The July 22 Garden

Gardens are a form of autobiography.

~ Sydney Eddison

The garden is looking a little bare in some spots because we’ve been harvesting a lot of produce in recent weeks.

I harvested the last of the green beans a couple of days ago. We’ve feasted on the tender young beans, I’ve got a shelf full of canned dilly beans, and my freezer is home to packets of beans to be saved for another day. Earlier this week I planted another crop of beans and am hoping to get another good harvest before the frost. (Sorry . . . I didn’t mean to mention the “f” word.)

I mentioned before that we were having an issue with the voles chewing on my beets. Curiously, they didn’t seem to go for the Bull’s Blood variety so I left them in the ground the longest. Finally, I pulled them all out and the spot they occupied has been sown with a row of Bright Lights Swiss chard and some more carrots. The carrot harvest continues and we’re enjoying delicious rainbow carrots in salads. We’ve been picking scallions for months and they’re almost finished. I planted another row next to the almost-finished one. I’ve also planted a couple of varieties of lettuce.

It’s been a while since we enjoyed a salad made with lettuce because I’ve been using Swiss chard and kale in salads–both of which are doing well and continuing to produce. I did plant more kale as I’ve read that it’s even tastier after a frost (Sorry . . . there’s that word again.) and want a late crop.

The cucumbers are finally starting to produce. Funny thing . . . I planted two varieties of cukes but they must have cross-pollinated one another because I’m not seeing any of the Crystal Apple cucumbers I was looking forward to. Lesson learned for next year.

I pulled out the Sunburst Scallopini squash plant to make room for the cukes to spread out. We really enjoyed the tasty little sunburst squashes; I’ll have to find a different place for them in the garden next year.

I have two delicata squash plants in this garden. We enjoy that squash and, while they were plentiful when we lived in Washington, I’ve not found that to be the case since we moved back to Kamloops. Solution: I’ll grow my own! I also have one of these plants in the deer-proof garden in our back yard.

We’ve been enjoying the sweet Jimmy Nardello peppers in salads and, recently, on a big plate of nachos. I’ll use these once the tomatoes begin ripening to make sauces with.

The green peppers are just starting to produce some little peppers now. Gerry has already put in a request for a batch of stuffed green peppers when they get large enough.

The tomatoes. Oh my. Nothing in the world tastes as good as a freshly picked still-warm-from-the-sun tomato. I don’t buy tomatoes at the grocery story (or those red facsimiles they label as tomatoes) so this is the only time of year we enjoy them fresh. We’ve had some of every variety except the Federle paste variety; the first of them is almost ready to be picked.

Meantime, we’re enjoying the Sungolds, Yellow Pear, Brandywine, and Black Krim and eagerly waiting for more to ripen.

The garden continues to be my sanctuary, the place I find peace, and–bonus!–the place much of what we’re eating these days is coming from.