Tossing the Tomatoes

There is a cool breeze blowing this evening. It feels good.  Rain clouds threatened, but only turned lose of a few rain drops, nothing significant, only a bit of a tease. We spent part of the morning in the vegetable garden. Let's go for a walk to see how the garden grows:

We started a dozen tomatoes from seed in March. Planted them in June. They weren't the prettiest or even very strong plants. Pretty pathetic, in fact, so the head gardener purchased six more just in time for them to get pummeled by hail, so the head gardener bought six more. We had a total of 35 bushes and volunteers are popping up all through the garden. So here we see a healthy, strong tomato.

  But next to healthy ones are these pathetically sick tomatoes. Who knows what is wrong with them. Could be blight, so I finally convinced him to pull out all of the sick plants, about six of them.

Bye Bye. Tossed in thrash can.

These are my lime green zinnias. I cannot wait for them to bloom. I planted more, but the heavy rain and hail in June washed most the seeds away. I think. I hope to save the seeds from these few. Unfortunately  they are planted at the end of the row of rather aggressively growing watermelons.

Speaking of watermelons. I was reading on Pintrest not plant cucumbers next to watermelons because to do so will make the watermelons lose their sweetness. Wouldn't you know the first year we try watermelons, we make that faux-pas. We shall see. I'll report back. Actually it may not be an issue if the melons don't mature.

Sundance has a designating latrine. Jacob asked once if it was the pooping station. Horse manure does not have any, as they say, nutritional value. It does, however, add necessary humus to our clay based soil. And it is free.

So the strawberries and the asparagus got a working over. I weeded, then top dressed them with horse manure, topped with grass clippings that our neighbor kindly delivered to us, since we don't bag our clippings. I guess I forgot to photograph the final top dressing. 

 I have been reading about asparagus on Pintrest, too. While my plants look rather unhealthy, they are actually surprising us by sending up new shoots already. The ferns (or is it fronds?) look unhealthy, but we purchased them at the end of the season half price, so they looked bedraggle when we brought them home. The article made it sound like growing asparagus in the garden requires a lot of work. The plants do need a lot water early on, so they got mulched with manure and grass clipping, too, to keep the moisture in and the weeds out.

Isn't he gorgeous? He lives next door. I had to take his picture.

Not enough for a pie, the black berries are nearly ripe. I tasted a couple, still a bit sour. They do make a berry pretty picture, don't you think?

So our little garden thrives and shouldn't it with a bright ray of sunshine?

On the patio, the newest gladiola has bloomed a deep dark magenta red.

We bought weed barrier today to put down in the front garden where we planted the David Austins. I am just so tired of fighting the weeds, those nasty Canadian thistle and bind weed that resist any effort to eradicate them: pulling, poisoning, and cursing. So this week we'll put down the weed barrier and add the mulch for a clean, well kept look.

So a busy week ahead, including an over night trip to the Big City (Denver).  I do hope a cool breeze passes your way. Have a great week.