Category Archives: VEGETABLES

End of 2025-veggie garden review

We tore out all but the chard and perennial fruit plants in the garden. I can hardly believe the Argentata chard is still doing good as of Dec 9th in the garden what with the nighttime temps getting down into the mid-high 20’s and only the rainwater now. It has green leaves with white ribs that are very tender. All the other chard are gone now.

But now on with the review!

I got a late start in sowing seeds this year due to us being in Europe in spring. When we planted seeds inside on March 28, it was a full 2-3 weeks later than I normally start seeds so this affected the harvest. This year in 2026, I’m going o drop some tomatoes and grow some others alongside my favorites. It’s fun to experiment and perhaps I’ll find some new winners in 2026.

 

PEPPERS
I thought I might not get peppers this year due to the fact I normally start pepper seeds inside in early March as it take 8-10 weeks to be big enough to plant outside by the time the frosts are gone. I wasn’t too far off as we had a less than spectacular pepper season with most producing only a few peppers before the season ended. But one outstanding variety, Sweet Calabrian Caviar pepper produced exceptionally well and saved the pepper season. Next year we are planning to be here during seed starting season. So, Poblano, Lava Red, Jimmy Nardello, and three other pepper varieties only got a few peppers. Over the years, I’ve come to like sweet peppers more than hot. I like to grill or saute them. Because they’ve done well in previous years, YES to all for next year.

TOMATOES
Surprisingly we did pretty well with most of the tomatoes this year despite the late start. The plants didn’t get as tall (4+’) but most produced well. We planted them outside on May 28 due to some late freezes and they were only 4-5 inches when they went in the ground. 8 yes and 5 no. Read on for details.

CHERRY TOMATOES
Super Sweet 100-red cherry tomato-very prolific and very sweet-good continuous harvest throughout the season. YES for next year.

Black Cherry-dark purple cherry tomato-very prolific and very sweet, smoky flavor-good continuous harvest throughout the season. YES for next year.

Sungold-yellow cherry tomato-very small, disappointing, average harvest. Fruit were too small for me although the flavor is always very sweet. Looking for a larger yellow cherry tomato for 2026. NO for next year

EARLY SEASON TOMATOES
Large Barred Boar-I’ve always like the flavor of this mahogany colored with green metallic stripes tomato BUT it does not have a long shelf life once picked. You must eat them within a few days or they turn soft-too soft. For 2026, I’m  looking for a dark tomato with a longer shelf life and great flavor. Let me know if you know one. NO for next year.

Sunny Goliath-yellow medium size tomato-my second year growing them. Nice tomato but not very prolific both years. NO for next year.

Goliath Pio-red medium size tomato with little to no cracks-Great old fashioned flavor with balance of sweet-acid. Always a star, My biggest producer this year. It did not disappoint this year-good for canning or fresh eating.YES for next year.

MID SEASON TOMATOES
Black Sea Man-black/purplish-75 days to harvest
-med-small size tomato with good flavor and good  production.Going to try other black tomatoes this coming year. NO for next year.

Cherokee Carbon-Purple with green shoulders-75 days to harvest
-med size-tomato with good flavor and average production. Unusual this year but perhaps because they got in so late, they didn’t produce as well as previous years but it is a winner. YES for next year.

Cherokee Purple-purple color-75 days to harvest
-Perhaps because they got in so late, they didn’t produce as well as previous years but it is also always a winner. YES for next year.

Pantano Romanesco-Red-70-75 days to harvest.Red medium size tomato-old fashioned flavor but didn’t produce that well. I had others that did much better. NO for next year.

Jaune Flamme-orange-70 days to harvest
-Can’t say enough good things about this one. Outstanding flavor, very prolific. YES for next year.

LATE SEASON TOMATOES

Lucky Cross-yellow with pink blush inside-74 days to harvest-Every year either Lucky Cross or Virginia Sweet do well. I like both but Lucky Cross didn’t do as well this year so NO for next year.

Paul Robeson-black/brick color-75 days to harvest-exceptional flavor-wins all kinds of tomato tasting awards. YES for next year.

Big Zac-red-80 days to harvest
. Not very productive this year and fruit were a little smaller than the large fruit they truly are. Excellent old-fashioned flavor. NO for next year.

Virginia Sweet-yellow with red blush inside-80 days to harvest. Did fantastic this year, producing many very large-1.5 to 2 lb tomatoes. A real treat. YES for next year.
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CUCUMBERS-A bumper crop of 2 of the 3 cucumber varieties I grew this year. So much so, I got tired of making pickles and pickle relish. We couldn’t eat them or can them fast enough.

