down in the garden

Heat is growing, so are the plants. Overhead shot- top left, the rue, then bed of beets, pink cosmos and leeks. Bottom row: perennial herb bed, middle is the bed of greens (collards, arugula, leaf beet chard and kale), right is the bed of turnips, epazote and carrots (not visible) with marigolds in among the now-cut-down epazote.

The three beds against the house wall look sparse- far left: amaranth growing where the lettuces came out, middle: peppers, cumin seed and sweet peas (haven't grown up their trellis yet), corner on the right: yellow snap peas have!

Closer up, on a walk through the garden: yellow rue flowers, floating over their blue foliage:

The beets are doing so much better than last year!

Golden ones in front:

Red behind:

In the herb bed- lavender is starting to grow flower stalks- too small to see in the picture yet. Nepitella- I still don't quite know what to do with that one. I will probably cut it to dry when the heat gets to be too much for it- and if I don't find a use by next spring, might pull up and use the space for something else next year. Lavender could probably use the elbow room, anyway.

Lemon balm in the middle here, perpetual green onions on the right. My lemon balm plant got flattened out from the center by the last thunderstorm we had. I've been going around the circle of it cutting the stems back, freezing some and using for tea. By the time I trim all around it, the first part I cut should be growing back.

Here's the sour leaf- sorrel.

After picking off a lot of caterpillars, I cut back some of my kale to the ground- the leaves were so riddled with bug holes it wouldn't have been worth the trouble to clean and cook. Letting those regrow- and even if they didn't, I still have enough.

In the center of the bed (not pictured) I pulled out all but two arugula plants, leaving those to set seed. Cut back a ton of arugula foliage also, so the collards can get more sun. They're doing fantastic! Time to eat more greens!

Leaf beet chard on the other side of arugula benefits from the trim, too.

What can I say about the turnips. They astound me. Bugs don't like turnip? I'm going to have to thin, soon!

In the newer bed, my fordhook giant chard is gaining size.

The asian greens mizuna and tatsoi, are not. Riddled with holes. Next year I am sowing these early in trays with the rest of them.

Green beans are climbing the poles! and that's it for now