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let's see your veggie garden {pics} 2021-24

deluxestogie

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Garden20210703_5814_BuffaloGrape_600.jpg


This grape is a red wine grape, though I don't make wine. Eaten fresh, these are intensely flavorful, with a robust skin and seeds. I love them. My white, Ontario wine grape is performing similarly, and is far more flavorful than the seedless, white grapes from the grocery.

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My Country Gentleman corn is approaching neck height. To the right of it is Delicata squash, which I've never grown before. Then come the Chinese eggplant, which are now just beginning to produce, followed on the far right by heavily grazed okra. I need to remember to order some okra seed other than Clemson Spineless. To resist grazing, it needs spines--long, painful, needle-sharp spines.

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Hidden within those four tomato cages are about 50 maturing tomatoes, conspiring to reach ripeness simultaneously. On the left, Georgia Candy Roaster squash thinks it owns the place. It's beginning to smother my caterpillar-riddled Bok Choi.

Bob
 

deluxestogie

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Would You Like Beans or Carrots?

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There is a bit of disquiet in this particular veggie province. My neighbors have delightfully grazed the purple beans and the Italian beans. Although they have nibbled at, and walked through my fava beans, they don't seem overly fond of them or their foliage. And the Bambina carrots--their greens at least--have been entirely ignored.

About 25 years ago, a groundhog totally consumed my habanero peppers as well as the plants themselves. But that was a hick, Appalachian groundhog about 30 miles north of here. This year, my more civilized, Blue Ridge groundhogs seem to have avoided the Basque Peppers.

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I've never grown fava beans. I look forward to making a dish of Catalonian fava beans with tomatoes. The pods turn completely brown when the beans are fully dried. Since I don't know what they look like when mature and still green, I guess I'll wait for the dried ones.

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Below, you can barely see the little sprigs of carrot greens scattered among the grazed-away stalks of purple beans (and weeds, which I've ignored).

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I'll watch these hazels for signs of maturity, and hopefully harvest a quart of de-husked nuts in about a month. But only if I can beat the deer and squirrels to them. They contain way too much tannin to be appetizing to even marauding wildlife, until they mature. After the harvested nuts are fully dried, I'll de-husk them, and store them in the freezer--for when I'm so bored that shelling small hazelnuts seems like a good idea. It's hard to beat finely minced hazelnut sprinkled on top of vanilla ice cream.

Garden20210704_5828_Hazel_600.jpg


Bob
 

msmith86

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The front of my house (east/southeast) gets sun from sunrise until about 5:00 p.m. so that's where is most convenient to grow everything. The south and southwest of the house is giant old oak trees and thick woods neighboring Codorus State Park. I'm growing several heirloom and cherry tomatoes, cabbage, cucumbers, herbs, peppers, watermelons, cantaloupe.
Added bonus pic of my tactical assault helicopter Ripley just to the right of the front porch. She lost her partner Daffy a few weeks ago after a second red tail hawk attack, and decided to dig a nest where I cut down a ridiculous overgrown lilac thicket. She prefers flying and roaming anyway, when she flies back in the fence with the other ducks, the boys have ulterior motives....
 

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deluxestogie

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An Imposter in my Okra!

A couple of days ago, I noticed that one of my okra plants (which had all been grazed, but are now recovering) looked different. The leaf margin was entire, unlike the incised and serrated margin of the other okra plants. Plant symmetry, stalk and stem habitus were the same. While okra has a noticeably reddish leaf stem, this odd one had leaf stems that were only slightly reddish. And the odd one appeared to be growing taller than the rest of the okra.

Garden20210708_5835a_velvetLeaf_inOkra_700.jpg


I vaguely recalled seeing a weed like this in a cornfield in southern Iowa, as the farmer and I walked along the corn rows. I just now looked it up online. Velvetleaf. The leaves were said to have a velvety texture. AND...they aggressively suck moisture and nutrients from the surrounding crop plants. I put on gloves, walked out there, and pulled it up. Sure enough, it had a substantial taproot, and a nest of more superficial roots. I took off one glove, and felt one leaf--velvet.

Bob
 

TigerTom

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An Imposter in my Okra!

A couple of days ago, I noticed that one of my okra plants (which had all been grazed, but are now recovering) looked different. The leaf margin was entire, unlike the incised and serrated margin of the other okra plants. Plant symmetry, stalk and stem habitus were the same. While okra has a noticeably reddish leaf stem, this odd one had leaf stems that were only slightly reddish. And the odd one appeared to be growing taller than the rest of the okra.

Garden20210708_5835a_velvetLeaf_inOkra_700.jpg


I vaguely recalled seeing a weed like this in a cornfield in southern Iowa, as the farmer and I walked along the corn rows. I just now looked it up online. Velvetleaf. The leaves were said to have a velvety texture. AND...they aggressively suck moisture and nutrients from the surrounding crop plants. I put on gloves, walked out there, and pulled it up. Sure enough, it had a substantial taproot, and a nest of more superficial roots. I took off one glove, and felt one leaf--velvet.

Bob

I have one of those in my yard. Nice looking leaves. Very soft.

I just looked it up and apparently its seeds can last decades in the soil.

Now I know what to do with it.
 

deluxestogie

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Velvetleaf is a member of the mallow family, with all kinds of claimed medicinal uses. The seeds are edible. I think, like milkweed, it would be a welcome member of anywhere but a farmer's field or someone's veggie garden.

Dr. John Hilty (at illinoiswildflowers.info) says it can be used for toilet paper.

Bob
 

deluxestogie

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Garden20210715_5851_Bob_veggieBeds_700.jpg


Country Gentleman corn is winning the battle against the Delicata squash (right). I have 8 or 10 nice-size Delicata squash fruit, that are all near the ground. The North Georgia Candy Roaster squash (left) attempted an illegal crossing of my grassy pathway, so its tips at that end (where I am standing) were unceremoniously mowed yesterday. It already has a half-dozen fruit, threatening to become two-footers.

My tomatoes are a mess. Not a problem. Just a mess. I forced all suckers inside the four adjacent (in fact, tied together) tomato cages. So there are gobs of green tomatoes in there somewhere. I was surprised at how difficult it is to see a bright red tomato in all that leafage.

Bob
 

GreenDragon

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Starting to look like summer in the Farmer's garden. The cucumbers are done and gone, as are the determinate tomatoes. I'm going to have to top the Okra if I don't want to have to lug around a stepladder. The vines are growing like crazy. Also planted 2 peach trees and two Blackberry vines last month; they all seem to have settled in OK.

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GreenDragon

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What is missing is a plaque for each plant species, with a brochure holder containing a guided tour and a discussion of agronomic properties. Impressive.

Bob

EDIT: Are you growing Clemson Spineless, or some other okra?

I looked but can’t find the seed packet. But they seem to be less prickly than others I’ve grown.

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