Garden 2026 is Upon Us!

Our Garden - July 25, 2026

We're back at it for another season! This is our 13th year gardening in this particular spot. (12th if you don't count the year I seeded all the beds in flowers and just let it go.) Over those years, I have realized one important thing: I'm a lazy gardener. I really enjoy gardening...every now and then when the mood strikes me. I wish I was a spend-time-in-the-garden-everyday type of gal, but I'm not. This revelation is a good thing! It has led me to plan this year's garden with my laziness in mind. 

Nearly everything in this year's garden is as close to "set it and forget it" as I could get. I planted summer and winter squash, pumpkins, beans (three kinds), corn, melons, tomatoes, cucumbers, and garlic. I've weeded a couple of times, watered and fertilized, but overall I've only gone into the garden a couple times a week to look over its progress. 

Oh! I did plant radishes too and they turned out beautifully.

Most of the work on the garden was at the beginning of the season. Let's go back in time to the middle of May. Since I had no plans to plant hardy crops like chard, beets, or peas, there was no need to get out and clean up the garden any earlier. My general rule of thumb is to plant the garden on Memorial Day weekend. This year, since that fell on the earliest date possible, I actually waited until the next weekend. Back on May 10, however, I did go through and clear the garden beds of weeds and last year's detritus. I also repaired the upper extension of the garden fence. We added an extra four feet to the top of the fence last year in an effort to keep the deer out (click here to read about that). Over the winter, the wind and the weight of the snow broke many of the bamboo uprights, so I had to repair them in anticipation of this year's onslaught of deer.

The garden on May 10, ready for clearing and repairs.

Nearly three weeks later, I did the actual planting. Everything was from seed in the main garden. I did try to start some seeds indoors, but that was not as successful as in years past. That failure didn't effect me much, though, as I had not planned on transplanting anything into the garden beds in the first place. The first thing I did was dig into the compost bin. 

Mmmm compost!

Rather than add the compost broadly to all the beds, I targeted application to just where the seeds would be planted. I did a lot of digging, but it seemed like the most efficient thing to do.

Targeted composting.

Once that was all set, I put the seeds into the ground, watered them in, wished them luck ("Do your duty!"), took a picture, and walked away.

Not quite like walking away from an explosion. 

Over the next two weeks, all my little seeds started growing (except for one zucchini) and I occasionally pulled weeds to give them the best shot.

June 14

And two weeks after that, the little seedlings were bigger plants and I was weeding less.

June 29

A month after that, the garden is beautifully lush. The vegetable plants are easily out competing the weeds and we've started to harvest. After the radishes, our first fruits of the garden were patisson strie melange squash. The heirloom pattypan squash are fun and funky. They taste pretty good too.

They can be eaten as summer squash or left to become decorative gourds.

The tri-color garden beans have started to come in and we're on the verge of being overwhelmed by cucumbers (my favorite time of the year!).

Yesterday's haul.

My new favorite thing to grow is garlic. I had never considered planting it in the past. For some reason, I thought it was too complicated or too much work. But, in the fall of 2024, we planted garlic just to have scapes the next spring. We ended up actually getting a few bulbs of garlic. I replanted eight of the cloves last fall and all of them grew! We had a lovely, tiny side dish of scapes one night for dinner and, just this morning, I harvested eight beautiful bulbs. I only have a 50/50 idea of what variety of garlic it is. I originally planted two types. Only one grew and I don't know which one. But that's okay. I like the taste of it and really love how easy and effortless it is to grow.

The garlic bed at the end of May.

Yummy garlic scapes!

Garlic sharing its bed with the morning glories.

Look at those beautiful bulbs!

I think that's enough of a report for today. As always, I hope to actually write here more often. Perhaps I actually will this year since the garden itself is so little work! 

Golden zucchini

Honeynut squash

Picklebush cucumbers

Honeybees busy at work!

A couple of our resident lurkers.

The 2025 Season in Review

I'm sorry to say that 2025 wasn't a great year for the garden, or for me keeping up on posts here. The weather was too wet then too dry the too wet again. The garden didn't enjoy it and neither did I. While it was generally a poor year for the veg, it wasn't a total failure. I'll start with the successes.

