garlic that should be harvestable before July. I'm drying half the bulbs and storing the other half in the refrigerator to use fresh. Of course, it's hard to track how the garlic will be used, since I use it in just about everything. It's an essential ingredient in Asian, Middle Eastern, Italian, and French cuisines--all favorites. So chances are it will end up in a lot of things. Maybe a stir-fry, maybe some hummus, maybe a batch of arugula pesto?

Last night's harvest was 8oz of spinach and chard leaves, which went into an spicy Indian-style shrimp curry served with brown basmati rice. The particular varieties I planted were 'Bloomsdale Longstanding' and 'Fordhook', both of which are heirloom varieties that seem to be doing well. While harvesting I noticed that the spinach was already going to seed, but I pulled off the seedheads and am hoping I'll be able to harvest more soon. Most of my cool-weather greens are starting to go to seed, so I have to harvest bok choy, raab, and more arugular before it gets much hotter.

The radishes, too, are on the verge of bolting, and yesterday I also managed to pull at least half a pound. The bulbs were still quite piddly (presumably due to the heavy rains we had last week), so I am just using them for greens. I'm thinking about freezing some greens, since right now there's an over-abundance from the garden and our CSA. On a side note, the 'Sparkler' cultivar strikes me as too finicky for my garden, and I will likely not be planting more after this packet is done. It may be that they're a fast-growing, early season variety, better suited to cooler conditions with less rainfall. I had better results last year with the 'French Breakfast' radishes and might give one of the varieties our CSA offers as well.

Long time, no post!

Though the garden has been quite busy this summer, I've been horrible neglectful of this blog. Has it really been over 2 months since my last post? My heads been full of various ideas for entries, but for whatever reason I've lacked the impetus to post. I want to change that. I'm going to start posting at least one entry per week and cover more issues pertaining to sustainability, local food, and urban homesteading. I'll also "redecorate" at some point and redo the layout of this blog, in addition to re-organizing/adding links. So expect lots more activity from now on!

To cover the time I've been away from this blog, here are some bits & bobs from late June and the month of July...



In June the lavender bush bloomed, and I gathered the flowers to dry. I believe it's the 'Hidcote' cultivar, whichever variety is well adapted to wetter, temperate regions. I've had the plant since 2008, and the bush has gotten progressively larger since then, blooming profusely in the summer and showing off its grey-green foliage through the winter. I don't have proper drying equipment, but it's very easy to collect the flowers, tie them into bundles, and hang them around the house for a bit of perfume. The flowers in the photo were too short/small to bundle, so I let them dry on paper towels. When they were finished drying, I pulled off the flowers and stored the herbs in plastic bags.



Here is one of the hornworms I found on the tomatoes near the end of June, thrown into the grass for the robins to find. Usually, I don't have problems with these little guys, maybe one or two a year. This year, in the new vegetable garden, I found a whopping three hornworms. OK...not that many, but more than I'm accustomed to. Haven't seen a one since I took this photo. Cabbage worms are generally a bigger problem for me.



Pretty bronze fennel flowers. My plants returned this year, and the one along the south side of the house is well over 6 feet tall. Amazing. I'm letting the flowers go to seed so I can get some use out of these plants. They don't bulb like Florence fennel does, and their stalks tend to be rough and stringy, so they're not ideal for cooking, but you can use the leaves as an herb/garnish, and the seeds taste just the same.



I just love this combination of textures: the large, broad leaves of the squash with the small, feathery leaves of the cilantro going to seed. I'm not sure if these are "correct" companions, but they seemed to do well together. Still waiting for the seeds to dry so I can have coriander. This is a 'Discus Bush Buttercup' winter squash and 'Caribe' cilantro.



Leaf from the 'Rond de Nice' summer squash, which is the closest to a proper bush variety I've found in this family. Actually, only today I figured out that this was the summer squash, not the 'Discus Bush Buttercup' I also planted (which forms less of a proper bush, more of a stocky vine).



