This
was one of two lovely Clematis growing on the trellis in front of my vegetable garden. When we went away for four days last week, I had a sprinkler set up on a timer to water the vegetable garden. Sadly the sprinkler malfunctioned and the water did not reach the two clematis.
I have spent the last two days installing a watering system, using soaker hoses in all the raised beds.
Here is one of the beds with the installed soaker hoses winding in and around the vegetables and flowers. I like to grow flowers along with the vegetables as they attract more bees, therefore giving me more pollinated vegetable blossoms. Also the gardens look pretty.
I planted these beans about two weeks ago, and since the weather has finally warmed up, the beans have sure put on a spurt of growth.
I have bent the leaves over the cauliflower and held them in place with a clothespin. Bending the leaves over this way, helps to keep the cauliflower nice and white. I have just four plants as MrC does not care for cauliflower, and fortunately they are not all growing at the same rate, so I will not have to eat cauliflower for days on end.
According to the saying "corn should be knee high, by the 4th of July" I don't think the corn knew about this, as a few of the plants are only about 18 inches high, the rest are shorter.
I really was hoping to have some lovely sweet corn slathered in butter.
Sighhhhhh!
The first crop of peas have produced abundantly, so I have planted this row hoping to have more of the sweet sugar snap peas to enjoy.
I can't say I have a bumper crop of parsnips, but the few which have grown are doing rather well, as are the carrots which were planted at the same time. I may plant another row of parsnips tomorrow for a fall harvest.
As I said I like flowers in my vegetable garden, so in this container are a couple of sunflowers and two shades of pink gladioli.
Swiss chard, one of my favorite vegetables and has been producing enough to feed us and a little left over to give a few leaves to the rabbits who hang around outside the fence.
There are quite a few tomatoes of a fairly good size and many more blossoms. My wish is for some nice hot days so I will have many, many tomatoes.
At last there are some tiny zucchini forming.
That is about it for now, and I am very tired after installing the watering system. Finally, I can sit back watch the garden grow, pull a few weeds when needed, then harvest the vegetable as they come ready. All the hard work is going to pay off.
I put a few wheelbarrows full of pea gravel around the out side of the vegetable garden to neaten it up a bit and to keep the weeds under control. Any weeds which come up through the gravel, will get a squirt of roundup.
These nice plump tomatoes are just showing a touch of pink. I trimmed off any of the large leaves which were covering the fruit, so the sun would hasten ripening.
The Bearded Iris given to me by a friend, have been planted in a newly created garden, along the outside of the fence, surrounding the vegetable garden.Today I put a layer of mulch around the Iris to conserve moisture.
Just a few more days and I will be tasting these beauties.
Almost ready for Zucchini bread.
This little guy was on the outside of the garden looking in, as I was going about the business of pulling a few weeds, and trimming any shabby leaves off of some of the Swiss Chard, Broccoli and kohlrabi. He sure did enjoy the trimmings when I dropped them in front of his nose.