Garlic

This was actually an unexpected surprise. I had planted the garlic just for the scapes. I planted two types, only one of which grew (and I don't know which type that was since the labels faded away). I harvested the scapes too late and they were woody. So, that was a fail on my part. I just left the rest of the plants in the ground. Well, lo and behold, when I pulled up the dried out stalks at the beginning of August, there were beautiful little bulbs of garlic on them! I put half of the cloves back into the garden this fall and we've been enjoying the other half. They are lovely and hot.

Surprise! Garlic!

Tomatoes

The experimental Burpee direct-sew tomato seeds were a success. They grew well and set a lot of fruit. The Groundswell beefsteak produced one truly massive tomato (1.7 pounds!) along with a fair number of smaller fruits and the Rain Drops cherries produced by the cascading fist-full. Too bad that when the rains came again, the tomatoes burst on the vine and started rotting before they could be picked. I suppose that saved us from being overwhelmed by fruit, but I still wasn't happy about it.

One massive tomato.

One massive tomato sliced.

Many lovely little tomatoes.

Corn

The Glass Gem ornamental corn came in fairly well despite the uneven weather. It produced about a dozen pretty little ears with beautifully colored kernels. They made a nice addition to my autumn decor.

Stalks all dried out.

Pretty glass gems.

Pumpkins

I'm a big fan of blue pumpkins so this year we planted Jarrahdale seeds. Even though we only got two pumpkins, one per vine, I'm calling it a success. They too became part of the fall decor before being eaten. I think I still have a few seeds in the packet to plant next year.

Jarrahdale on the vine.

Jarrahdale on the porch with purchased pumpkins and glass gem corn stalks.

Morning Glories 

The biggest success in the garden was, unfortunately, not anything we could eat. It was the morning glories. Back in 2022, we planted the entire garden with flower seeds. Along with the bulk mixes, I put in a packet of morning glory seeds. I had never had much luck with them growing in the past and, on that occasion, maybe two or three of the seeds actually grew. But those that did grow dropped seeds at the end of the season. From those seeds came more plants that dropped more seeds that made even more plants. Now, three years later, they are edging on invasive, popping up in most of the garden beds. Rather than just weed them all out, I moved a bunch of the seedlings to the garlic bed (since half of the garlic didn't grow). They ended up making a beautiful screen on the garden fence. I'm sure I'll be enjoying them next year as well.

Glorious.

The rest of the garden was a mixed bag this season. The rattlesnake beans were fairly productive - enough for one batch of baked beans at least. The turtle beans made lots of pods but when I went to shell the dried beans they were tiny and dull. The tricolor bush beans were a bust. One plant of purple ones finally grew and only produced a handful of beans. The chard was very productive, as always, but it got spotty and unappetizing. Only one of the two zucchini plants actually produced fruit - which I'm grateful for as I love zucchini - and the two yellow squash plants just withered away. The peppers set some wonderful large fruits but most of them were consumed by blossom end rot before they ripened. We did get a couple peppers, which were nice, but it was still disappointing.

Zucchini!

Beautiful until they rotted.

There was only one major garden disaster. It happened late afternoon on August 24. We were enjoying a summer thunderstorm while sitting on our screened back porch when we heard a crashing sound. From where I was sitting, I could just see the southwest corner post of the garden. It was waving furiously. My initial thought was that the storm had sent one of the dead trees on the property line crashing down onto the garden fence, but that wasn't the case. Once the rain slowed a bit, I dashed out to try to figure out what had happened. And I saw this:

Oh no!

Earlier in the year, we had extended the garden fence upwards to around 8 feet to keep the deer from getting in as they had the last couple of years. Well, apparently, it wasn't enough. A young buck (perhaps the one we call Bonehead, though there are a couple of them who frequent the neighborhood) had leapt into the garden then panicked and smashed his way out right through the garden fence. He and a doe stared at me from the back of our yard as I surveyed the damage. We pinned everything back together as well as we could and plan to make better repairs next spring.

After the frost hit, I cleared out the garden beds, as I like to do, and that's it for this year. The seed catalogues have started arriving now and I've started plotting next year. I think it'll be an experimental year. I already purchased some Oaxacan green corn and skunk beans to try. I'm envisioning variations on the Three Sisters theme with a few more different types of squash, pumpkins, and beans. I'm also hoping to keep up better with my updates here. I don't know if anyone else out there in the universe reads these posts, but I enjoy looking back on them. 

