Veggie Patch :: Update

I am so delighted to be finally harvesting lovely fresh, home-grown produce from my garden!  The snow peas are proilific, as are the radishes.














The tomatoes are have grown to almost my height (all of 5 foot!) and are producing plenty of fruit, although none of it is showing any sign of ripening as yet.

This looks like a jumbled mess, but it's actually thee rows of
iceberg lettuces, interspersed with radishes.

The lettuces are very big and have started to set nice tight hearts inside all those floppy outside leaves.  I pluck a few juicy green leaves now and then to throw into our salads for dinner or lunch.



The cucumbers are coming along fantastically and are starting to weave their way up the 45 degree terrace that Wayne built for them. 

Underneath, hanging vertically are lots of lovely baby lebanese cucumbers!

The beetroot have come on so well that they can afford to lose a few baby leaves for our salads, too even though the beets themselves are not yet big enough to dig up.

The broccoli are getting bigger every day and I have managed to keep the grubs from eating them up by using a bio-insecticide called Dipel, which is a bacteria that affects the grubs but not other animals or humans.  However, I haven't yet seen any flower heads coming up.

The one and only eggplant has put out one single fruit, which looks beautiful, but lonely.  So, I have bought and planted another grafted eggplant to be its buddy, as well as eight baby Lebanese eggplants.  Hopefully all this company will encourage it to produce more fruit, showing off to its new neighbours!

Just to make sure, I sprinkled a line of Epsom Salts (magnesium sulfate) around all the eggplants.  This was recommended by quite a few commenters on the Gardenate website, when some gardeners complained that their eggplants were flowering profusely but not setting much fruit.  It will be interesting to see what effect it has.

The spring onions are coming along nicely, but were being extremely untidy - falling about the place like drunken sailors.  So, I put stakes in and tied them up to them.  Now they are nice and tidy, standing in formation like soldiers.

The pumpkin have gone absolutely crazy and were pushing right the way through the lettuces, radishes and cucumbers.  So, I have taken each trailer and gently lifted it over the wall of the veggie patch and told it it will have to continue growing "on the outside" now.  They looked very sad this morning, with all their leaves facing down, but this afternoon they had got over their disappointment and their leaves were facing up to the sun again.

The pumpkins are full of male flowers at the moment, but I did notice one female flower bud starting near the end of one of the plants. 



This photo has been classified by the ACB as R-Rated

When she is a little older and opens up, I will perform a marriage ceremony between her and one of the male flowers.  Unfortunately, this means the death of the male flower, as I will have to pluck it, strip its petals and rub its stamen into the middle of the female flower, but the sacrifice should be worth it!  No pain, no gain, honey!

The little celery plants have been doing very little for the past few weeks.  But, all of a sudden this week, they have realised that they should be doing something worthwhile and have begun growing.  AT LAST!!!

Considering how well they had all been behaving, I decided to reward the veggies with a delicious dose of PowerFeed for Veggies.  As I sprinkled this beautiful brown liquid from the watering can onto the plants, I was sure I could hear them sighing, sitting back and enjoying it ... something like how we might enjoy a lovely cab sav.

So, all in all, the veggie patch is coming along fantastically!