Cucumbers are Now Done for the Season

The last cucumber was picked this week and that means once I finish eating this last cucumber I will have to wait till next year to eat delicious, home grown, organic cucumbers.  This happens every single year and this makes me look forward to the next season.

Although the cucumber season is coming to a close that doesn't mean that the entire garden is completely done this year.  I still have plenty of food that needs to be harvested such as eggplants, pole beans, carrots, some celery, pumpkins, peppers, and some regular and Roma tomatoes.  It is not completely over until the first frost comes.

Here is the last cucumber that I was able to harvest today.

Here is a look at the pepper plant that is still growing flowers even right now.

Eggplants are also still growing quite well and I have six of them that should be ripening within the week and I will pick them very soon.  I am not getting flowers on them and if I were it would be too late for the plant to produce another fruit.  Right now I have six and it looks like it is going to stay that way till the end of the season.

Sunflower Heads The Last to be Harvested

This is probably the last summer plant that needs to be harvested if you plan on using the seeds for various reasons.  I like to bake some of them and eat them while the rest is going to be turned into compost for next season nutrients.

I was able to cut a few of them down that I had growing in the garden.  All of them were pollinated correctly by the bees that just love them.  Once they were pollinated and some of them were ready for picking birds and squirrels took many of the seeds.  Luckily this only happened to a couple of heads and the rest were still fine.

You can see some of the damage on this sunflower head here.

You can see on the left side that some of the seeds are missing.  That is where most of the damage occurred, but still plenty of seeds to use were left.

Here is a head that was supposed to be left on the stalk a little bit longer, but I didn't want them to be eaten by the birds.  I could have covered it, but they tend to collect insects and fungus when I do that.  Once they start being eaten then I know it is time for harvesting.

The Last Zucchini and Pole Bean Harvest

Today was a nice cool day with bright sunlight and I took a look at my bean plants and saw that it might be time to pick them once again.  Some of the plants were still producing many flowers and it looks like they might be in time before the first frost appears.

I picked as much as I could today and did not get as many as I thought I had.  Many of them were small and not very big which is to be expected since the temperatures are dropping in the area.  The first frost will not probably come until October unless we get one earlier than normal which can definitely happen.

My zucchini plants are well done and most of the plants have died and will not be producing any more fruits or flowers this season.  They did produce much fruit this season so I am not very surprised that they are finished for this year.  I was able to get three of them average size today.  I can still use them for my stuffed zucchini recipe.

Eggplants will probably be the last thing to pick in the garden besides the carrots and the cabbage which happens every year.  I have several eggplants that are growing from a single plant.  I am not sure how or why this happened, but I am not complaining because they are all a decent size and this is all that matters when growing these vegetables.

This is just the latest on the garden and I will let you know when the garden is officially over and the first frost has come.  I will also keep you up to date on the cabbage which I am going to take care of for the fall season as well as digging up the carrots in a couple of months.

Cantaloupe and Eggplant are Finally Harvested

I had been discussing my cantaloupe and recently my eggplant that I have been watching for the past week and I had been hoping to pick them soon.  I was surprised when my cantaloupe was done because I wasn't certain that it had completed the ripening process.

The eggplant I picked this week was something that I was going to do real soon and I couldn't let it sit there any longer and decided that it was time to pick it and eat it.  That is what I did today with my eggplant and had it for dinner.  It was very delicious even though eggplants don't have a tasty flavor, but with my own recipe I was able to easily make it a delicious food once again.

I could have had my cantaloupe for dessert to eat both of the new harvests in the same day, but I think I am going to save it for tomorrow or sometime this week.  It will most likely not last long since it was a smaller cantaloupe than I had hoped for, but I am still happy with the results.  I have some pictures below for your viewing, but for more you can check out my latest blog post right away.

Second cantaloupe on the way.

Eggplant

Beans and Corn Again?

Yes that is right it seems that my corn and pole beans are the best harvest that I am having this season at the moment.  It doesn't look like anything else is as productive as these two are.  That is great for me because I love beans and corn and I always grow them every season and enjoy it whenever they are around.

Summer comes just once a year here and it is important that I get as much out of my garden as possible.  This way I will have no regrets or disappointments at the end of the year.  So far this garden season is turning out quite well.  I can't complain about the small things that have been happening and I always try to take the good out of each season.

I check my corn at the beginning of this week and only a couple looked like they were ready to be picked while many others were still at the stage of ripening.  When I checked this past weekend many of them had become ripened and ready to be used for dinner.

Here are 24 ears of corn that were picked just yesterday.

I still have some left over from other harvests that I will have to eat first, but in time these will be used for the same reason and I am looking forward to this time.

It can be a tedious process to pick all the beans that I have received this year, but it is definitely very rewarding to see all the work I put into it was worth it.

The beans are very large and the vines are looking very healthy which means I might be getting more beans in the very near future again.

There are also a couple of plants that are starting to end the season early.  The zucchini had a good run and only a few are left still producing some fruit.  These will be small for the most part, but still edible.  I also am seeing some cucumber plants dying off and no longer producing any new leaves, flowers, or fruit.  A couple of them are still looking healthy, but for the most part they were not good as last season.