I see red

First tomato turning red

Peppers

Peppers are getting bigger!

Eggplant buds

Flower buds are developing on the eggplant plants

Thunderstorm Damage

Strong winds flattened the plants today. Nothing broken, just bent.

Keep up the good work!

The tomatoes are still growing. There are a few on one of the other plants as well. Still nothing on the rest. The plants themselves have definitely gotten bigger over the past week or so though.

Two of my three pepper plants, despite being pretty small, are growing multiple peppers.

There are also buds on the zucchini plants- male and female! I hope they open at the same time this year.

Video Tour

Come on Tomatoes!

Lots of flowers on both types of tomato plants, but so far still only tomatoes growing on the one plant. Here are the two types and the information on each from the Park Seed web page.


The photo to the right is the Tomato Mega Bite Hybrid. Park Seed advertises that each plant will produce up to 60 4 to 6 oz. fruit (3-4 inches in diameter). The branches are described as being short and lateral with the fruit close to the stem (thus not requiring staking and tying). That seems accurate although I do still wonder if the plants are somewhat stunted from the less than ideal soil. I have four of these plants. You can see the two large ones in the photo and one of the younger ones in between.


The photo to the left is the Tomato Container Choice Hybrid. It is advertised as producing 8 oz tomatoes. So far nothing on mine. I have three plants. I tied two of them to sticks after they started to lean in last weekend's thunderstorms. They've had a smattering of flowers for a week or so, but no sign of a tomato yet.

The eggplant plants are growing peppers!!

Or perhaps slightly more likely, I mixed up the two plants. :) So reverse eggplant and pepper in my previous posts.


I was just outside watering when I spotted the open flowers on the "eggplant" plants. When I leaned in closer to look I spotted little green peppers! Oops. But still- Cool! Check out the little pepper right in the middle of the picture above. The real eggplant plant is pictured below.

Garden Update

So far the only produce actually growing is some tomatoes on one plant, but flowers are starting to appear and bloom, so more harvests should be on the way soon (I hope!). The top picture is of the tomato plant that has at least a half dozen little tomatoes forming. The photo at the very end of this blog post is another kind of tomato plant. It's a lot less compact. Both are supposed to be container plants. (I bought the seeds before we decided to put in the raised bed in the front yard.)


I planted some more of the zucchini seeds I planted in containers last summer. I planted three of one kind and then two of the black beauty kind. They're all growing fast. The picture to the left is of two of them.


Things are not going well with the peas. I don't see the little green aphids but there are definitely little bugs on there and the plants are dying. Perhaps I'm not meant to grow peas. I might pull them up this weekend and do some yellow squash instead if I can still find seeds.


The pepper and eggplant plants aren't all that big but they seem to be doing ok. The eggplant have what look to be buds forming. Right now an egg plant would crush the whole plant, so hopefully it has a growth spurt soon. We should have fertilized more when we planted. The dirt we got from the dump was supposed to be a mixture of dirt, compost, and fine mulch. It just doesn't have the nutrients in it. The picture to the left is of one of the eggplants.


Some of the beans are getting flowers and the plants are getting bigger, so I should at least have a handful for a meal soon. I've got some more seeds soaking now and am going to plant them tomorrow. Some of the plants look a bit stunted, which is going to leave the beans dragging on the ground. I just got some Miracle Gro fertilizer granules for vegetables to mix into the water and have applied that a couple times. I hope that helps create some more robust plants.


The little broccoli plants are still growing, apparently unaware this is the wrong season for them. I don't know if they'll actually get to the point of broccoli heads, but I don't have the heart to pull them up. No picture of those since I'm running out of space in this blog post, but I've got three in the ground.

Carrot Harvest

Making beef stew today. Just pulled the carrots. Dug up four onions Sunday.