Poona Kheera-Our favorite fresh eating cuke. A yellow cuke that did exceptional well-sweet melon flavor that we use for fresh eating only. Good producer. Non bitter. YES for next year.

Boothbys Blonde-Another great yellow cuke-I use this variety for making bread and butter pickles and pickle relish. Good producer this year. YES for next year.

Salt and Pepper-new variety for me this year. Not a good producer and small. NO for next year.

Parisian-I use this variety for making cornichon pickles but I still have many jars I canned from last year, so I didn’t grow any this season but I love this one, especially if you like Cornichons, which mean tiny tart pickles.

 

RADISHES-Two new varieties this year and one I always grow
Pusa Gulabi and Pusa Jamuni-I loved these two and I don’t love radishes so that says a lot. Both were great flavor and look beautiful. They are not round but long. Seeds from Baker Heirloom. YES for next year.

Watermelon radish-I love this variety too but it takes a little longer till harvest. YES for next year.

 

PEAS
Super Sweet Sugar Snap pea- I normally try to grow these in a pot in SPRING- I say ‘try’ as the plants and harvest are usually small but this year I grew them in the garden in the FALL in a raised bed. What a difference that made! Super big 5′ plants and great producer! YES for next year.

 

CAULIFLOWER
I grew both orange and white varieties and both did well in the spring/summer. In the previous year, we had a hot summer and I tried a purple cauliflower that didn’t do well in the heat, so I stuck with the other two this year not knowing if we would have a hot summer.
Freedom-white variety-love this. YES for next year.

Cheddar-orange variety-love this. YES for next year.

 

CHARD
Argentata-a big winner with the white stalks soft like butter when cooked. Very cold and heat tolerant.
YES for next year.

Orange and Ruby varieties-both grew great and looked good together when cooked. YES for next year.

 

CARROTS
-All carrots did well this year.
Dragon Purple
-Purple outside with orange inside. YES for next year.

Atomic Red-Red outside and orange inside. YES for next year.

Black Nebula-Black inside and out. Makes the most beautiful, tasty purple soup. YES for next year.

Scarlet Nantes-standard orange inside and outside but big! YES for next year.

 

SQUASH-I grew a yellow, bumpy summer squash called Friulana-looks kind of yellow green in this photo and Butternut winter squash-both did well. YES for next year.

 

BEETS
Cylindra
-deep red cylinder shaped- grows upright out of soil-easy to pull. Cuts into nice even disks-nice flavor. YES for next year.

Badger Flame-beautiful reddish ,orange-yellow outside with yellow inside. Exceptional flavor. YES for next year.

Chiogga-I can’t resist these red outside with concentric circles of red/white inside-like a bullseye.YES for next year.

 

LETTUCES– I grow many varieties under 30% row cover this year outside starting in
early spring. All did well under shade.
Santoro–butterhead
-My favorite lettuce-YES for next year.

Yugoslavian Red-butterhead-good cold tolerant-YES for next year.

Salanova-butterhead-red and green-good cold tolerant-YES for next year.

Oakleaf-good heat tolerant-YES for next year.

 

NOTE:Fruits and flowers will be in separate posts coming up.

 

 

IT’S TIME! Take your row covers off of your tomatoes

IT’S TIME! Take your row covers off of your tomatoes! Monsoon season has arrived! I’ve been gone on a flyfishing trip but kept up with the weather news. Just got back last night. So today I will be taking off all the row covers off the tomatoes. Then I can see the plants again-yay!

Here is a link to a time lapse video I did taking off the covers several years ago-Enioy!

 

Time to take your wall of waters off your tomato plants now!

Walll of waters

If you still have your tomatoes in wall of waters, take them off now because the temperatures are suppose to get into the 90’s next week and if that happens, it could fry your plants. I’m taking mine off the next few days.

Covering up the tomatoes with row cover.

Since we haven’t really had much rain to speak of, after I remove the wall of waters (WOWs), I will put cages on and wrap my cages in medium weight row cover (.55) from top to bottom completely covering the cage. This is to protect the tomato plants from getting exposed/bitten by the Beet Leafhopper which can give your plants CTV (curly top virus) which will be fatal to the plants. I will take the row covers off when the monsoon rains come in ernest which is usually just after July 4th weekend but has come earlier in some years. The bug seems to leave or get suppressed once the monsoons start.