When July came, I decided to visit some plant sales and found quite a few good deals, including this coneflower and oregano plant. When I moved the vegetable garden this summer, I had to rearrange the flagstone path somewhat and pulled out the once-thriving oregano, which I inevitably waited too long to re-plant. The oregano died, so I bought a new plant for a mere $1. Hope it does better!



Another shot of the coneflower, the ubiquitous 'Magnus' variety, of course. I like my echinicea pallida plants, but they have less immediate impact, and I thought some variety might be a good idea. I love coneflowers, though. Can never have too many.





The 'Stargazer' lilies in the front border, putting on their yearly show. I especially like the 2nd photo, because you can see the black seed pods from the baptisia, which is impressively big this year.



One of the lobelias I planted back in May. After I saw these on a camping trip last September, I had to have one. The flowers are on a tall spike and pretty small, but they look a bit more striking in groups. Given the right conditions, these are supposed to spread very reliably. They're native to this region, like wet conditions along river banks, but hold up well through droughts. I'm sure they'd be perfect for a rain garden.



A few weeks ago, we visited my mother and stepfather's house in California, MO and were impressed by how well her garden is doing this year. She planted 3 types of melons, which covered probably 20 square feet or more. They weren't yet ripe, so I just took pictures.

I've avoided growing melons myself, because they tend to put out very long vines and I've yet to find a shorter vined or bush cultivar. If any wayward readers can recommend that works in small spaces, I'd love to hear about it!

A Walk Through the Garden

Since the backbone of the new vegetable garden was completed, the last month in the garden has mostly been filled with busy work in between heavy bouts of spring rain. The last several days have been thankfully dry, leaving me plenty of time to wander around the garden. So I thought it might be nice to give a walk-through everything that's been going on.

Starting from the backyard, here's Molly busy with her usual chore, patiently waiting for squirrels:



Of course, looking at this photo, I'm reminded of all the weeding that needs to be done on and around the path. The violets I let grow by the steps and now threatening to overtake the steps, and you might see the walnut seedling growing nearby. Maybe you can also see the yarrow, creeping thyme, raspberry, bronze fennel and mint? This bed is a bit formless, an afterthought compared to other beds, very much a work in progress.

Turning to where the old vegetable garden used to be, you'll notice big changes:



The beginnings of a woodland garden. Back in January, my mother and stepfather moved to a new house along a lake with plenty of garden, much of it filtered shade. Lots of hostas, more than she wanted. So when we were down a few weeks ago, she dug up a bunch and gave them to me. They're already serving as excellent filler, and there are plenty more to plant along the fence.

The focal point of the woodland garden is a serviceberry (sometimes called juneberry) tree purchased from Suburban Lawn & Garden:



It's an understory tree that does well beneath the filtered shade of the redbuds and larger trees that surround our yard. In spring it produces a show of white flowers and produces small edible berries that attract birds. Apparently, the berries make good preserves, but much like crab apple, the fresh taste is too sour to be enjoyable. The tree should get about 20 feet high when fully mature, and we are attempting to stretch the trunks for a more open shape.

Turning back towards the patio, there's the new rain barrel we installed next to the gate:



We might make further changes to the spot behind the gate, since we overshot the length on the downspout and the gutter is still prone to overflowing. Rather than struggle with the water, I'm considering building a little rain garden. This might also be a great spot for a native plant I really love called Joe-Pye weed.

Walking through the gate, you can see the other rain barrel we installed on the south side:



We got the rain barrels from a local non-profit called Bridging the Gap, which facilitates recycling and other environmental programs in the Kansas City area. They do workshops teaching folks how to build these things, but we decided to purchase a couple of pre-made barrels instead. At $65 a piece, they were a far better deal than anything from a catalog or online. Not so pretty, but I don't really care so much about that. With all the rain we've been having, I've already watered my plants from the barrels several times.