There were so many angry chipmunks this year!

The Garden Today

For weeks I've been meaning to write an update of the garden's progress, but I don't feel like I have much to report. The garden has been doing its thing with little interference from me. I've pulled some weeds, supported some vines, harvested some veggies, the usual. So, finally, for the sake of keeping a record, here is a general overview of how it grows.

Droopy pumpkin vines on the back fence. (left side)

The weather this season has been less than ideal but the plants are still soldiering on. Those in the squash family seem to be having a particularly tough time. They didn't like the soaking rains early on and now that it's turned hot and dry, they have a tendency to droop during the day. The leaves on the pumpkin vines were particularly limp this afternoon (see above), but they have set fruit (see below).
 

One of a few small pumpkins starting.

The zucchini have had a rough time of it. I put out two plants this spring and both died. When the first one died, I planted a few seeds in its place. When the second one died, I replaced it with a plant from the local grocery store. As of right now (knock on wood) both are doing okay. The plant from the directly sown seeds is actually starting to produce tiny zucchini. It feels like it's late, but I'll take it.

The first tiny zucchini.

The yellow squash are also struggling. One plant seems to be doing okay and has a teeny tiny little bitty squash started. The other is a wilted flattened sad specimen at the moment.

Poor sad little yellow squash.

While the cucumber plants also look overwhelmed by the heat, that has not kept them from making fruit like it's going out of style. We are deep into cucumber season - one of my favorite seasons of the year - with bags of them in the fridge and plans to start giving them away, maybe, if my 2-3 cucumber-a-day habit gets tiresome. 

So many cucumbers.

My husband and I joke that the only thing that loves the heat and humidity here in our river valley is the corn. Ours is no exception. I've never grown decorative corn before so I'm not sure what metrics I should be judging for its success. It was over knee high on the 4th of July, so that's something. It looks happy and we'll see how it goes.

A pretty little insect of some kind on the corn.

Corn and beans make fine neighbors.

Last year we planted the shell beans in the same bed as the corn and pumpkins. This year, with the smaller beds, the corn and beans became next-door neighbors with the pumpkins more down-the-street neighbors. As always, the rattlesnake and turtle beans are happily growing along with little-to-no trouble. The turtles are sending up more climbing vines than they have in the past. I just encouraged them to join the rattlesnakes on the trellis and all seem happy.  

Oh how I love happy beans.

Our other beans have not had such an easy time of it. I got a sack of tricolor beans this year - yellow, green, and purple - and planted the seeds so that I would have two plants of each type. Well, early in the season, something decided to come along and pull up all but one of the plants. I think it was a crow, or other bird. They weren't dug up or eaten, just plucked from the ground and laid on the dirt to wither and die. (sad, no?) I planted more seeds, unsure of which color had survived. The next round of seeds did grow, but not very well. The one plant from the original batch is now producing beans - green ones - and I've decided to be content with that. I'll still hope the others catch up too.

Our bed of Bright Lights chard.

As usual, the chard is one of the stars of the garden. I've only done one picking so far and made lovely chard, mushroom, and goat cheese tarts. I really have to get in there and harvest more. The more I pick, the more it'll produce and it freezes very well.

Experimental tomatoes.

When I was back in the planning phase of the garden last winter, I came across some Burpee direct sow tomato seeds. The promise was that, when planted directly in the garden just before the last frost date, the tomatoes would grow and produce at the same rate as tomatoes that had been started early inside. So, I thought I'd give it a try. I planted enough seeds directly in the garden to have two each of the cherry tomatoes and the beefsteak ones. One of the cherry tomato plants died about a month in but we were able to replace it in the garden bed with a mystery tomato plant growing out of the compost bin. The other tomato plants are doing very well and have started setting fruit. I haven't checked to see how that compares to tomatoes we have grown in years past but, so far, the experiment seems to be a success.

The first of the direct-sow beefsteaks.

