Full Garden Update: End Of July

It's been about 2 weeks since my last full garden update. A lot has changed. My Bell Peppers (California Wonder) are finally starting to fruit. I have a ton of mini hot peppers on different plants. I continue to harvest a few cherry tomatoes each day or two. Several Early Girl tomatoes should be ready to pick in about 2 weeks or so. My new additions are mostly doing well. The Tabasco pepper plant did not make it, but that's ok because I have a ton of other various peppers growing & being harvested. Steve's Garden goes well. =) Updates on each plant are below.




Dwarf Banana Tree (Did not do much for the first week or so & made me worry. It has started to grow two more leaves/branches though, so all should be well):






Pickling Cucumbers (They have way outgrown their original bed & are starting to intrude on the tomatoes & yellow wax beans...lol):






Yellow Wax Beans (Growing nicely, at about a foot tall. They should start flowering in 2-3 weeks):






California Wonder Bell Pepper (Finally there's a Bell growing on this one after the first 15-20 flowers just dropped off. I think the crazy weather this year has something to do with that):








"World's Hottest" Habanero Pepper (There has to be close to 100 buds on this thing. Already 8-10 little Habs growing. Soon i'll have more than I can handle):








Hot Hungarian Wax Pepper (Continues to produce well. I should have 2-3 more off it in a week or so):








The "Hyponex Experiment" Jalapeno Pepper (4 new Jal's growing on it. The leaves look yellowish, so the poor quality Hyponex Potting Soil continues to strain the plant):








Jalapeno Pepper (My other Jalapeno Early Organic plant. Faring quite a bit better than The Hyponex Experiment one):








Serrano Pepper (Probably over 4 feet tall & just like my Habanero, it has 100 or so buds on the top of it. Some are wee 1 inch peppers, some flowers & some yet to open. This plant should also overload me with peppers soon):








Yellow Bell Pepper (Still yet to give me one Bell. That's what I get for buying it from a chain store...lol):






Chocolate Mint:






Mint:






Lemon Balm:






Mammoth Dill Weed (Still in the process of "going to seed"):








Dwarf Lime Tree (Continues to grow well. Hopefully, i'll get some limes off it next year):






Garlic Chives:






Strawberries (Leaf sets are starting to get big on one of the two plants, so I might get a handful of strawberries this year):






Thai Basil:






Thyme:






Triple Crown Blackberry:






Wineberry Raspberry:






Early Girl Tomato (Growing like mad! Each plant probably has 20-30 tomatoes growing on it, if not more. Some of them will start ripening very soon. Yay!):














The Infamouse "Monster Cherry Tomatoes" (Whole plant pics are kind of hard to make out with the pine tree in the background, but I wanted to at least try and take some of the complete plants. The larger one in the third pic is from an angle where you can't see too many of the tomatoes on it. The fourth pic is of 4 seedlings from one of the plants/tomatoes):












San Marzano Organic Tomatoes (About a 90% BER fatality rate on these so far. Probably 40 or so all started off with BER. I know am doubtful as to the "only the first bunch or two will get BER" theory about these. I'll probably go back to Roma's next year because of this. The second & third pics are of a few sets that have not yet developed BER):










Foam Flower:






Stephanie's African Violet (not sure on the care of this plant, so it's barely making it):






Indian Princess Nasturtiums (I think I followed the wrong advice on these (took out of full sun) & that's why they now look like pitiful spaghetti):






Red Dragon Flower (Looking cooler & cooler every day. I can't wait until it flowers!):






Russian Sage (Pretty purple flowers on this now):

New Plants, Canning & Soon To Be Harvested Veggies

A quick update this time with a few new plants, a full run of garden pics including a few soon-to-be-harvested veggies & my first canning experience of the year. =)




Here's a few new plant additions to Steve's Garden...

Thai Basil...kind of new...store bought...the only slightly healthy plant left at Wal-Mart...lol.