In this photo, you'll also notice my tomato cages and filled-out flower/herb border. The lavender and thyme plants have really taken off this year. Here's another photo taken a few steps down the path:



You can see how the yarrow, salvia, and perovskia are doing quite well. The pale coneflowers are a bit too slender and diminutive to be seen in the background, but I'm hoping that with some time they will spread. They get around 3-4 feet tall in summer.

Along the path near the gate, you can still find some pennyroyal:



Beside the gate is my new bed for the raspberries:



As mentioned previously, it's 'Caroline', ever/fall-bearing variety that produces big juicy red fruits from August to October. Soon I'll string some wire or twine along the posts and bring a bit of order to this bed. I'm waiting until fall/winter pruning before filling the box up with soil.

On to the vegetable beds! Look at the lovely little surprise I discovered a couple weeks back:



It's a volunteer potato in my hot pepper and basil bed. When we dug up the soil from the old boxes, I searched for any remaining potatoes and other bulbs and roots, but found nothing. So imagine my surprise when this little baby popped up. It's probably on of the 'Caribe' potatoes I grew last year. I'm going to let the vine grow and flower and see if it produces more of those violet-skinned beauties.

Elsewhere in the vegetable garden, a bush beans waits:



I've got two 2'x1.5' bush bean plot, but I failed to mark them after planting and am not sure which is the 'Gold Crop' and which is the 'Jade'. Guess I'll know when the pods start appearing this summer.

What else is growing in the vegetable garden? Well, we have some Swiss chard:



Typically, chard and spinach are started outdoors, but I started a few indoors, all of which died in the great cold frame debacle. The plants started outside have suffered a few insect attacks and are just now getting their 3rd and 4th leaves. I've had to cover the spinach and chard plots and do a bit of reseeding, but the chard is holding through admirably.

Despite similar insect attacks on the raab and cole crops, the plants have continued to persist:



Actually, I fashioned makeshift cloches to ward off further damage until the plants got large enough to hold their own:



I'm sure you can tell that it's just the top of a soda bottle, the cap of which can be removed to let cooler air in. I've been saving these a few years for just such a purpose, and they work pretty well.

And here's a partial view of the vegetable garden from the east:



The mulch we bought ended up not being enough to cover all the paths, but at least we've got the landscape fabric to stifle the weeds. I also wish the beds looked more abundant than they do, but I'm hoping it looks more impressive by July.

Anyway, on to the front border I never seem to talk about anymore:



The Siberian irises look quite impressive, and the baptisia makes for a wonderful backdrop when in full bloom. The current plan is to remove the tall red-orange Asiatic lilies that clash with my relatively cool color scheme and give them a new home, perhaps elsewhere in the yard or with family. The 'Stargazer' Oriental lilies, which are a more pleasing fuchsia-streaked white, will go in that spot. Or perhaps that's where I'll put the lobelia syphilitica. I like how the reddish tones and white pop beside the blue and violet. The lobelia won't bloom until late summer and fall, at which time it'll be the main show.

But those irises look lovely...



Don't they?



Elsewhere in the front garden are little surprises:



Finally, there's the rock garden I started last year in the northeast yard along the rock wall, a spot that is dry and gets a fair amount of sun during the day. The 'Ultra Violet' hybrid salvia (or desert sage) I planted last year is now in bloom:



I think the yellow flower of the sedum makes a lovely contrast. Below that is one of the purple hens & chicks that I started with last year, along with a blue-green sedum I bought about a month ago:



I'm still looking for more succulents and alpines to fill the space, but as with most of the plots in my yard, I've decided to take a slow-paced piecemeal approach to design. Wandering through my garden, I'm starting to really love how everything's taking shape and looking more like the space in my head.

Rebuilding a Garden

Back in December, I discussed my plan to move the vegetable garden from the backyard to the space on the south side of our house. This spring we've been working hard to turn plans into reality, in spite of circumstances intervening and things going slower then planned.

