Summer                                                            Moon of the First Harvest

Rain last night.  A morning walk through the garden shows many beets ready to harvest, carrots, too.  The last of the onion and garlic crop out of the ground drying in the sun.  Most of the crop is on its second week in the shed for further drying.

Our several tomato plants have both blossoms and fruit.  Two of the heirlooms have large beefy tomatoes, Brandywine and Cherokee Purple.  We also have cherry and roma varieties.  All have fruit and blossoms, presaging a bumper year.  We planned for this because our pantry stock of tomato based canned goods has almost reached depletion.

I did buy, for the first time, this year two non-heirloom varieties from Gurney’s.  A brix test will tell the difference, if any, in nutrient value.  Of course, the heirloom is not a highbred, so the seeds will breed true, meaning growing them retains and preserves the genetic diversity in our vegetable crops.  That’s a valuable tradition to support.  I prefer heirlooms, but didn’t want to be in a purist rut.

It also looks like a good year for peppers with several large peppers already on the plants. The eggplants have more fruit coming, too.  The cucumbers have begun to climb the bamboo, have blossoms, but no fruit so far.

The leeks, our remaining allium crop, have begun to fatten.  Which reminds me, I haven’t mounded them yet.  Oops.  Gotta get on that.  It creates longer white sections on the stalk and white is usable, green not.

Our pear crop has been harvested as has been most of the cherries.  The plums fall to the ground, not quite ripe and I have yet to find a ripe one on the tree.  Not sure what to do next with them.  Our quince with its first fruit has not yet begun to ripen.  The currants are ripe and we may not harvest them this year.  The apples grow inside their plastic ziploc bags though right now the apples I couldn’t reach to bag look just fine, too.  They’re a much later harvest.

I did find one raspberry on our canes in the vegetable garden but this is very early for them.  We have golden and red all in one patch.