Vegetable Wrap-Up

Not a good year on the food-growing front. My tomatoes were a disappointment, with both deer damage and virus damage and rain damage. For a couple of weeks, one of the cherry tomato plants had recovered from the deer chomping long enough to produce some ripened fruit - enough to keep me in salads. One other plant never produced anything, and the third gave me two ripe medium-sized tomatoes. I don't buy grocery store tomatoes, but farmer's market tomatoes carried me through.

Giant zucchini

My zucchini got a great start, but then died, as did the pumpkin plants I started from seed. But after I had given up on them, the zucchinis produced two actual fruits that got huge before they were picked. Like baseball bat sized! My girl thought we should try to cook them - but when I did, they pretty much tasted like wood. Sigh.

I wrote earlier how the broccoli and cauliflower failed early and often, and the onions just melted away.

But the star of the garden has been my chard! I've had a surfeit - I've eaten more than my fill multiple times, and allowed it to keep going and going. Unlike other vegetables, it doesn't go to seed.

Chard and marigolds behind the deer / rabbit barrier

Right now, the chard and the marigolds are fairly attractive, some consolation.

I wonder if I'll be beating my head against a brick wall if I try tomatoes again next year?