The Kitchen Garden in Early July

The kitchen garden has really taken off the last 10 days. I am pleased to report that everything seems to be doing really well. There are no crop failures to report - so far!

The tomatoes are insane. As you can see, I needed to corral them and put the upper tier on their cages a good week ago. As always I am running behind. It is hard to tell one plant from another right now and getting the top sections of the cages on is going to be a challenge.

All four plants have started to bloom. As you can see in the above picture, the "Sweet Million" has begun to set fruit. I think that I might have tomatoes to pick on this plant by the end of July this year.

My volunteer "Galina" tomato has finally recovered from getting moved. It dropped a few leaves but other wise you can't tell that it wasn't always right here.

My "Nicola" potatoes are really getting tall.

They are also getting covered with buds. So far I haven't seen any open but it shouldn't be too long. It looks like that are going to be white.

The "Good Mother Stallard" beans have also taken off in the past week. The first plant has wrapped around the bean tower and it won't be long before they all have grabbed a hold. Even though they are now growing in the shade of the potato grow bags they still seem to be doing just fine.

The morning glory plants have also taken a hold of their tower and are now quickly climbing ever higher.

My "Camelot" shallots are a lovely shade of purple/red. I haven't ever grown shallots but these appear to be  full sized. I am going to harvest my first one soon and see if I am correct.

My four "Red Bull" storage onions are looking good.The tops are thick and strong. Now that the Summer Solstice has passed the bulbs will quickly start to fatten in size. Last year the average size for this variety in my garden was over 1 lbs.each.

The "Frontier" yellow storage onions are looking good too.

And here is my section of "Candy" onions. These sweet onions aren't a storage variety so I need to start pulling and using them in the next month.

The garlic plants are nearing maturity. I will pull both varieties sometime this month. The scapes have already uncurled and should be cut off. These "Russian Red" plants are just huge.

The "Chesnook Red" leaves are just starting to brown. Another sign that they are reaching maturity.

All of my Winter Squash are off and running. Here are my two plants of "Guatemalan Blue Banana".

This year's "Butternut" plants are the healthiest that I have had in the past few years. The "Delicata", pictured below, are also looking really promising. It is always a good feeling to have started all of my squash from seed and to see the plants healthy and thriving.