Sadly my courgette - which was doing so well - succumbed to all the rain and wet weather and rotted through at the stem nearest the soil. I don't know if I did the right thing, but I snipped off all the wilting and dead leaves, leaving only the very top and let it dry out
( the sun has been out for a good few days now!) So far the top part seems to be growing - but I have planted another one just in case...
Everything else is doing really well. I'm super excited about the loofah - it's growing like a weed up the trellis I put in for it. There are lots of flower buds appearing.
The Chillis are kicking into life. They're always terribly slow to get started but once they do, they thrive!
The sweetcorn is ready. And is so amazingly sweet and delicious. I planted 2 types. Which I'll need to check the names of - but one is a bright yellow one and the other is a paler one with different shades of yellow. I far prefer the totally yellow one. It's sweeter and has more flavour, I think.
Tomatoes - Finally we've managed to eat a tomato from the garden! Only the one, mind, but there are more almost ready. These are sun cherries and the vine is more than a foot long!
Potatoes, beans, herb garden, peas, gem squash are all doing their thing rather nicely.
For the last week we've had 2 of the most lovely ladies here as helpxers. Usually Lloyd 'gets' the helpexers to help him with chainsawing or anything really. I'm sure this is mostly down to the fact that I hate telling people what to do! However Jay and Marion are fabulous gardeners so I laid claim to them and to say they have been amazing is an understatement - the garden has almost never looked so neat and tidy - a HUGE feat as this garden is gigantic! They're leaving today and I'll most certainly miss them. I can't thank them enough for all their help.
Still my favourite place
With all this rain we've had we're still having to cut the grass twice a week - usually by this time in summer we're down to once a week or perhaps once every 10 days. It's bliss as it's an almost 4 hour job so it certainly eats into your time. However it's still growing very fast and very lush. Great for farmers, though, so mustn't grumble. (grumble grumble...)
Chookies are fab, donks are fab, alpacas are fab, dogs are fab, new cows are far from fab! For such quiet, calm wee things they sure know how to break through fences and into our neighbours farm. It's incredibly demoralising. We've spent, quite literally, hours repairing and checking fences. Everything looks good, the electric is up to strength, but still they manage. Even our neighbour ( who thankfully is a lovely guy) is bemused! Their escape antics are certainly one of the major factors in our, pretty much come to, decision of moving into keeping some alpacas rather than steer fattening.
Oh and I've been reading a really lovely new blog - cottonbluehome by the gorgeous Ingrid. If you have a sec go and have a look. It's so pretty and she's new to blogging so it would be lovely if you could say 'hi'!
Finally it feels like summer!
Everything looks so warm and toasty ~ it's minus 30F. here tonight .. brrr Winter at it's finest in northern Wisconsin
ReplyDeleteSo lovely! Your farm is the bees knees :-) Shame about the steers - what little menaces they are - we hope to have a dairy cow one day and perhaps some steers for meat - I don't know how I'll go eating them - hmmm ... All our tomatoes are green too. And our corn has gone nowhere. We're building new beds next month - in the the front garden where there's the best sunlight. What will you do with your Alpacas? Will you raise them for their wool?
ReplyDeleteThat was so sweet Laura. Thank you.
ReplyDeleteI'll look up that paint colour too.
Your garden looks so lush, your food bill must be so low. Do you raise some animals for your own meat? Our courgette did the same thing and it is usually a bbq staple. Your soil looks so much richer than our sandy mix.
Beautiful photography.
Jeepers, Mel that's absolutely freezing!
ReplyDeleteLily, the alpacas will be - well build up a little flock of our own then breed some to sell and also sell the fleece ( once we've done what we want with it!) tbh I don't even know if there's a market for selling the fleece! Anything has to be better than stressing every second about these new cows - in 6 years we've never had any do this.
Ingrid, we're right in a narrow volcanic seam of earth so it's unbelievably fertile. We're very lucky! xx
My zucchinis are on there second go Laura, I too cut them back to nothing because they had powdery mildew all over them, and they loved the cut, I have had a second crop of them and they are still going...I think keeping the leaves in control may be a good thing...I love your potting shed door.. :)
ReplyDeleteIt all looks amazing you have me itching to get planting.
ReplyDeleteWhereas normally I would at least be preparing pots and setting myself up to plant, because of the move this year I am a totally frustrated veggie gardener.
I am just digging up trees, replanting my strawberries into pots and generally disturbing things that should really be left well alone just so I can take them with me.
Seeing your sunny pictures is so nice though (and you did exactly the right thing with that courgette it will grow back bigger and stronger for you now).
Sue xx