In March, Rob dug up the forsythia, which ended up taking a couple of hours and a sledge hammer. The results left a nice little pit of dirt and at last no stump to contend with:



After that was done, I pulled up the old beds we built back in 2007 and took a look at the boards. My assumption was that the bottom portions would have some decay but would be otherwise usable in the new plot, so I was a little surprised by the severity of the decay on some of the boards. Here's a photo to illustrate what I'm talking about:



The heaviest decay occurred on the boards further downhill, which is lightly shaded throughout much of the shade and obviously gets more water when it rains. It's also worth mentioning that we built the beds with 1"x8" untreated pine boards. After 3 seasons in-ground, some decay is to be expected. Less expected were the termites that infested 2 or 3 of the boards; our house suffered minor termite damage in the distant past, but we've never seen any sign of the critters. When I first discovered all this, I was afraid we wouldn't be able to reuse the boards at all, but after further assessing the damage, we were able to salvage half for use on the small 2'x2' and 2'x4' frames. Not bad!

For the rest of the boxes, we settled on untreated pine 2"x6" boards, which would give us a good bed height without having to double them up. Initially, I considered the more rot-resistant cedar, but it wasn't as cost-effective. In theory, the sunniness of the new spot and the thicker weight of the boards should help stave off decay longer than in the previous plot.

But before we actually built the frames, it was onto the new step, which was clearing out the grass. Originally I considered doing what a lot of raised bed gardeners do, which is starting right on top of the grass and blocking out weeds with cardboard, newspaper, or landscaping fabric. We'd lay some cardboard along the paths to kill the grass and eventually lay some pebbles or mulch. This idea wasn't really that great, though, since it would end up diverting more water down the path, which would pool up near the gate. Not cool. So we decided that removing an inch or two of sod would be a better idea.

Last weekend we rented a sod cutter and spent an hour or so ripping out lawn:



A bit of a spotty job, but nothing a shovel can't fix.

The last step was building the frames and installing them, which takes more effort than you can imagine. It's hard to tell in photos, but the south yard slopes ever-so-slightly, necessitating the leveling of each bed. Once this task was finished, we broke up the remaining layer of soil (mostly clay), removed offending root masses, and brought in the wonderful soil from the original vegetable garden that took 3 years and a lot of compost to build. We ended up having lots left for the future woodland garden, the backbone of which we'll start building in another week or two.

While the renovated vegetable garden has gone brilliantly, I've had an awful time with seedlings and have lost most while in the cold frame. It does a terrific job trapping in heat during the hottest parts of the day but seems not quite able to block out the frost. 2 weeks ago we had a few nights when the temperatures dropped near freezing, effectively killing the bulk of my seedlings. It's also possible that I have not left the cover on long enough to generate the necessary heat. Whatever the issue, I'm going to try and work it out before autumn, so I'm able to extend my crop a bit longer than usual. I look forward to the challenge!

How to Build a Cold Frame

The title is not completely accurate, i.e. this entry will not lay out detailed instructions on building your own cold frame. Instead, it's about how we (my significant other and I) finally built our own cold frame from an old window and some 2X4 cedar boards. For the uninitiated, a cold frame (or cucumber frame, as they say in some parts) is sort of like a miniature greenhouse with a basic frame and a hinged roof on top. What's the point of building a cold frame? Well, it's a good way of extending the season in your vegetable garden. You can start plants early inside the frame or keep plants inside after frost hits. You can also protect young seedlings from possible frost in the early spring.

As I mentioned in some entries last year, I've been planning on building a cold frame for a couple of years. Last spring I made a makeshift cold frame using one of my raised beds and a glass window, and it worked well enough for protecting seedlings at the time. I toyed with purchasing a frame, perhaps a high quality cedar box, or a cheaper plastic box, but since a lot of people makes their own using an old window and a wooden frame, things we had access to, it made more sense to go the handmade route. So I chose the biggest window in the basement (the previous tenants kindly left us plenty) and measured it. 61"x28". Plenty of room. I consulted a number of websites, including some videos on YouTube, on the construction. This particular demonstration was especially helpful:



We decided to go with cedar, since it resists decay better than pine, and I want my cold frame to be a more or less permanent structure within the garden. Most of the construction was done by Rob, who laminated and screwed the boards together to ensure sturdiness and keep out any drafts. The photo above should give you a clear enough sense of how he put it together. Very basic, nothing fancy. Once the box was finished, we painted the window and the box, using the same trim paint the previous owners had so graciously left behind. We attached the window with two hinges and used an old metal pull we found on a cabinet in the basement (more leftovers). While the paint was drying, I dug up almost a foot of dirt from the spot where I planned to place the frame, lined the square with bricks for the frame to stand on, and then added a layer of gravels and rocks for drainage.

