Garden 2011 update 8

Okay. I know you are tired of hearing about the garden. You. Are. Over. It . I feel you, I understand your feelings but I am not tired of talking about it. Tired of spending time cutting into my weed barrier, making a hole, scooping out dirt, sticking a slightly less tiny plant in it, covering it with dirt, patting it down and then turning the hose on. Over and over. I think I have hit the wall with the plants. Also, I have run out of space. Finally.

The tally is  seventeen bell pepper plants in a variety of colors from yellow to red to black and eleven (!) tomato plants, plus many, many green-beans ( now sprouting!) and three kinds of peas (not sprouting) plus one kind of watermelon. And that's just in the back yard. Upfront I have three kinds of potatoes, three varieties of pumpkins, some nice strawberries and raspberries and a single watermelon. Wow.

The backyard gang. I think I'm going to remove the cages that I worked rather hard to get installed. I want to see what happens without them. Those plants are veryclose together - I don't know what I was thinking and I have thoughts of maybe moving a couple of them. Maybe.

Despite first being trimmed back to an inch of their lives, re-potted and then eaten to lace by caterpillars - they still found it inside to produce! Yay raspberries.

I can't take credit for the strawberries, Alphagal raised them, but I can take credit for them not dieing immediately after leaving her sphere of influence. It helps I have a picture of Alphagal in their pot to help with their homesickness. As nice as the dirt is, I wish the camera had thought to focus on the berries and not so much the potting soil.

The white circles mark the other two watermelons. The one in the lower left is not as close to the pumpkin vine as it looks - also, the vine is spreading! I found a scout under the shrub. I want to point out that while the vines are fab and seem healthy, I'm not sure they are going to produce actual pumpkins, but the vines themselves are quite lovely and viney and they are making that otherwise icky corner green and lush.

The potatoe plants are very green and pretty. I have added soil three times and I think I have one more  layer of dirt to go.  So far, they look very nice, again, not certain that they are going to make veggies but the plants make the corner softer and nicer.