Over the weekend I harvested my first peas and they were so delicious. I just shelled them and ate them raw. yum! Today I harvested all the lettuce and will eat a yummy salad in a few minutes.  The spinach bolted last week.  Its supposed to get up into the 90s this week (where did spring go!?) so I figured the lettuce was about done too.

Today I also saw a Soldier beetle (I think). It was just chillin’ on the sunflowers, hopefully making a meal of lots of cucumber beetles.  I also saw another bug that I think (even less sure on this one) may have been spined soldier bug.  Or maybe just a regular stink bug.  I didn’t get a close enough look at it.  I did notice that as it flew off, there was red coloring under its wings.  I will have to get pictures next time!

One ocra and a lot of the black beans came up today!  I think I will be able to pick my first harvest of peas this weekend!

The past week in the garden has been very exciting!  Here’s a list:

• Planted soy, black and lima beans; limas and soy are mostly up; still waiting on the black beans
• Planted clover in back beds
• Planted pumpkins and watermelon; came up yesterday
• Cucumber beetles (spotted and striped) are out with a vengence (as of May 1). I squished lots of them as they nibbled on my sunflowers.  When their numbers seemed to dwindle I put my actual cucumbers out. So far so good
• Bought hot (chile and something else) and chocolate bell pepper plants to replace those lost to frost.
• Bought fluffy pyramid flower plants to add some color.
• My tomatoes have flowers!!!!!!!
• I have peas!!!!!!!!
• I’m only mildly excited about those last two..

So everything is gradually greening up and filling in all the empty space.  yay! I will try to post some pics eventually.

L: CW from the front: Lettuce, oregano, peppermint, spinach/lettuce

R: baby corn and sunflowers. A couple of the corn plants got frost damage

L: Tomatoes and basil. A couple of the tomatoes got frost damage too. I think they will recover but right now they look pathetic.

R: Strawberries!!! I have one that is almost ready to pick

L: Rosemary bush, marigolds, peppers

R: Peppers (frost damage! ), chard, onions/potatoes under cage- which still hasn’t kept the rodents out. I think it must be mice that can fit through the chicken wire. grrrr.

L: Peas and where the soy beans will go

R: More peas and the bed where I planted the lima beans. The rough looking patch in the background is where the black beans will go

View of the whole plot from the north end (the hanging baskets are behind me)

There has been a lot going on in the garden plot lately.  Sorry I don’t have any pics. My camera battery is dead and I haven’t had time to go get another.  Here is a list of whats growing (or at least not dying):

• Corn: planted about a month ago; sprouted two weeks ago; about 5-6 inches high now
• Tomatoes: planted a couple weeks ago, growing pretty well; still waiting for them to get bigger before I ’string’ them
• Basil: Growing well; still covered with plastic jug, just in case it gets cold
• Cilantro: One pathetic little plant
• Peppers: planted with the tomatoes; red, orange, purple and hot varieties; growing slow but not dead
• Sunflowers: planted with the corn; sprouted at different times so lots of different sizes
• Peas: not very many sprouted, but the ones that did are growing well- I can see the beginning of flowers
• Strawberries: got free from my neighbor; growing well- lots of green strawberries
• Rosemary: growing like CRAZY!
• Swiss Chard: just transplanted today
• Lettuce and Spinach: very happy in their baskets; I’ve eaten several yummy salads!
• Peppermint: happy in the basket; I had some peppermint tea last night!
• Oregano: happy in the basket
• Marigolds: blooming!
• Crimson clover: leftover cover crop is blooming; I should probably turn it in but the flowers are so pretty!
• I believe thats all!

This weekend is PICNIC DAY!!! so. excited.  I am most excited about free plants.  If the PES dept doesn’t do that again this year I will be crushed.   I also will be at the BAE poster from 1-2 and Biotech exhibit from 2-4! Come say hi!

So over the course of the week I have planted pretty much all of my tomatoes and peppers outside. Still waiting a bit on the basil because its supposed to get down into the 30s tonight. I will post pictures as soon as I take some!

Today my Bright lights Swiss chard came up! I originally planted it directly outside but it never came up. Apparently each seed is actually more than one seed stuck together- check this out:

Theres like 4 plants coming out of there!  I love that the colors are already visible.  I have no idea whether or not I even like chard, I just bought it because its so pretty!

I have been hardening off some of my seedlings for the last couple of days.  Most of the tomatoes, peppers and marigolds are big enough to go outside and I am so excited.  Sunday afternoon we set up the tomato trellis. It looks nice, but will look even better with lots of tomato plants growing up it! :)  I am using the ’string’ method as described here.  Last year I used cages and the plants outgrew them about halfway through the season so I am hoping that going up will work better.  I am only growing one type of tomato: Roma.  I will probably get 1 or two more from picnic day too, but for now thats all.  For the peppers I have several different kinds: CA wonder (red bell), orange sweet bell, purple beauty and cayenne hot.  I was never able to get the purple to sprout so I just went out and bought a plant at Ace.  I am thinking that next year I might just buy all my plants.  For all the effort it takes to start seeds it might be worth it to spend the extra, at least for things like tomatoes and peppers that you transplant anyway.

So my efforts at burying the fence were fruitless. I came back a couple days later and they had just gone under it. My new strategy is to scatter the remaining plants around the garden in hopes that the squirrels won’t find all of them. So far they haven’t found any. In the future I am going to line the beds of root crops with chicken wire. I did that for my tulip bulbs and it worked so hopefully it will work for more tempting things like the potatoes I planted this weekend.