Meanwhile June is getting it’s usual heatwave which is normal for June in the Santa Fe area. Come on rain!

Tomatoes are in-FINALLY!

Tomatoes in wall of waters (wow) May 23, 2025

Today Elodie and Bob and myself planted 18 tomato starts today.THANK YOU! YOU BOTH ARE THE BEST!

I grew them from seeds inside the house under lights and heat mats since early spring. The tomatoes are so happy to be free-FREE at last! I don’t think I’ve ever put them in so late.

I was suppose to plant them on Monday but the weather was horrible and the nightime temp was down to 31 degrees at our house so I’m glad I waited. It was so cold and windy this past week-what a difference a few days can make. No need to stress them out.

We did plant them in wall of waters (WOWs) out in the veggie garden to help with our cold nights. I will take off the WOWs sometime in June when the plants either reach the top of the WOWs or the temperature gets into the 90’s. You don’t want to leave them on when it gets hot-you could fry them. But the weather has warmed up nicely and today the high is 80 today and a low of 48 degrees tonight. Perfect temps!

18 tomatoes is smallest number of tomato plants I’ve ever planted. Back when I was at the Santa Fe Farmers Market selling tomatoes, I use to grow 120 tomato plants and would sell out by 11 am. I’m so glad I retired from the Farmers’ Market after ten years there. Farmers work hard!

Now it’s a more reasonable pace. As I’ve gotten older, I realize I need to slow down a little and I’m glad I listen to my inner voice (sometimes). With age comes wisdom (well, maybe a little!)

May 19, 2025-Tomato plants still inside!

This has been an unusual year for spring-freezing cold then warm then cold again and warm again. Today it has turned cold again-windy and 55°F high/31° low tonight. I was suppose to plant my tomatoes outside in wall of waters today but it won’t even get warm enough for the wall of waters to warm up before night.

Supposed to be no more frosts from May 15th
on but not tonight.

I have been able to get my tomato plants in the ground the first week of May in previous years, but not this year.

So it looks like it will be warm this Friday, May 23rd-a full 8 days past that date when we are supposedly safe. No sense in rushing it at this point. Looks like I will get tomatoes later this year… sigh.

 

Black Nebula Carrot/Soup

Carrots come in all colors these days and this past season, in addition to Cosmic Purple and Atomic Red carrots I grew, (which are orange inside), I found online a carrot variety called Black Nebula. I always want to explore the garden universe! I like to try new varieties and this sounded interesting! It’s deep purple-black outside and inside. I’ve always seen carrots mostly orange inside, so I thought I’d try it. It is an open-pollinated (OP) rare variety and the seeds can be saved. It does well in our heat and grew all summer till harvest time in the fall-75 days to harvest. I got it from trueleafmarket.com. I thought they would be good roasted in the oven with other colors of carrots and they were very tasty.

 

Then I thought of making them into carrot soup. The carrot soup  I make always turns out orange. I knew I wouldn’t put the orange carrots and black carrots together to make soup as I thought the soup would be grayish. I gave Mernie, a friend, some of the black nebula carrots and she made them into soup. It turned out the most beautiful purple color and had a nutty/sweet taste. Ah ha-another way to use them! And they don’t taste like beets but true carrot flavor.

Here is a carrot soup recipe I gave her. You can use it for any carrot soup. As you can see, I’ve used it a lot and made some adjustments. So I went ahead and retyped the recipe as this one is too beat up from use.

Here is the recipe for you to print out. Enjoy!

HARVEST CREAM OF CARROT SOUP

 

 

 

August Veggie Garden Tasks

I love August. The monsoons are here to give us relief from the heat and help water the garden. I really enjoy the lightning storms at night. I got my first few tomatoes actually in July. Already harvested garlic, carrots, beets and radishes. Chard has been harvested once by taking the outer leaves only and leaving it to regrow back. Same with kale.

I will start harvest grapes, blackberries and raspberries in August. Flowers are beautiful and filling out, blossoms soon to follow. In August, harvesting tomatoes will really kick in-I’ll be headless soon. Don’t forget to keep harvesting veggies and fruits. if you stop picking, the plants think their job is over because their priory is to make seeds. I’m really enjoying the garden this year.

 

Cabbages will be harvest in August too. I really like the variety Kalibos shown here.

 

Even so, there are some tasks for us to do in our August veggie gardens.

AUGUST

Tomatoes-prune tomato plants/suckers as needed and fertilize this month.

Cucumbers/beans-Train vining varieties of cucumbers and beans up a trellis.

