What Once Was.....

This was July 15th. The garden was not quite full, but about as healthy as it was this year. Its an interesting cycle to plant everything, nurture it to bear fruit, and then cut it down and throw it on a pile. Its funny, it seemed like I should have left them there to fully die in the tomato cages.


But alas, everything must come to an end. All of the fruit that was slowly ripening was doing so with something wrong - mold, infestation, etc. So, in order to begin really pushing towards garden2010 I needed to be done with this. Finally, after two different days of work, I got things cut down and cleaned up. Two main observations here: Jalapenos have an incredibly woody and hearty stem and LOTS of tomatoes end up on the ground no matter how hard you try. Also, I am not sure that planting these tomatoes 4ft apart would have gotten it done. The vines were amazingly long, and intertwined with each neighboring plant in all directions. It took a lot of patience to get them out without destroying the cages in the process.

Notice: You can see garden2010 planning in effect in the foreground. I have taken all of the grass off of the part between the yard and the house, and all of the stones out of the walkway all the way to the back gate. Today I cut out the tree (more like and old honeysuckle bush) on the back fence next to the gate and I just have the back part of the yard to take up. Once I have that done I will have my landscaping neighbor haul it away, and I can begin turning all of the soil in the back.

I have been having some good thoughts on ways to set the garden up, and I think this is going to be good. I am going to be spending a lot of time out there, but I think that next year it will be easier to have the whole family out there with Astor being 2. Good times :).


And this was the aftermath. I got an entire wheelbarrow full of tomatoes and leaves that were left over when I was done. I ended up harvesting another 20 green bell peppers, and something like 50-60 Jalapenos that looked quite good. Everything else that was coming out was dying already, and the frost we had on Saturday night effectively killed any additional growth.

I am going to be taking out grass at some point this week. I will update then.

I know, I have been quiet. I have good reasons.

The garden has absolutely been in limbo for the last 6 weeks, easy. The weather has been very mild and damp. As a result, most of the tomatoes have just been chillin, no ripening and mostly just getting rotten.

I have been getting quiet a few bell and jalapeno peppers out of the garden in the interim. I stopped counting, but I want to say that I have taken at least 50 bells, and over 100 jalapenos out in the last few weeks.


Lots of the tomatoes are coming out looking like this. They are just too big, and they are starting to split at the top way before they are ripe. The good news is this doesnt ruin the whole tomato. Just slice off the top and you are good to go. I actually think the cooler weather have made the tomatoes sweeter. Not sure why, just what I was tasting.


Current pic of the garden today. The tomatoes are coming to an end. Pretty much everything left on the vine is not ripening with health. The only healthy tomatoes on the vine are ones that are green. So, I am taking them down. I started this afternoon, but it began to rain so I stopped about here:


This is how it looks right now with roughly half of the plants cut out and thrown away. They have been shedding tomatoes as I have picked them up, and I have found a few that actually look pretty good.

This is the mess left behind. A lot of what is on the left is the grass from the part of the backyard that I am currently ripping out to make room for garden 2010, but most of whats on the right side of the wheelbarrow is from the garden this summer. MESS. I am going to have most of this hauled away this year so I can start next year fully cleared and can compost properly.

I am going to get more up in the coming weeks as I start to get the rototiller out and working on the other part of the lawn. Also, all of that taller foliage in the backround of the photo above will be coming out as well. I am going to try to have everything completely bare by the first snow. Its a TON of work, but I think if I get some done every weekend, it should be enough.

Now lets just hope for no October snow (crossing fingers).