July is when the plants really start to grow quickly, and August is when the harvest gets going seriously. I actually took the pictures nearly two weeks ago, but couldn't find the time to write a post.
First, the flowers! Both of the deck railing planters are flourishing.
The pot of bidens is doing well. The internet tells me this plant is also commonly called Spanish needles, tickseed sunflowers, and beggarticks.
The raspberry row is in the background of this photo. It was The Year of the Raspberry! Nearly everyone around here had a bumper crop. I got at least 10 gallons from my row. In front of the raspberries are the gladiolus. None were in bloom the day I took this photo, but you can see the tall spikes getting ready to bloom. In front of those are the tomatoes with nasturtiums and marigolds between them.
This is also why no gladiolus were to be seen in the garden in the previous photo: I've been bringing them into the house to enjoy.
I didn't know there was such a thing as spreading/climbing nasturtiums until this year, when I ended up with some. Ms. W. gave me some small plants, and they just keep growing and spreading!
Here's a purple gladiolus just starting to open up.
The various squash and cucumber plants have grown quite large. The zucchini and yellow straightneck summer squash are producing more than we can eat, so I've been sharing with garden-less friends. The cucumbers are trickling along slowly. I am using the pickling cucumbers to make dill pickles, but have to store the cukes in the fridge for a few days until I have enough to make it worth running the canner kettle.
And the dill is finally getting tall enough to use for the dill pickles! I had to buy one bundle at the grocery store, but now I can use my own dill weed or the dill heads for future canning.
The green beans were ready to start picking on July 30th. I picked 10.5 pounds of beans that first day. I normally pick beans every three days. But three days later I only picked 4 pounds, and three days later only one pound. Plenty of beans remain on the plants, but they aren't developing properly. I asked the local gardening expert about it. She suggested adding some fertilizer, and making sure they were getting enough water. I am quite certain I have watered them adequately. But the weather has been very warm, which may be messing up the bean growth. Every afternoon, most of the cucumber and squash plants look very droopy and wilted, but they perk up again by morning. I don't recall ever seeing that before.
This is my pea crop for the year. The ground squirrels nibbled the plants while they were very small. A few of them tried to make a comeback, but I had quit watering them.
The sweet banana peppers are quite happy beneath the shade cloth. (I probably should have spread some over all of the squash and cucumber plants, too!) I have harvested three so far. One of them was hiding and actually turned red, which they do when fully mature. The flavor is mild and pleasant.
Growing one's own vegetables requires planning, soil preparation, planting, weeding, fertilizing, more weeding, watering, harvesting, and preserving. It's a great deal of effort, but it's so rewarding when a nice collection of vegetables can be gathered nearly every day.
All photos taken on my Android phone.