Monday 25 August 2014

Harvest Monday: August 25, 2014

The past week started with the cool, wet weather we have had recently, but ended with a few more seasonal days - very hot, very humid!  New to the harvest this week are borlotti beans and spaghetti squash.  Most of the borlotti beans (7 pounds was the total) have been left to dry out ...


Some have already been harvested as shown on a previous posting.



This spaghetti squash is the first of about 8 on the go.  It is the first time I've grown this type of squash so I'm anxious to crack it open.  I love spaghetti squash and have already promised some to friends so I hope it is okay.


And more of the usual suspects.  These 5 pounds of blue russian potatoes puts me around 20 pounds plus so far for my potato harvest.  And I still have about 15 plants in the ground, including my beloved fingerlings which I haven't touched yet.



I don't have too many tomatoes ... not enough to start canning, at least. 


The black krim, which are normally a purplish-brown, are all coming out this yellowish-green.  Strange colouring, but ripe and sweet.  The seeds I used came from one of last year's tomatoes which was the right colour when I harvested it - but almost all of my black krim's have been this lighter colour this year.  I think I'll chuck the leftover seeds and start over.



I pulled out all of the beets as I wanted to use the space to transplant my strawberries.



I also pulled out the remaining cucumber plants - too many already!  But look at the monsters that I found underneath.  Not sure what to do with these, but I hate to waste them so I'll figure something out.



And I harvested all of the remaining red onions from the raised gardens. I'm pretty happy with how they came out as I usually struggle with onions.   I suspect it is simply the location as the raised gardens have great loose soil.  I still have some Spanish onions in one of the dug gardens but they are tiny in comparison.




These are actually Red Baron bunching onions - I have been using a lot of chives when I want some chopped greens for garnish and have been neglecting the green onions.  I didn't realize they would grow so large if left long enough!?




I realized it was silly not to dry out herbs when I have so many so I've added some thyme to the sage I started drying last week.



And from this mornings little harvest, I have some more tomatillos and both sweet and hot peppers.  I have never had problems before growing jalapenos but this year's crop is a bit pathetic - again, I think it is the cool, wet weather.  Most of my gardening friends around here are complaining about the lack of tomatoes and peppers.


In fact, I went to a local market where I often purchase "seconds" of tomatoes when I am making large amounts of sauce only to be told their tomato crop wasn't doing too well this year.  But they suggested I come back in a couple of weeks (I must have salsa for the winter!).

That's it for my recent harvest ... visit Daphne's Dandelions to see other harvests from around the globe.

11 comments:

  1. A colorful, varied harvest. Sounds like your Black Krim got cross-pollinated, it is an OP variety. For the big cucumbers, you could try making senfgurken pickles (Google for a recipe). Even big yellow ones succumb to this treatment.

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    1. Usually the overgrown cukes require the 9-day type of pickling recipe (which I rarely am successful with). The senfgurken seem to be just overnight ... I think I'll give it a try!!

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  2. So much variety! Of course, so jealous of the spaghetti squash and potatoes. I see you hang up your herbs to dry. I think I'll try that for mine. I don't have a dehydrator (yet) so have been holding off on drying them. I suppose that's rather silly of me, when you think about it - it's not like they had dehydrators 100 years ago ;)

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  3. I love Borlotti beans but didn't grow any this year, there's just far too many good beans to grow and not enough garden space. I hope your weather remains good for the tomatoes and peppers, it sure would be disappointing if they don't come around and produce a decent crop.

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    1. I still have some hope for tomatoes in the garden, but the peppers were in containers and just too far gone to think anything better will happen!

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  4. I hear you about cool wet weather. Our tomatoes have done ok but the peppers and eggplants are very slow to come on. Interesting about your Black Krim. I'm having similar problems with Cherokee Purple from seed I saved. I'm going to go back to purchased seed for it next year.

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    1. Yes, me too, I wanted to try saving seeds just to see if I could do it ... but I'll go back to purchased seeds for a bit.

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  5. Nice varied harvest, the Borletto beans are pretty. All my slicer tomatoes didn't do well, the only 2 plants going for me now are small cherry variety.

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  6. Nice harvests. And isn't it weird that your tomato didn't come true to seed. Most tomatoes self pollinate, but then there is always the outlier.

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  7. I truly love the way those beans llok. How many plants did you have to get that much?

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    1. Hi Barbara, I think I only had about a dozen plants - they produce quite a lot of beans each.

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