Monday, June 28, 2010

June 28 - Harvest Monday

Harvests have pretty much slown down this week because of the heat. It's just gotten too oppressive for things to flower and pollinate successfully. Heat seems to make the eggplant incredibly spongy, so my hopes now are to keep those plants alive for the next two months and maybe they'll start flowering again when it cools off in September. Zucchini is coming to an end as I rip out about a plant every other day or so because of SVB damage. The tomatoes aren't putting out many new flowers, but those that are there are ripening fast, which is nice. I'm taking a couple of Cherokee Purple tomatoes to my parent's house with me today. I hope they'll like them as much as I do. They're more of true tomato lovers than I am, so this should be a real treat for them.

The real odd factor comes in with the cucumbers. Last year I had over 40 pounds of cucumbers by this point and I've not yet gotten a cucumber that's not woppy. I can only guess it's the heat of this June in comparison to last. I've been dwelling on how to approach the garden now. Here in GA, I can get almost two rounds of summer crops in if I put some in the ground in July, but it also limits my fall crops. I need to decide what to baby in order to keep producing, where to cut my losses, what to replant and what space to save for the fall. Ah, decisions, decisions. Here are some pictures of this week's harvests. The girl was in here a minute ago demanding why there were pickles in her basket. I instructed her that they were not pickles and if you leave your basket in the living room it's fair game. Not pictured are four zucchini, two tomatoes, two squash and a cucumber.

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Happy harvesting everyone and make sure to stop by Daphne's to see what everyone else is up to this week.

16 comments:

  1. Wow, you have a lot! I can't wait to have that much of a harvest in just one week. I think I will be there by mid July. I cannot wait for the first tomato to be ripe!

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  2. Dang, that is alot! Boy, those CP tomatoes are certainly worth all the trouble, aren't they? Mine should be coming in pretty soon.

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  3. You have a very nice harvest variety. This HOT weather has been very challenging for the garden, to say the least.

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  4. Nice harvest despite your weather :)

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  5. Oh man, those tomatoes look good!

    Did you know your picture has a black hole? I suppose you're getting all artsy, like Daphne ;-)

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  6. YAY! Summer harvests really rock. Isn't it wonderful when the tomatoes come in? You are having such a bountiful harvest this year!

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  7. The heat has been hitting our crops too. The cukes are producing, but not like last year.

    Too bad the SVBs are getting your zucchini. Here it's usually the squash bugs, though sometimes I'm so tired of squash I don't mind!

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  8. The heat has been oppressive here too! It's good that you can harvest some veggies. Our tomatos are not ripe yet. We can't wait though!

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  9. I despise the damn SVB. They are up there with ticks in my list of creatures I wouldn't mind making extinct.

    Those pretty purple eggplant sure look good!

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  10. Perfectly respectable harvest. I have heard (via the internet) of this heat wave which for us just means that we are finally getting some fruit ripening weather. Hope that your plants keep pumping out. If it were me, I'd save the eggplants but that's just me.

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  11. All this talk of CP tomatoes makes me want mine to be ready NOW. I don't think it is happening though. I have one tiny little tomato on my plant right now, so I'll probably have to wait until the beginning of August :<

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  12. Your harvest looks great! I'm still waiting for my first zucchini (ever). I hope they turn out as well as yours look!

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  13. It must be hard to deal with the heat. We have pretty much a 50/50 split of hot humid weather and cooler weather in the summer.

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  14. Yes, the heat is starting to get to us here, too. I've long since ripped out all the cool weather crops. I'm interested in your 2 summer crops. Might have to read up on that for our garden. Lots for me to learn!
    ~~Lori

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  15. I thought eggplant liked heat, it must be really HOT there. My problem is finding eggplant that doesn't need as much heat. Your harvests look good even if they aren't as big as usual.

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