Project Garden

We are two months into project garden and things are moving along wonderfully!  As I mentioned in my yard update post, we have had some amazing weather for growing plants this year and our garden has definitely benefited from it, for the most part....  To see what this garden looked like at the start click here!

Let start off with the herbs, or as I refer to them as, the jungle.  We use a lot of parsley when we cook, especially in the summer, so I figured it was a good idea to plant 4 parsley plants.  Who knew that they would all grow to a mammoth size!  I have been cutting off branches and leaves every few days and they are still growing out of control!  I guess that is a good problem to have when it comes to growing food.  Clearly I couldn't possibly use all of this parsley fresh, so after washing it I pop it into a sandwich bag and freeze it.  The best part, when it's frozen you don't even have to chop it because it breaks up like ice!  The basil, thyme, chives and dill are all producing well.  I've been able to harvest from each several times already.  But seriously, if you need some parsley just let me know and I'll mail it to you!

 

I have been very pleasantly surprise but the pepper plants.  To be honest I didn't have a whole lot of faith that they were actually going to produce peppers.  I've only ever tried to grow peppers one other time and all I got was one measly pepper.  While I don't have any peppers yet, the plants are loaded with flowers which I hope (fingers crossed!!) will turn into delicious peppers.  Unfortunately I don't have quite as many peppers plants as I started out with.  It seems the learning curve for a certain white sasquatch (Bronx) was a little slower than I hoped it would be, and of course he had to level the two strongest plants with the most flowers.  Oh well, such is life I suppose.  I'm sure whatever caused him to high-tail through the garden was extremely important and would completely justify the loss of my pepper plants....

 

The white sasquatch was also responsible for the loss of my watermelon plant.  I wasn't too broken up about this since I didn't think I was actually going to end up with a watermelon anyway.  In hindsight, with the fabulous weather we've had, it might have stood a chance!  There is no sense in leaving an empty space in the garden when I could be growing something, so I decided to pick up some cucumber plants to fill the space.

 

Mother Nature wasn't completely on my side though.  I had almost no luck at all with any of the seeds I planted.  Part of the problem was where I decided to plant some of them; I didn't realize one corner of the bed was as shady as it was, and I think the other part was the white sasquatch and his spotted companion (Lola).  Over the course of their many trips through the garden I think they pounded the seeds down far enough that there was no hope in germination.  Animals I tell ya.  I recently seeded beans where the original cucumbers were, so here's hoping that these ones take!

On to the fruit!!  The strawberries are doing surprisingly well considering I had basically zero hope of them producing anything.  There was one good size strawberry that I was saving for Roman but the birds got to it before I did.  I've been meaning to cover them with mesh but since the first berry I haven't had many more show up, so I haven't been in a rush.  Not bad for an experiment I guess!  Our Saskatoon tree is chock-full of nice sized Saskatoons and I couldn't be more excited!  If you don't know what Saskatoon's are, they are a delicious berry synonymous with Saskatchewan and quite possibly the most scrumptious morsel of berry goodness that you will ever taste!  We are taking the birds on head on and trying anything we can to keep the birds away.  So far we have spinning shiny decorations hanging in the tree to deter them, and we may have shot a few with the water hose when they got too close.  (No birds were harmed in the writing of this blog post!).  If you have any tips to keep the pesky birds away, please share in the comments!

Onto the pies de resistance, the tomatoes!  I have no idea how these behemoths came to be.  All I did was water (although not much with all the rain) and give them a bit of organic fertilizer.  These plants also get the most sun out of any of the plants in the entire garden.  I guess the trick to growing massive tomatoes is to ignore them for the large part....  I think we are going to be overloaded with tomatoes come fall, which is good because Mom's tomatoes died so we'll be able to supply her!  Be sure to keep an eye out for a tomato sauce canning video this fall, no canner required!!