July 17, 2020

Today is a bit blustery but the overcast skies and drizzle are good for the newly planted seeds and seedlings. Some of the established veggies could use a welcome break from the heat and the sun too! I'm so excited for the beans and peas to pop up and for the cucumbers, melons and summer squash to take off. Things are changing quickly in the garden and will hopefully give us great harvests once school is back.

If you take a walk through the garden you'll notice little baby pumpkins starting to grow in some of the back raised beds. Above you can see the difference between the male and female flowers, both of which are needed to pollinate a pumpkin before it can grow. Did you know that you can help pollinate your fruits and veggies? On a windy day like today, it may be hard for the bees to get in there and do their jobs and since these flowers only last for a short time, you don't want to miss your window of opportunity! All you need to do is pick a male flower, take off the petals and rub it's "anther" (the part with all the pollen on it) on the female flower's "stigma" (the same pollen-covered part of the female flower). You can read more about it here. I'll try to post more detail shots next week!

You can also see above some early ripened raspberries. The blueberry bushes are also covered with fruit just waiting to ripen. And our small batch of garlic has been pulled and will be dried and cured for any of the fall recipes we want to try out.