some garden things

A tiny bug with warning colors. I don't think it's a wasp, though?

My cantaloupe definitely crossed with the zucchini. It will probably taste bad. Or at least bland. 

The cowpeas are thriving! It's lovely to see how healthy they are. In the same bed, barely noticeable, are the few bush green beans, their leaves sickly looking and wilted from whatever pest or disease gets them every year. Cowpeas are a win. So far, my family all likes eating them cooked as tender young 'beans'. And the few I miss when picking keep growing- there's several deep in the mass of plants dry and near to rattle now.

More tomatoes 

some picked early to ripen on the windowsill.

The cat sat with me on the garden bench.

green and purple

My regular bush green beans aren't producing much. Last two pickings all I got was enough for one serving. I made a new recipe with it, book borrowed from the public library. It's nicely tossed with a tiny bit of butter, garlic, and fresh herbs. The recipe calls for dill but suggests other herbs. I tried tarragon- now that I have a plentiful supply! pretty good. Would like to try with chervil too but mine's long spent.

Cowpeas are finally blooming! Pretty lavender color. Doubt I'll get beans mature enough to save as dried, just hoping for ones to eat as fresh 'green beans' now.

Benne would be a pretty plant, if mine wasn't so damaged by insects. I like the flowers. They now have fat, oblong slightly fuzzy pods on the stems. Intriguing to see them develop as I haven't grown this plant before.

My hollyhock mallows have gotten taller, and the flowers are more visible- makes me think they might be worth growing in the front bed next year.

I have one small cantaloupe!

and have eaten one more zucchini. Nice size and great taste, just with there were more. Which is a really funny thing to say about zucchini.

grey

The garden is withering. I was going to take photos and post happily about how the cardinal climber has grown up to deck height and wound through the trellis my sweet peas vacated, and the zucchini leaves are bigger than my head now with bold yellow flowers- but yesterday I saw to my dismay that half the beds are unwell. All the leaves turned a sickly greyish color and severely wilted. Carrots, beets, tomatoes, cucumbers, lovage, cantaloupe and zucchini affected. So many nice tomatoes in there, but all still too green to pick! It's spread to the cardinal climber vine too so I'm doing work to cut things out.

We had three days of very heavy afternoon downpours- I wonder if the plants simply drowned. Also I caught a half dozen harlequin bugs among the collard greens- they could very well be the culprits. It's time to go out with gloves and a trash bag. I'm acutely reminded of the time years ago, on another property, when I had to rip out most of my garden plants- especially the green beans- due to similar symptoms. Harlequin bugs showed up in that garden, too.

end of june garden

Lots of things are thriving now- and the scented plants, rue on one end of the garden, marigolds, hyssop

and wormwood on the other- seem to be keeping the rabbit away so far.

I recently planted out my zucchinis,

cucumbers

and cantaloupe

Peppers growing great

And all the basils- the ruffly one, lemon basil, regular sweet basil, purple amaratto basil

I haven't used the variations on tarragon yet- just noticed the one in a pot has finely serrated edges-

We're eating leeks regularly now, and had first tomato last night. Chard almost big enough to cut now too.

Have too many chamomile plants!

Need to figure out what this plant is! the one I thought a reverted wild coleus? it's getting huge leaves.

garden pics from today-

Second round of blooms on my clematis. Not as many, but still pretty.

My rue is doing very nice 

and the Lovage has grown a lot since I moved it- 

but I don't see swallowtail caterpillars on either one. Did they already pupate? or their camouflage is just so good.

My tomatoes are doing so much better! They have good color now- all but one which has remained yellowish and smaller-

and are growing fast. I've already eaten a few single cherry tomatoes.

A few of the cardinal climbers have gone up the trellis, many are flowering 

and the what-is-it maybe a wild-reverted coleus next to one row is grown huge. Is this a plant I'll regret allowing to grow in the garden.

I didn't expect the turnip/rutabagas to look so lovely, but the foliage is huge, quite blue, and even has an attractive scent, like a nice collard.

The rest of that bed is pretty full. We've been eating the beets and turnips but I haven't started pulling carrots yet.

I started cutting down the peas, today. The golden snap peas first, as they are kinda unruly.

Last lot of plants to go in the garden! Only two pots didn't sprout.

come up

All my new plants are sprouting in the greenhouse!

Outside, spears of gladiolas are coming up on the sideyard. Tithonias look great, one aster died. My purple clematis is blooming again, lavender is flowering, cardinal climbers are starting to go up the trellis. More sweet peas are in flower, lots of white nicotiana, and a hummingbird visited yesterday. I only caught a glimpse of it, though. At first I thought it was a cicada!

I pulled the older tokyo bekana and cut off all the dried seedpods. Just as many more were still too green. Even all these weren't good- on opening, more than half were mildewed. 

Still got plenty of seed, though!

the only cantaloupe

I figured I better harvest it, because the skin was getting these cracks, and I didn't know if that would let insects or bacteria get inside-

So cut it open and ate half for breakfast. My husband had the other half. It was rather bland- not quite ripe. He liked it, I was a bit disappointed. It was just alright.