Protect your crops-Use row cover, hail netting or shade cloth against hail in case it comes. I always protect my crops now as we’ve had bad hail in the past.

Start seeds for fall crops indoors-I’ve startied lettuce and spinach in early August.

Direct seed fall crops outdoors-yes many crops can be direct seeded right now with our warm days/nights.I already planted seeds for more carrots, beets and radishes.

Check for pests-Aphids on many different plants-spray with water first and then Neem in the evening.

Tomato horn worms-I’ve seen the hawk (also called gypsy or hummingbird moths) out and about in the evenings but haven’t seen hornworms yet. Handpick the hornworms off the tomato plants when they arrive and put in bucket of soapy water.

Cabbage loopers on brassicas-handpick or spray with Bt.

Leaf miners in beets/chard-keep covered with row cover.

Squash bugs are here too. Be on the lookout and check weekly as squash bugs go from eggs to the dreaded gray nymphs every 7-10 days so it’s important to get them-I check plants every 7 days. Take off row cover once the female blossoms appear. So now the individual plants are uncovered. Put all adult squash bugs in bucket of soapy water, take off eggs under leaves and remove the gray nymphs and put in the soapy water also.

Rodents-This year with rats, mice, and gophers, I’m experiencing less pressure from these critters. But I think catching 3 rats in a live trap and relocating them really helped. This year with the good monsoon season going, they are not as present. I believe they didn’t have any food or water last year out in the wild but this year is better with the moisture (for everyone!)

Warm Season Lettuces To Grow That Are Heat Tolerant

Warm Season Lettuces To Grow in Summer Heat

I use to think of growing lettuces only in the spring as a cool season crop before the heat of summer hit. But you can grow a variety of heat-tolerant lettuces in July-August that you can harvest in late September and into late October (with row cover for cold nights) and enjoy fresh salads into late fall. These summer lettuces are called Crisp or Batavian lettuces which are heat tolerant. There are many more Crisp or Batavian lettuces  than listed here. Also Romaine is more heat tolerant too. Plant these in from July-early August to harvest before it freezes. The early days to harvest are for harvesting when they are young and the latter days to harvest would be for full grown lettuce. I grow mine inside under lights to give them a head start but you could direct seed as well, just keep them well watered for germination. I plant lettuce outside under 30% shade cloth. Here are some varieties I’ve grown.

 

Red Salad Bowl-

A popular loose-leaf heirloom lettuce that is heat resistant. This variety is a slow bolting deep red leaf lettuce. The Red Salad Bowl has a sweet and tender flavor.
45-50 days to harvest.

 

 

 

 

Anuenue-

If you’re looking for lettuce to thrive in the heat of summer, you’ve found it. Selected at University of Hawaii for impressive heat resistance. Anuenue (AH-new-ee-new-ee) is the Hawaiian name for ‘rainbow’ and it is some of the most heat-tolerant lettuce.
55-65 days to harvest

 

 

Manoa-

A tender and buttery variety known . to be a heat-tolerant romaine summer crisp that grows well year around, even during the hot days of summer. It is a semi-heading type lettuce with extra-early maturity. Light green internal color. Recommended harvesting when heads are smaller. 50-60 days to harvest

 

 

Merlot-

Excellent bolt resistance, and good cold tolerance for a late fall to winter crop. Recommended as a cutting type for baby greens production or cut-and-come-again harvesting. Striking, deep dark red, almost purple frilly leaves. One of the darkest lettuces you can grow. The plant is nothing less than stunning. A very crisp and open headed leaf type that stands upright with a waxy shine that makes an ideal salad lettuce. 55 days to harvest

 

Joker-

This variety will perform well in all growing seasons and has excellent heat and cold resistance. Slow to bolt on the longest days with high heat.This crisp leaf type forms a tight, savoyed green leaves splashed with red specs,. Harvest from baby-leaf size until the heads are fully mature. 45 days to harvest

 

 

 

Jester-

A heat-resistant multicolored lettuce. Showy, ruffled leaves have a crisp, juicy texture. Harvest individual leaves or as dense, crunchy heads.
45 days days to harvest

 

 

 

Cardinale-

A red wine European Batavian type of lettuce. This french crisp Lettuce has thick, crunchy red leaves with wavy, bronze-tinted edges. Heat-tolerant, it rarely bolts.
50-60 days to harvest

 

 

 

Salanova Red Batavia-

This lettuce hails only from Johnny Seed and is heat tolerant. Beautiful contrast of purplish coloration at leaf tips and deep, yet bright green color at the base. Leaves are semi-savoy and scalloped.
55-60 days to harvest

Squash tips-dealing with squash vine borers and squash bugs

This is an updated and expanded post on squash bugs that I posted in 2011.

