Much of the U.S. has faced an endless heat wave and drought this summer but Maine has just joined the trend with some high 80's to low 90's in recent days. I really never complain about the summer heat in Maine for high humidity often is not part of the process at all and even if there is a typical heat wave it is only a matter of a few days each summer. Also, there is an ocean beach barely a mile away!
The vegetable garden welcomes the heat for now the growth spurt begins in earnest. I would still say the typical harvesting of various eatibles is about two weeks behind last year's pace. This spring was cool and less rainy and growth was slower. The big tomato bed shown below has a long way to go. These sixty tomato plants are much smaller than they were in in mid-July of 2010. My starting plants were fairly small though so that was an additional factor. My landscape cloth method to help give the plants a chance against the prolific weed growth seems to be working. I still find handweeding to be a regular necesity but it isn't nearly as difficult of a process this year thanks to the cloth. One picture shows a bed of cucumbers, squash, etc. and each "hill" of the plants has a cloth rectangle buffer zone with the plants in the middle of it. I plant a lot of beans for dried bean use and a photo below is one of three beds of them: red kidney; cannellini; soldier beans, and pinto beans. They stay in the garden until the plants and bean pods are completely dried. I better throw a bean shucking party this year for reducing this harvest of dried plants to jars of individual shelled bean varieties will be a big project this fall....many hands will help.
Vases of flowers are beginning to be an easy addition to the house now. The shasta daisies are in full bloom and all over the place. The hydrangea bushes get biggier and bigger each year and other colorful flowers grace the flower and vegetable gardens. As the season goes on the range and beauty of flowers gets better and better. Unlike many gardeners, my efforts here have not been carefully executed to have constantly changing blooms but the gardens are not too off the mark on that score for there is now much new color to follow the earlier tulips, irises, daffodils, et al that started the colorful look in the spring.
The harvest tally so far has been eight weeks of incredible asparagus and I only just reluctantly stopped that harvest so the plants could begin the process of going to seed and renewing themselves for next year. The rhubarb continues. The strawberries are done for the year but yielded about 40 quarts and 43 jars of jam in addition to lots of fresh berriy eating and some giveaway baskets. Lettuce from the garden has eliminated the need to even consider buying at hte supermarket for the rest of the summer. The first meal of Swiss chard has happen as well. The first zuchinni and yellow squash are nearing the dinner table as are the first of the cucumbers. The snap pea and snow pea harvest was a small one but tasty. A few small broccoli heads have been harvested as well.
Blueberries are right around the corner now and should be prolific as will be the blackberry crop. Green beans are a matter of two weeks away as well. I don't expect any tomatoes until August though.
On a daily basis I pick the Japanese beetles off the grape vines but aside from this daily burden I can report the thrill of watching the many grapes grow in size, pointing to the first grape harvest on the grape arbor in this, its third year.
So while the hot sun limits the amount of garden work one can endure as July moves along, I marvel at the rapid growth of the veggies and patiently await the big harvest. The visitor calendar is rapidly filling for the month of August but all family and friends on that schedule will certainly enjoy the tasty results and the fun of simply standing in the garden and eating some items right off the bushes/vines like blueberries, blackberries, cherry tomatoes, grapes, peaches, apples, etc!
