Things are really doing well this year. I’ve been picking zucchini, yellow squash, string beans, and sugar snap peas for a while now. I thought I’d picked the last strawberry last week, but then the funky pink-flowered strawberry plant that I found at the Portland Farmer’s Market a few months ago produced a couple more!
The blueberries are in full swing and I can’t pick them fast enough. The black raspberries are coming along; only have a few plants this year but they are doing great, for the most part.
I’m eating the sugar snap peas and string beans as fast as I’m picking them. Good thing my family isn’t enamoured of vegetables.
The lettuces and basil is doing great; all of the herbs are kicking butt, actually, as usual. Herbs rock! They know what to do and they do it; they need very little help from us.
The bell peppers all look great. I have one eggplant that unfortunately has a hole drilled straight through the top. The pumpkins, winter squash, and potatoes (Yukon Golds) are doing well. Even the watermelon is still alive. That’s already better results than last year.
But here’s the real news: the first two (cherry) tomatoes have ripened! They are ready to eat! I can’t wait. Now, the bad news: one of the heirloom tomatoes has a disease of some sort. The bottom ends are blackened halfway up on two of the plum style tomatoes. 😦
I will be hitting the books tonight to figure out what to do, but I’m not optimistic. Other than removing the offensive tomatoes and keeping my fingers crossed, I haven’t found much that helps this.
Will be consulting these books: Terrific Tomatoes (really old, found used copy at a bookstore years ago) “By the editors of Organic Gardening and Farming”, and Garden Primer (revised edition) by Barbara Damrosch…basically it comes down to a watering problem: too much after too little, or perhaps too little calcium. One book has the nerve to say a solution is to “choose disease-resistant plants”…OY! Are you kidding me?
Okay, note to self: next year, consult crystal ball to rule out plants that will likely develop blossom end rot due to watering problems.
In the meantime, I’ve thrown those two rotted bottomed tomatoes as far away into the woods as I was able. Hopefully the rest will be okay.
Now if i can only figure out what ate the hole through my eggplant…
Karen Creamer Author, Coach, Speaker 
I didn’t know there was anything out there that ate rhubarb either. Wow. Our growing time here is ahead of our OWN typical growing time; not sure what’s up this year but I’m grateful for it. Here’s hoping your produce is ready to eat soon!
Your garden looks great! Our growing time here is behind yours but I have little babies of peppers, zucchini, tomatoes and cukes in the garden. My beans are flowering still. I am so looking forward to be able to eat fresh from the garden like you are doing now. I have a mystery eater in my garden too…one that is eating at the rhubarb leaves…I didn’t think there was a bug out there that liked rhubarb! Thanks for sharing your Garden Update!