It’s squash season! I get a lot of questions about how to control squash bugs and squash vine borers. They are a veggie gardener’s nemesis. I have read and tried several things and think a few help. Here’s a list of things you might try to control squash bugs and squash vine borers.

Learn to identify squash vine borer and squash bugs

 

squash bug

 

SQUASH BUGS
Squash bugs attack both summer and winter squash. They are here now. They pierce it and suck out the juices. If left unchecked, they can take over and destroy the plant.  The key to control is catching them right away. Here are some things to try:

 

 

-Learn to identify male flowers vs female flowers on squash plants so you know when to remove row covers.

-Plant squash that is somewhat resistant to squash bugs. I’ve grown many varieties of squash but have found some seem to resist squash bugs while others attract them.

Summer squash-I grow the variety Friulana, a yellow zucchini style squash, which don’t seem to attract as many squash bugs.

Winter squash-I grow Butternuts which don’t seem to attract as many squash bugs

-Completely cover plants with med weight row cover till the female flowers appear, then remove the row cover so bees can pollinate them. Still check your plants weekly.

–Squash bugs life cycle from egg to nymph is 7-10 days so keep ahead of them by inspecting every week BEFORE they hatch.

-Hand pick every 7 days and remove eggs, nymphs and adults from leaves. Put in bucket of soapy water. Then cover plants again with row cover if no flowers.

-Rotate squash into different beds every year. They may not find you. First time squash growers generally get the first year free of squash bugs. Afterward the bugs find you and the battle is on.

–Plant late-like the first couple of weeks of July-you may miss their lifecycle.

Spray with Azamax which contains a Neem product that has anti-feeding properties. It helps somewhat.

 

 

squash vine borer

SQUASH VINE BORER
It comes in July. It bores into the main stem around the base of the plant to lay its eggs which then turn into larvae inside the vine and eat it from the inside. Look for sawdust like  particles around base if plant suddenly wilts. You can try to slit the vine parallel  (not across it) and dig out the grub and then tape the wound shut. It may survive.

Here are some things to try:
–Once again cover them with row cover until pollination needs to happen.

–Wrap aluminum foil around the base of the vine for about 12 inches to keep them from attacking the base of the vine.

–Also bury the vine with dirt or mud covering the main vine.

I find keeping squash plants covered with row cover really helps in that I don’t have to battle the bugs till the flowers appear.

My favorite peppers To Grow

I love growing peppers. But not the hot ones New Mexico is so famous for. Now I love NM chiles but I can buy those chiles (that is how we spell it in NM-not chilis). And not those screaming hot ones that are the latest fad for those who want to see how much heat and pain they can endure. No thank you. I like to grow other sweet varieties from Italy, and other peppers from around the world.

One of my favorites is a large cone shaped red pepper, Corno di’ Toro, which means horn of the bull. I named mine Lava Red from my friend Lava, who brought some back from Germany but didn’t know which variety of Corno di Toro they were as there are several varieties. It is 5-8″ long, and starts off green but will turn red as the season progresses. Very sweet with thick skin. We like to grill them (like our NM green chilis) to char the skin and then I peel them. I lay them flat on several layers of wax paper (separating each layer) and freeze them in freezer ziplock baggies. Then I bring out a layer at a time and put them in various dishes-pastas, salads, eggs, etc. I try to wait till they turn red but last year I had to harvest some green and they were sweet also.

Another pepper I discovered last year is called Calabrian Caviar. I got the seeds from Secret Seed Cartel online. It comes from Calabria, Italy.  It has a sweet, crisp flesh and a chili flavor without the heat. I like to stuff it with goat cheese, grilled and serve as an appetizer. I understand there is another variety called Calabrian hot pepper also. These are becoming one of my favorites.

A third variety I love is Jimmy Nardello peppers. They are a red thin-skinned pepper which is even sweeter than either of the two mentioned above. I like to grill or saute them with their skins on. In fact you can’t skin them as the skins are too thin-just eat them raw or sauteed or grilled. Sweeter than most peppers.

