Well underway now in the Gardens 2012 - actually had the unpleasant joy of having to weed out the raised beds the yesterday (couldn't have too many weeds in the pictures, duh ...) Thank goodness for some good Revive and Scott's Max Green Fertilizer to get the grass to green-up before snapping this picture - almost fairway quality ...
The potato grow bags are going crazy! We started them this year much earlier than we've done in previous years. On the last day before I was to leave the first flowers were just starting to blossom on the russet potatoes - second up from the bottom on the photo below. These potato grow bags that I found three years ago from Gardener's Supply Company have worked really well and are a great way to grow potatoes in a contained space.
Caesar's Salad anyone?? Kerry's little salad garden that she helped plant in the upper raised bed really took off and both her and Laura (and I'm thinking others as well) have been enjoying the fresh Romaine lettuce over the past couple weeks.
The main corn and bean bed is coming up ... You can see the bean sprouts and corn plans pushing through about 7 days after Kerry dropped the seeds in the ground. I did cheat on the six plants in the first row (left side of the picture), picking those up at the greenhouse and dropping them in.
The pole beans are off and running, should be climbing in about a week. Hopefully this year we'll work to pick them a bit earlier. For the past couple of years we've let them grow a bit longer and they've gotten very stringy and chewy. This year we're hoping to harvest them a bit younger.
Of course the raised beds are taking hold with the tomato and pepper plants growing well. The Big Beef tomato plant in the middle spot of Bed #3 is already four rungs high on the support. The Mountain Fresh Tomato plant (front spot of Bed #3 shown below) already has fruits growing.
Can't wait for the first Roma Tomatos for my yacos. Both the Roma plants in Bed #2, middle spot and in the rear raised bed have large fruits already growing - just waiting for them to ripen up. Have to mention that you can also see (in the first picture below) Kerry's Carrots are sprouting along the right edge.
Not to be forgotten, the pepper plants are going well - but they typically don't take off and grow like crazy until we get into the dog-day, 90 degree consistent heat of summer. The one exception is the Sweet Bananarama plant that already has three peppers growing at full side - probably will make an early delivery to the Van Leuvens. Surprisingly, we also found the first sweet belle pepper growing this week (third picture below).
The Murder's Row Pepper (containers) are struggling a bit. These are usually smaller plants in the pots, and with that they sometimes get more water than they really need and I think that slows them down. From the bottom to top, after the Patio Tomato plant, is a Chayenne pepper, then a hot jose' jalepeno, then a Thai Pepper plant, followed by a tabasco pepper and then two Fogelberg Habanero plants. Nothing in that row that doesn't require some serious stomach anti-acids. The Patio Tomato plants on the ends of each row have really taken off (much to my surprise) - first time I've had success with those. We'll see how many fruits these are able to produce.
