Harvest Monday - Oct 3, 2011

I did not post anything at Daphne's Dandelions last week, as I didn't have much to report gardenwise.  I will combine last week's one or two pics in this post.  We finally got around to picking apples from the trees for two reasons - wasps were having a field day eating up fragrant apples and plenty of ripe ones were falling off the tree!  There were approximately 50+ Honeycrisp and 60+Sweet 16s this year.  Our basement is now smelling heavenly!!  I have left just a few on the trees, as they didn't come off easily, guess they need more time.  We gave away some to neighbors and friends and will eat the rest as fresh apples.  When refrigerated, they will last several weeks and Honeycrisp will last about 6 months.  So that's where they are currently stored :)

Not pictured - yellow/red raspberries eaten off the bushes and white radishes, 2 of them over a feet long but nice and tender.

Tomatoes

chillies, bell peppers, beans, okra

Sweet 16

Honey Crisp

More apples(fell off trees) and a cucumber

Tomatoes

All of this year's carrots

Carrots (cleaned)

Last of the green(some red) bell peppers

green/red chillies

Banana Peppers

Harvests - Sept 20, 2011

Technically, it's tuesday, but I'll go ahead and add my Harvest Mondays post, at Daphne's Dandelions.  We had an early Frost last week, and as a result, I picked off almost anything that was close to harvest.  This will be the last major harvest of the season.  There will be smaller harvests for another week or two, then I will be done with the garden work for the year. 

I had to pick so many things that were getting closer, but not really ready.  This also meant picking green chillies, as they hadn't matured to red color yet!  I couldn't use that much green chillies, but after freezing a good amount, they were given off to neighbors and friends.  Apples are yet to be picked.  But I also didn't get pictures of everything that was picked, as it was too tiring to cover up plants, pick off harvests, store them and also photograph them.  I did the best I could, and there are more pictures than usual....

Tomatoes and 1 zucchini(hidden)

4 Butternut squash(2lb 13 oz - over 4 lbs)  This one 4lb 4oz!

More tomatoes

okra, eaten apples(not by us :), cantelopes, red chillies

Part of kung pao chillies

Some more tomatoes

Bell peppers and beans

More peppers

Some apples and cucumber

Eggplants

Cayenne Peppers

Banana peppers

Harvest Monday - August 29, 2011

Finally, this week, I picked 8-9 large tomatoes.  First of the season!  It was a happy week. Also, in were the sweet plums.  After a few were pecked by birds, it was time to pick them all.  Since dealing with the pests, eggplants grew large and finally I had several nice sized eggplants to harvest.  First blackberry was ripe(not pictured).  Here goes my harvests for the week....

Zucchini, apples, tomatoes, plum

Plums!!

Tomatoes, chillies

Bush beans

Check out the size!

Tomatoes and plums

Cucumbers, zucchini and chili

Eggplants

Methi(Fenugreek) leaves

Sweet banana peppers and bush beans

For all other harvests, head on over to Daphne's Dandelions - Harvest Mondays!!

Harvest Monday - August 22, 2011

Thanks to Daphne for hosting Harvest Mondays.  This week the harvest was good.  It's always nice to walk into the garden and come back with some veggies.  I'm struggling somewhat with something that has been eating eggplants and tomatoes, even to the extent of climbing onto the plants and eating veggies that are atleast a foot off the ground.  I spent time reading online to find some clue and figured out that it must be either mice or field rats, since they have similar diets as humans.  Voles/moles do not eat veggies.  I had wrongly assumed that it was voles/holes eating up my eggplants, but I was so wrong.  I have come up with an idea to outsmart(I hope?) these mice/rat and will post a blog later on in the week.  Here are my harvests for the week.

Yellow Squash and two (bird pecked and why is it rotting?) plums

Green beans and two red chillies

Cucumbers, red bell, zucchini and TWO tomatoes!!

Carrots, 2 radishes, zucchini, eggplant, cucumbers, green beans, red chillies, 1 tomato

Eggplants, cukes, zucchini, green bell, and lots of green chillies

Red bell, 2 Roma tomatoes(mice/rat eaten), green beans

Sweet banana peppers, red chillies, cucumbers

In other news, Tiny Gardener has a birthday giveaway on her blog, so if you'd like to be entered into a drawing for a year long subscription of Hobby Farm magazine, head on over to her site to check it out.

Harvest Monday - July 25, 2011

An update on the duck that I blogged previously.  Yesterday evening, the duck was fluffing and spreading wings quite often and during this process, we could see some movement underneath its wings.  Ducklings!!!  Eggs are finally hatched.  Kids were glued to the windows to see some glimpses of the little ducklings and to count how many there were.  We were expecting them to be gone this morning, but the mama duck is sitting on the eggs/chicks with a couple of ducklings' faces visible around her body.  I could see a few, but there were about 8 eggs in there.  Not sure when she'll leave with the ducklings. Perhaps there are some more eggs to be hatched....

Can you see the duckling underneath the wing?

Onto Daphne's Dandelions for Harvest Mondays.  This week was when I finally dug out the Yukon Gold potatoes.  Kids were excited to dig and find some.  I have them in the container, so it is easy to dump the contents onto a tarp and go through the dirt.  It is hard to miss any potatoes that way!  Also, cherry harvest continued.  Will be making a pie today :)

Yukon gold potatoes

Sour cherries

Beans and cherries

Yellow raspberries

Yellow squash

Beans and some peas

Green Bell Peppers and Red onions

Yellow squash, 2 tomatoes, sweet banana peppers

Green beans

Dill

Mint