Here are the list of peppers I’ve grown so far and like:

PEPPERS
Lava Red– a variety of Corno di Toro or “Bull’s Horn”-sweet pepper
Calabrian Caviar-small bright red pepper hails from Calabria, Italy. Rustic and sweet.
Jimmy Nardello-sweet thin walled pepper-came to US from Italy
Piquillo Lodosa-Hails from Lodesa, Spain. It is an official Basque pepper-very sweet
Habanada-sweet (not to be confused with Habanero which is very hot-this one is not hot at all)
Shishito-not particularly sweet or hot but very tasty (used in tapas)
Poblano-mild heat-used for chili relleno

All these pepper seeds you can find online (except for Lava Red). But you can find other varieties of Corno di’ Toro peppers online.

HOT! 94 degrees today—Uggh!

This week and particularly tomorrow is HOT temperature wise. I went out a little later this am and only lasted 1 hour. Trying to get winter and summer squash seeds in their prospective beds. I had to redesign and replace the drips but I burnt out before actually getting the seeds in. So I will get up early tomorrow and finish the job-then I am done with putting in the garden! Well not exactly but should get easier. Right now there are lots of seeds out in the garden covered with row cover to keep birds/mice from eating anything as it comes up. I can water right on top of the row cover which will keep the seeds from moving around, especially flower seeds which were broadcast across an area.

2023 August veggie garden video tour

I thought you might enjoy this video I took of my veggie garden in early August 2023. When I see this video now, the garden looks pretty good. I just want to see some GREEN now instead all this white snow but I know we need as much snow as we can get due to our droughty area. Yes I said, ‘droughty’!  Walk with me while I do this year’s summer tour of the veggie garden.

Dec 1 final harvests

Harvested carrots and lettuce On Dec 1, 2023

I decided I better pull out the second crop of carrots before the ground freezes sometime in December. We got 6-10 inches of snow the past few days and even more out in the open. If I had waited, I might not have gotten them out.

The first carrots I planted in late spring by direct seeding and harvested most in September. They kind of stalled out in July but came back in September when the temps were cooler. I did a succession planting of more carrots in August-Sept.

In the garden on Dec 1, the remaining carrots were covered with 12′ of snow. So I dug through the snow till I saw the row cover I had put over them when the nights got cold in November. I pulled back the row cover exposing the carrots. It brings such joy to see how well they did. I think they got so long because I had planted them in a 12′ deep raised bed that I made to grow potatoes one year. The carrots loved the extra depth.

 

 

 

And over in the greenhouse, I had transplanted lettuce starts in early September. I kept the greenhouse windows completely open to keep it cooler and a fan to help as well. Then when it got cold at night, I covered the lettuce with some row cover to protect them. I also buttoned up the greenhouse to keep the cold out but did open the door and some windows in the day when it was warmer. Yesterday I harvested the last of the lettuce. Some had bolted and gotten bitter. The chickens got them. But a lot was still good and hadn’t bolted so that is now in the refrigerator.

I always start lettuce seeds in January inside under lights and put them out in February in the unheated greenhouse. I just grow cold varieties in the winter and use row cover to keep them above freezing at night. So we have lettuce all the way through May. Then the greenhouse gets too hot so don’t grow anything in summer. I did a 2nd succession crop of lettuce in late August-Sept when the temps start to drop. Success!  Nice to see some green (lettuce) and orange (carrots) so late when everything is covered with snow. Now the garden is truly done!

 

 

‘Show and tell’ garden photos-August 2023

Triple Crown Blackberry
Borage flowers
Buschbonne Cannelino Roso bean
Violetta cauliflower
Cool season bed_chard
Cosmos flowers
Emerite green bean
garden view
Mohawk Beans/flowers
Zinnias flowers
Mohawk dry bean bed
Pasilla Baijio pepper
Zinnias, Himrod grapevine and Amaranth

To see descriptions, hold cursor over each image

Took row covers off tomato plants today-August 3, 2023

I promised my followers that I would tell you when I took my row covers off the tomato plants. I did this today.

Here is a video I took on July 18, 2020 but basically looks the same as today.

I have heard from several sources that we might not get a monsoon pattern setting up here in August and that alarmed me. We have never NOT (I know, a double negative) had a monsoon season in the 27 years I’ve been here and now this. I decided to chance it and take off the row covers. I didn’t see any any leaf hoppers today but that doesn’t mean anything as they are so hard to see.

So I am hopeful that they are gone. Who knows, maybe they have a limited lifespan in summers.

I’m not telling you to take them off-that is your decision, but I will deal with whatever mother nature gives us…and it is soo good to see my beautiful tomato plants! Good luck!