I also planted some slightly experimental pepper plants. The experiment, or more properly, mystery, is that I don't know what color the peppers will be. The pack had four different types - red, orange, yellow, and purple. I'm hoping for a variety of colors but we're still in the waiting phase. At least I know that they are not ready to pick until they are no longer green.

One pepper waiting to reveal its final color.

I think that's all that's going on in the garden now. We harvested all the pak choi, arugula, and radishes. We got three garlic scapes that had turned woody before I picked them. Oh yeah! And our peas are currently making peas. 

As for my herb garden just outside my back door, it's exactly what I had hoped for. I can pop out the door, grab some herbs and barely miss a beat while I'm cooking. The deer sampled some of them early on but they bounced back. The dill had some sort of caterpillar infestation, so it's been stripped of nearly all its fronds and flowers. I did let a few rogue dill plants stay in the main garden, though, so I still have them for my recipes. Overall, I'm very pleased with my patio herbs.

My lovely herbs.

And all around the yard, the other plants and flowers are doing their thing. I'm happy to see that the mondarda and orange butterfly plants are still drawing in the bees. I'll have to do a separate update post about the wild seeds I planted over the winter. It's been a mixed bag with them. And then there's the Subaru tree to write about too. And an update on the luffa plants. I guess I do have some stories to tell still even as the garden plods along.

Bee being busy.

Rebuild Time Part 2

Last spring, we replaced half of the old wooden beds in our garden with metal ones. This year, we finished the job. There were still two 4-foot by 11-foot and two 1-foot by 11-foot wooden bed to replace. One of the smaller beds was filled with asparagus, which we relocated outside the garden. Part of the other smaller bed had horseradish, which we pulled out and deposited along the back treeline. After that, there was just a lot of dirt moving to do.

Garden bed rebuild in progress.

It has been a very wet spring. Because of that, and my lack of enthusiasm for hard work, the rebuild took several weeks to finish. My husband really did most of it. He built the six new metal beds, shoveled tons of dirt, added compost, and relaid the stone paths. I helped by decided which type and how many bags of new soil we would get to fill in and I added those bags to the beds. And finally, it was all done.

All the bed replacements finally finished!

But that was not all of the rebuild. For the past couple of years, the deer have been making themselves at home in the garden. Beyond the nibbled plants and obvious hoof prints, we got photographic proof last fall.

A taller fence was obviously needed. Our original fence was four feet tall. We got a couple more rolls of 4-foot wide plastic mesh fencing and 6-foot long bamboo poles for fence posts. The process of adding height to the existing fence actually went more smoothly than I expected. I had a plan, of course, but was still surprised that the plan worked so well. We wove the bamboo poles through the mesh fencing then lifted them up and zip-tied them to the fence posts that were already there. Then I went around and hand "sewed" the seam between the two fences so there wasn't a gap.

"Sewing" the fence seam together with some garden twine.

The result is an 8-foot tall fence all the way around our garden (except for over the gate).

Let's see those deer jump over this! (I know they could so please don't.)

With the garden now better protected, I got the rest of the seeds and plants into the ground. I had planted the hardier seeds - radishes, arugula, pak choi, chard, and peas - and the direct-sew tomato seeds (as directed) before the average last frost date and before we finished the fence. 

A lovely row of sugar snap peas.

After the fence I planted the bush beans, turtle beans, rattlesnake beans, blue Jarrahdale pumpkins, and glass gem ornamental corn. I also transplanted pepper, zucchini, yellow squash, and cucumber plants.

The young plants hardening off a few days before transplanting.

The spring rains continued and I mostly stayed out of the garden. Yesterday, I finally thinned out the seedlings. I also added a fence for the peas. Everything is growing, though much of it is unhappy with the large amount of rain. 

Corn and radishes before thinning.

This poor little cucumber plant isn't well.

One other thing we planted outside the garden was some luffa plants. We had very good luck growing them a few years ago. We still had some seed left and they were still viable, so now there's a tall teepee in the back yard near the new asparagus bed. There is also one long pie pumpkin plant under the teepee. 

I don't know why I didn't take a picture of the whole teepee.

You grow, luffa!

So far, the pumpkin and luffa plants have been left alone by our backyard wildlife. We'll see if that lasts. 

Oh deer, oh deer.

A sweet, fluffy bunny.