And here's how the cold frame looked yesterday:



While the cold frame is about 6 feet long, it looks pretty small in context of the landscape. The fact that it's buried about 6" in the ground helps too. It's going to be another week or two before I can tuck some seedlings inside, but I've already noticed the window collecting condensation and how warm the soil inside is compared to soil outside. I don't have a thermometer to test it, but I'd guess there's a 10 degree difference.

So that's how we built a cold frame. The task that had been persistently dogging me for over a year is officially finished, and I'm looking forward to another spring. Next, we'll be ripping out the grass along the south strip, tearing down and rebuilding our raised beds, and relocating the vegetable garden to make way for a woodland garden in the backyard. Perhaps we'll make headway on the grotto this summer? Stay tuned!

On the South Side

Since I've spent the last few entries focusing on my vegetable garden, I thought with the next batch of posts, I'd explore other areas of the yard. One area that's undergone the greatest evolution is the garden on the south side of our house. When we initially moved in, the space was dominated by cracked sidewalk that was blocked by the air conditioner. The only plants remaining were what are colloquially known as spider lilies and elsewhere called Resurrection Lilies or Naked Ladies (Lycoris squamigera, if you're curious). So, 2 years ago in 2007, we tore out the sidewalk and built a flagstone path that curled around the air conditioner and between the forsythia.

The space you see in the photo is what you see as soon as you leave the backyard. Since 2007, it's been in a sort of limbo--me uncertain what to plant. I knew that I would be planting creeping thyme along the path, along with the Roman chamomile (which grows lower than the German varieties and survives the winter). And though it wasn't my original plan, the spot east of the lavender along the foundation has been perfect for tomatoes. Much of the rest was up in the air.

This spring I decided to take some initiative and fill the space in. The first goal was to find a plant tall enough to block off most of the air conditioner, but small enough to fit the tight space (it's only about 5 feet from house to path). Once I decided on that plant, I would choose some shorter plants to add interest. After spending hours combing my catalogs and notes, I decided that a Russian sage was closest to what I wanted. I'd add a salvia and something else and be done with it. It took some searching to find a proper variety. The first nursery had only dwarf hybrids available, but they had the fantastic 'Caradonna' variety of salvia, which has deep violet flowers and stems and leaves tinged in purple. I found the sage at the second nursery and brought it home.

Because of this spring's abundant range, I was forced to put planting off for a while. When I was finally able to do so in May, I had had time to think things over and strategize my design. Here are the results:



Of course, right now things are still filling out, but this gives an idea. The yarrow comes from another part of the garden, where it was too tall to fit in. Here, it should be fine, since it should stay shorter than the sage and the pink and white flowers will make the salvia pop. I also tucked in a variety of creeping thyme, 'Minus,' with tiny, tight leaves to cover the area between the stepping stones.

I'm happy with the results, though it's going to take another year or two before everything fills in to my liking. At some point this summer we're going to be removing the forsythia that you see in the right side of the photos. It's just too big and hard to keep from growing over the path without deep trimming, which prevents it from fully flowering in early spring. Removing it will also allow more light to hit everything I've planted.

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Eventually, there will be another rain barrel in this area and another one on the other side of the fence. I was going to purchase another pre-built model online, but I discovered that a local non-profit, Bridging the Gap, sells kits as well as cheaper pre-assembled rain barrels. Since I support their efforts to promote environmental issues locally, I think it's the best option. If you're composting your yard and kitchen waste and don't yet have a rain barrel, consider it. You'll be preventing run-off, in addition to having a supply of free water for your garden.