The newly arrived & transplanted/potted up Dwarf Banana Tree (more like stub...lol). I'm hoping it will grow to give me some bananas in 2-3 years.



A Tabasco Pepper Plant I bought just for the heck of it. It's not doing too well. I don't think it took to the transplant very well, even though all I did was take off the peat pot. I'm hoping it will come around & survive, but it may very well not make it.






Now for a full round of pics of Steve's Garden (sorry if some are slightly blurry...they were taken with my camera phone)...

Early Girl & San Marzano tomatoes. First, a picture of all 4 tomato plants (SM on left & EG on right). Then, a bunch of Early Girl maters that should be picked within the next few weeks! Yay!













Some of you may know that the first 10-15 or so (both plants) of my San Marzano's had BER (Blossom End Rot) right from the start. I was upset about this at first & actually thought it might be the dead blossoms just hanging on. I later found out from my friends on GardenWeb that BER is common in the first set or two for this type of tomatoes & that they should start growing w/o the BER soon. Thanks to them, as I believe I now have evidence that this is true. The first pic below is one of the BER sets I had to yank and the second pic is one of the new sets growing fine so far with no BER showing! =) I have about 7-8 wee Marzano's growing now w/o BER.





Last, but not least, here's my pot of "Monster Cherry Tomato" seedlings. These came from seeds off a freshly picked mater from the enormous Cherry Tomato plants I have growing. Every single one sprouted, but I have thinned them down to the strongest few. This is only 8 days of growth straight from seed! =) For all the non-believers out there (my "sun critics"...lol), they get almost full sun (probably at least 8-10 hours a day).






The flowers & ornamentals...

Foam Flower:



Indian Princess Nasturtiums (lookin like some spaghetti...):



Red Dragon Flower:



Russian Sage (I really think this stuff needs to be in the ground...it's spreading like mad...lol):



African Violet:






The peppers...

Hot Hungarian Wax (one of the few pepper plants I have that's producing well & i've already harvested off)...Yummy peppers a bit hotter than a Jalapeno:



A close-up of the plant above & one of the peppers I picked off it a few days ago:





The "Hyponex Experiment" Jalapeno plant (picked that one Jalapeno off it yesterday & it was tasty! It has a few more buds on it that should open soon):



The other Jalapeno plant (had 4-5 wee Jalapeno's on it currently & should be a good producer):



One of its babies:



The Serrano Tree (lol...it's about 4 feet tall and has 30+ buds soon to open...hopefully, it will be an awesome producer):



"World's Hottest Habanero" (makes the Serrano above look like crap in terms of new buds...this thing easily has 50-60+ little buds on it soon to open...I really hope this one produces well):



Yellow Bell (left) & California Wonder Bell (right). Neither of these have produced a single bell so far this year. They just sit there growing massive floppy leaves. I've seen about 10 or so flowers between the two of them that just disappear...haven't had time to figure out that mystery yet. The Cali Wonder Bell has a wee pepper on it about 1/2 cm long currently. I'm hoping i'll get at least one pepper from this plant:






All the other plants...

Triple Crown Blackberry (on right) & Wineberry Raspberry (on left):



Strawberry (finally starting to grow some bigger leaf sets...maybe i'll even get a berry or two this year...for sure will next year though):



Chocolate Mint:



Mint:



Lemon Balm:



Mammoth Dill Weed (first pic of both whole plants...second one of flower heads):





Dwarf Lime Tree (now over 2 feet tall! I bet i'll get some limes off this thing next year for sure):



Garlic Chives:



Pickling Cucumber Bed:



Texas Sweet Onions (Just sitting there, alive as can be, but doing nothing...I think I planted these at the wrong time of year...i'll just keep them in the same container & see what happens):



Thyme (finally got around to transplanting this one about a week ago...hopefully now, it will grow more):






Here's the results of my first item to be canned this year (not from my garden...a friend of mine at work gave me a bag full of awesome looking Cayenne's...I didn't want to waste any so I pickled some and ate the rest fresh):