It's Wild Blackberry Season 2019

We will have a series of hot days that started with today. I waited until twilight to traipse across our field to the neighbor's fence and picked as many berries as I could get in 15 minutes. Two pounds worth and are now in the freezer for yummy eating later this summer. I will attempt to do that again tomorrow evening.  It's right at the time that the day is starting to cool off and before the mosquitoes are buzzing. 

2 lb of wild blackberries I just picked.

On other gardening updates, it was too hot in the sun for the tomatoes and the bell peppers, so they have been moved to morning sun and afternoon shade to keep them from burning their fruit. Cucumbers continue to pollinate. We have three cucumbers that are five inches long and one that is four inches. Soon!  Pulled more carrots today.  Nice and sweet. They make a great evening snack. 

Thinned out the lettuce. I counted 19 broccoli sprouts. I have five Romaine lettuce starts now. Keep pulling about three to four ripe Sungold tomatoes every day. Cute little orange round orbs. Still waiting for the Chocolate cherry tomatoes to ripen. Boy are they slow! Pulled off some of the Purple Cherokee.  Any branch that has more than three on it are getting thinned because those tomatoes are huge and two tomatoes are plenty per branch. 

Corn ears continue to fill in. Picked about 1/2 pound of green beans yesterday for dinner. Just perfect. Still nice and tender although they are about five to six inches long. I will try to get my radishes pulled tomorrow morning and get them pickled.

August 4 - Update
Rather than creating a new post - I'll just add to yesterdays. Today, I whipped up a pint of sweet pickled radishes and a quart of dill pickled cucumbers. Both are refrigerator versions and should be ready to eat in 48 hours. I also picked another 2 lb 3 oz of blackberries tonight. If I do this every night for the rest of the season, I could, conceivably have a freezer full of blackberries! The first frozen batch of berries filled a 2-quart freezer bag! If I am so inclined, I can make up some blackberry jelly or a pie for some event. Or, just eat them! 😋

Temps were over 90 today.  Thankfully the dewpoint & humidity were a little lower today. Put the sunshade over the greenhouse and hung another shade over the back deck to protect the tomato plants from the hot early afternoon sun. 

Phenomenal Growth for a Cool July

We had some amazing growth this week, which I would never have imagined! Let me take you around the garden to look at some of it. First, I noticed right away that the beans had doubled in size in a matter of days. I had pruned/trimmed the basil and dill, right next to the beans, just a day or two ago, and the beans were not this thick/tall as they are today. 

Beans twice as tall as a few days ago.

Baby Beans are Forming

The thyme is starting to pick up, as well. Nothing that spectacular, but it's growing and making an impression with it's dark green color. 

Thyme it filling in.

The corn, I kid you not, grew 10 to 12 inches in less than a week! The tallest corn is now 60" tall when it was about 50" just a few days ago. The "ear" sprouts are showing up too, but I didn't think to get photos of that. 

4-5ft Corn

Nice full tassels

Not that they are "my" crop or anything that I did, but the blackberries are thick as can be this year. We've had, actually, perfect conditions for wild blackberries, with temps in the 70s, humid days and cool nights. We are going to have a bumper crop of berries. And they are not even done flowering yet. So that harvest may last well into August.

Thick crop of wild blackberries	More berries
Some are still flowering

The potatoes took a huge wilt today with the warmer sunshine. Harvest is still planned for the last weekend of July - August 1. 

Wilting Potatoes

Tomato blossoms are finally taking hold and creating some nice tomatoes.  The Purple Cherokee are a bit ugly in shape, but I think they will be a nice size when ripe. The Sungold have a lot of cherry tomatoes on it. The Chocolate Cherry plant is, so, so with tomatoes.  Not a lot, but there's still time. The German finally has its first fruit.  I think I see a few more potential ones, but they could be fakes because of the way the blossoms are on this plant. Sorry for the blur. The wind out of the west was a bit blustery today.

First German Tomato	Some Purple Cherokee Tomatoes
Another Purple Cherokee tomato	Tomato plants lined up in the warm sunshine

I never realized how pretty the Walla Walla Sweet Onion blossoms could be. Enjoying the beauty while waiting for it to die so that I can harvest the seeds for next year.

Walla Walla Sweet Onion Blossom

Our temps finally hit 85 today. That's a decent warm temp for the garden.  I pulled the lettuce out of the sun, into the shade to protect it from burning.