The state of the garden

A couple of you asked to see some pictures of the vegetable garden. Here 'ya go! After a slow start during our cold and wet spring, summer arrived at the beginning of July and did its thing. The plants are growing well and starting to mature. I've already harvested some zucchini and cucumbers, but the tomatoes will be a while yet.

The winter squash plot with nasturtiums sprinkled about. The nasturtiums re-seed themselves and come back every year.

Long-time readers will remember that the garden's four-square design is based on a jardin potager (kitchen garden) that I saw at the Château de Fougères-sur-Bièvre back in 2003. I laid out each square at four meters on a side with a meter-wide grass strip separating them. The actual dimensions have probably changed over the years.

 Four squares in the background and part of the long strip in front.

We've since added a long planting strip beside the four squares for more space. You can see part of it in the photo above. This year it's home to eight tomatoes, some lettuces, and radishes. The radishes are all done now and what's left has gone to seed. I'll dig them up soon and put in some jalapeño seedlings I've got going.

 Zucchini in the foreground and sixteen tomato plants in the back.

This year I've got twenty-seven tomato plants. They're a mix of varieties that I grew from seed and I'm not sure now which varieties they are. Three of the plants are volunteers; dozens of cherry tomato seeds sprouted in the plots from last year's fallen fruit. I kept three of them since I didn't plant any cherry tomato seeds this year.

 All four squares (mostly) and the strip behind. It's not your imagination or my crazy photography, this part of the yard is on a slight slope.

There are also four zucchini plants and four cucumbers, all seed-grown. Our rhubarb patch is a row in one of the squares, but that's done now so I'm letting the remaining leaves feed the rhizomes below ground (and the weeds are enjoying being left alone). We've also got a patch of collard greens and kale in the same plot. I tried a row of sweet peas there, too. We got one meal out of that.

So that's the state of the vegetable garden at the end of July 2013. It's not the most lush and luxuriant garden we've had over the years, but with the crazy weather we've been having lately, it's doing just fine.