Poor Garden

My garden has been the victim of neglect lately. The weeds are rapidly taking over and many goodies are being missed. I'm unsure exactly the reason for the garden being overlooked but I feel like I reach this point every gardening season, I simply forget that it happens.

Tomatoes are coming ready. We've been having rainy days here on the west coast so there has been some rot on my plants but I've done my best to rescue them. One of my plants fell down so I picked all the green tomatoes to save them from the bugs. I'm still undecided if I will make green tomato chutney or simply let the ripen on my windowsill. The sun sugar tomatoes are doing the best so far. Little yellow globes of sweet delight. All these years of gardening and they are still my very favorite tomato. I'm very disappointed by my Roma tomatoes. I was hoping for some big, beautiful sauce tomatoes but it looks like they will be small and few.

I'm very pleased with my squash crop this year. We have butternut, fairy squash, pumpkin and delicata this year. They all seem to be doing well. The pie pumpkins should be ready very soon and I can not wait for all the pumpkin spice muffins, pumpkin pie, curry pumpkin soup, pumpkin fudge, oh the possibilities. The rats have gotten to a few of my delicata squash but I still think there will be enough for us to enjoy. The rain is getting to these plants as well but I think they will make it long enough to produce some good squash.

Fall fruit is also coming ready. We've been picking basket after basket of pears. It has been a bumper crop of pears this year. It's too bad my family doesn't seem to like them. I'm still planning on make a few batches of spiced pear fruit leather in the dehydrator but most of the pears are being given away. The apple tree did not do as well. The bugs really got to it this year and stunted much of the fruit. We will still try to harvest as much as possible since the juice we got last year has been a huge hit in this household. We use it for popsicles, hot cider and of course the good old juice cup. It appears as though we should get a good amount of grapes from the vine this year. Jon has been reading about grapevines and has been taking extra care of it. It seems to be paying off. The grapes are growing in bunches and are starting to turn red. April loves frozen grapes so hopefully this crop will be gobbled up quickly.

I need to get my butt in gear if I want to plant fall crops. My beets, greens, carrots and turnips should all be in by now. If I can't get the garden ready and seeded by this weekend I think we will take a pass at the fall garden this year. That would be disappointing since last year we had quite a few successes but this mama can only do so much. Let's hope there is a break in the rain and my garden gets the attention it deserves.