cleanup discoveries

I finally did some work in the garden. Cut back a huge amount of sage-

it was smothering everything else in the herb patch. Found under there my row of green onions is looking great! Time to eat something.

I took out a lot of borage. The older stems were turning black and collapsing, all the flowers I hadn't collecting for seed becoming brown mush. I am not surprised, there are now -for the first time all year- squirrel or chipmunk holes in my garden again- big ones, as if the buggers are making up for lost opportunities! Never fear, the borage seeded itself and young plants are coming up again already.

Pest population was different this year- I definitely had more of a problem with leaf hoppers and aphids than whitefly and japanese beetles. My marigolds look much healthier this time around:

Another real bright spot is cosmos- but you can see there are caterpillars hiding somewhere. These flowers sprinkled with frass. I couldn't find the larva. Have been picking more lately- good treats for the fishes.

Tithonia has become a bold wall of color. It attracts lots of little skippers, and I've seen black swallowtail and bright monarch butterflies. I really wish to see the hummingbird again, but no such luck. Only one sighting so far and now I think they've moved on.

Found a volunteer cantaloupe growing in my daughter's patch! It's bigger since I took this photo, and has the tan webbing starting to form. Hope to eat it soon. I never did get any zucchini or butternut squash, but then I have rather neglected the garden this year.