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Additionally, a friend of mine in Kansas City, Alex, started her own gardening blog a few months back called Unaccustomed Earth. If you're interested in urban gardening and exotic houseplants, I recommend having a look. I've found a number of her entries useful and entertaining, and I've even learned about carnivorous plants.

While I haven't been keeping up with garden blogs as regularly as I'd like, I have been reading a local food blog out of KC called Everything Begins With E. Emily belongs to and volunteers with the Fair Sharm Farms CSA and much of her blogs charts how she uses food from the CSA, as well as other local sources.

2008 in Review

Late autumn and early winter were quite busy for me, far too busy to think about gardening. I hardly read any garden blogs in December and have only been seriously planning for spring since mid-January. I've been getting back into the swing of reading and just placed seed orders yesterday, so the slow crawl to spring has begun. Of course, this is Zone 5/6 and we officially have another 2 months until the last frost. Missouri has notoriously difficult weather, though. Right now it's utterly spring-like outside at 60 degrees, but forecasts suggest the usual 20-30 degrees by the end of the week. A couple of years ago, we had an early thaw in March only to suffer a late frost in April. Many fruit crops weren't able to recover.

In other words, I'm not planting anything outside until at least March. I envy those in warmer climes.

While I wait for my seeds to arrive and the seed-starting season to begin, I thought I'd share an assessment of some vegetable varieties from last year. Maybe they'll help you decide what seeds are worth buying for your own garden. Or maybe which varieties to look for at the market? Since I suffered a few setbacks, I'm including only the varieties that matured and produced, noting susceptibility to disease, yield, and flavor.

First, there's the Bull's Blood beet. While my plants failed to produce any bulbs, I did harvest a few meals' worth of lovely dark red leaves, which is what this heirloom variety is noted for. Beet greens have a flavor similar to spinach or Swiss chard (they're all close relative) and look great in salads--though, beware, they'll turn your pasta pink! Definitely something different with added decorative potential.


A 'Carmen' sweet pepper...great for roasting...

Next, there was the Carmen sweet pepper, an Italian variety bred especially for roasting and grilling. The walls are thinner, with a lower water content than your grocery store bells, but the sweet flavor is more concentrated and the roasted peppers weep less as a result. While you can use this variety the way you'd use any other sweet pepper, I don't recommend it sauteed or stir-fried. If you like to roast and freeze peppers, this is probably the variety to get. Regarding the plants, they are rather tall and seem to like a bit of support. Yield is pretty good, though my plants produced more towards the end of the season.


A variety of tomatoes from the garden: 'Early Girl,' 'Big Boy,' and a 'Striped German' on the bottom.

Tomatoes are always a big crop for me, and my goal last year was to branch out and try a few different varieties.

Because I like to can a lot of salsa, I thought I'd try a paste variety. Burpee's Big Mama, with its big, enticing fruits, looked like a variety worth getting, but as noted in a previous entry, it's very susceptible to blossom end rot. Initially I had assumed this was simply related to my container grown plant, but as the in-ground tomatoes matured, I quickly discovered this was not the case. I followed the same watering schedule for all my plants, but it would appear that this variety prefers that the soil remain moist at all times. Reading more about Roma/paste varieties, this problem is quite common.


Overgrown 'Big Boy' bushes in the south garden.

If you like productive hybrid beefsteaks, I can heartily recommend the Big Boy bush variety. The flavor is good and sweet, if not terribly unique, and grown in a good full-sun location it should produce nice big fruits.


'Early Girl' tomatoes (with a 'Big Boy' on the top right).

Another hybrid I tried as the Early Girl, a smaller early variety that failed to produce anything substantially earlier than the other varieties. Taste was somewhat bland, too, so I can't say I'll be planting it again.

I will, of course, be planting some seeds from the Cherokee Purple tomatoes I planted last year. It's not as sweet as the ever-popular Brandywine, but there is a mellow smokiness that adds a depth I really like. It makes a fantastic salad or bruschetta, and is pretty good on its own too.


