By mid-July, we were seeing some mature Japanese eggplant. I like these guys. They’re ideal for the grill, don’t even really need to slice them. Anything that’s prolific and yummy gets my vote, and eggplant have been prolific for us. And yummy.
Around the same time, the green zebra heirloom tomatoes were starting to come into their own. Not just an interesting color, these have also proven to be some of the tastiest I’ve grown.
A few days later, some color was starting to appear in some of the cherry tomatoes. The green was starting to reveal a bit of orange beneath.
At this point, mid-July, the walls of the garden were in full tsunami mode, pushing an ocean of cascading pole beans at us…
…from the west…
…and the east. Morning Glories were also slowly strangling the beans as well, even spilling over into the neighbor’s side of the fence.
The cucumber production was… robust. Over the course of the season we ended up with 14 pounds of pickling cukes and another 10 pounds of larger ones for salads. Here I picked seven on a day along with kale, beans and Shishitos. We couldn’t eat all these cukes… I gave quite a few away that season.
Gherkin harvest, mid-July
Here’s a jar of little gherkins getting ready to be made, with some dill from the garden as well. I think there was like 30 or so in this pint jar.
At this point, the southwest corner was becoming quite the jungly situation. While a lot of green growth might look impressive, it doesn’t always translate into heavy fruiting. Doesn’t count if it doesn’t produce!
The western fence was now thick with the purple pole bean vines, mixed in with a few morning glories.
A few pole beans started showing up, ready for harvest. I picked purple beans as I figured they would be easier to spot when the time came. True enough, but these guys are a little bit tougher than your average edible bean, unless you get them early. The ones that got too fat we let dry on the vine for seed saving day.
The kale was looking great, and we were able to start picking leaves for the pot. Soon we would transfer them to pots. Harvests were picking up.
The Shishito peppers were starting to become quite prolific–something I look for in a garden vegetable. In a few weeks we would be counting these by the dozen… then by the hundred. Most peppers are easy to grow and these ones crank out fruit.
This was the first season I’d gotten much out of beets. Scattered about the garden in spots, if they don’t get enough sun, they won’t shape up into a large enough root to use. The greens are great to eat as well.
Looking very similar to beets, the rainbow chard was getting large, but showing a few warning signs that its good health might not last. Up front here, it’s set against a backdrop of Indian Mustard.
At this point, the tomatoes were getting almost too tall to reach. This bamboo pole is an eight footer.
The purple pole beans began their assault at that point. They became the boss for a while. We just worked for them.
Once in a while, we even took breaks.