Young 'Cherokee Purple' tomatoes on the vine.

I try a lot of different heirloom varieties when I go to the market and save seeds from the varieties I like. Last year I planted some Striped German plants from seeds I saved in 2007. While the plants aren't as leafy and robust as the Cherokee Purple, they have a certain "weediness" that's part of the heirloom charm. The fruits are a mottled orange and red inside and out and like the Cherokee Purple prone to a bit of cracking at the shoulders. More acidic than sweet but fairly balanced overall. I like it more on sandwiches or in addition to another tomato in a salad than by itself.


'Blue Lake' pole beans.

Another vegetable I always make an effort to include is the snap bean. In 2008 I tried the Blue Lake pole bean, which produced consistent yields from August to September. It likes lots of sun and water when it begins to flower (like most pole beans) and seemed to hold up through some bouts of mold. The beans were around 5"-6" long with a straightforward snap bean flavor and texture. Overall, this variety seems dependable.


'Dark Red Norland' new potatoes, freshly scrubbed.

I've previously mentioned my delight at growing my own potatoes, certainly one of my favorite vegetables and one I would like to keep growing in the future. I tried the Dark Red Norland, which did not garner high yields but was dependable in the production of tasty new potatoes. Thin-skinned and waxy, I would say they are best steamed and paired with green beans (preferably a filet variety) in a fresh nicoise style salad. Or make a light and vinegary potato salad.


'Jalapeno M' hybrid jalapeno peppers--small, but tasty!

Lastly, I planted the ever-dependable Jalapeno M, a hybrid I attempted in Vegetable Garden 1.0 and was mostly pleased with. It doesn't produce the big honking jalapenos you might be lusting after, but the yields are consistent and dependable, even after the high heat of mid-summer. The bushes are nice and compact and don't seem to require any support. The flavor is classic jalapeno, a low to medium heat that's great for salsa. Also good pickled.

Was there anything you tried last year that you would plant again or recommend to others?

Since I've had my camera back for the last couple weeks, I've been meaning to finally take part in the Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day. While I did venture into the garden to take photos, the day completely passed me by, and so now I've decided to post my backlog of leaves and blooms from the last week or so.

Here's a half-grown Echinacea pallida, a native coneflower not as commonly cultivated as the 'purpurea.' I planted it last year from seed because I loved the narrow pink petals.


The hyssop, another plant I cultivated from seed that never flowered last year. It just started flowering a few days ago and is quite pretty. The leaves, when crushed, smell a bit like lavender and sage. I'm going to try brewing them for tea.


And some 'Rudy' Tritelia flowers from the front garden.


A 'Cottage Red' marigold. I love marigolds, but I'm so sick of the full French varieties. This Mexican cultivar is more diminutive, but the coloration is so lovely.


Here's the Oakleaf hydrangea I recently planted in the front garden. I absolutely love the flowers, though they are so heavy that they weigh down the branches.


But let's not forget my 'Annabelle' hydrangea in the backyard, which is now (mostly) in full bloom.


The nasturtiums are not yet blooming, but their leaves are so lovely I couldn't resist including a photo (please ignore the weeds). And those are 'Bull's Blood' beets in the background for some lovely contrast.


The yarrows, threatening to bloom. These were part of a sunny seed mix I received from Burpee, none of which bloomed last year. Only the yarrow held through. Which is good; yarrow is a traditional part of any herb garden.


Here's a better photograph of the pale coneflower mentioned above. While it looks almost white here, the color is really more of a lavender/pink.


An earlier photo of the 'Annabelle' hydrangea, which I like almost more than the full bloom. Or maybe I just like the photo itself more.


And for more of a surprise bloom, here's one of my cucumber vines.


And here are some tomato blossoms. I've already got something like 10 baby tomatoes. Here's hoping the squirrels stay far away from the fruits of my labor.


By the by, did you know that yesterday was Bloomsday?