Have you noticed that when it comes to gardening, it seems as if there’s something almost magical about the effect rain has on the plants? Both the plants and the weeds have been enjoying the moisture and mild temperatures we’ve received recently. As often happens though, some of that rain was accompanied by strong winds and damaging hail. Nothing horrible, but our young plants did receive some minor damage. Nonetheless, by the end of the month, over 1800 pounds had been harvested. Admittedly, most of that weight came in the form of onions – red onions, white onions, yellow onions-some weighing nearly two pounds. Boxes and boxes of onions. We pray that is only the beginning of what will be a bountiful harvest this year. .
We’re entering an extremely demanding time. In addition to the regular routine of caring for the plants and soil, we also have the added task of harvesting ripening produce. If the harvest is plentiful, we find ourselves scrambling to get it all taken care of. Early in the month, we were hustling to finally get our tomato and pepper plants in the ground-somewhat later than normal. We have our favorites, as always, but just can’t resist trying a few varieties that are new to us as well. We are growing the Jimmy Nardello peppers that we fell in love with last year along with two types of jalapeños, Big Guy and Mammoth. The Mammoth peppers are new to us this year, and we’re anxious to see which one ends up being the larger of the two. Poblanos once again made the cut, but the number has been significantly reduced to make room for a few Anaheim peppers that are making a comeback to the Garden this year. We are also growing Carolina Wonder (a nematode resistant bell pepper) and a few Sweet Marconi Rosso, another type of sweet pepper that’s new to us. (It caught our eye as we dreamed our way through the online seed catalogs in January.) By the end of the month, a few peppers were just getting large enough to harvest.
Just like the peppers, we have our favorite tomatoes, Celebrity and Park’s Whopper. They are disease and nematode resistant, two characteristics we insist on. We’re also trying a newer variety, Purple Boy, which supposedly tastes similar to Cherokee Purple but is easier to grow due to its disease resistance. Unfortunately, our Celebrity and Whopper tomatoes somehow turned out to be some kind of plum tomato. Very disappointing, but tears won’t help now. We call them our “mystery tomatoes” because we don’t know how this happened or even what type of plum tomato we ended up with. We did remove a few of these and replaced them with what we hope to be Celebrities this time, but no Whoppers for us this year.
By the end of the month, most of the cucumbers were just starting to produce with the exception of the Armenian (a favorite from last year) and the Indian Snake (a new variety this year). Supposedly the Indian Snake cucumber is even sweeter and longer than the Armenian. Both are quite heat tolerant which is perfect for our Texas summers. They should be in production shortly, but so far the Indian Snake looks to be the more productive of the two. Time will tell. Our hero from last year, the Armenian, may be replaced with what we believe could be an even better cucumber. We’ll keep you updated.
As May came to an end, our two plum trees started to ripen. They were absolutely loaded this year. For the two preceding years, we had lost our crop due to cold temperatures when the trees were in bloom. It looks as if they are now trying to make up for those two years. It was a sight to see as they began to ripen. Green beans, squash, and blackberries complete the list of what was harvested this month.
With the onion and strawberry harvests completed and the beans nearing completion, we now have room to begin planting okra, a bit later than normal, but the more summer-like temperatures towards the end of this month are to their liking anyway.
So, as we head into the summer months, we pray for cooler temperatures than last year and give thanks for the rain and especially for our faithful volunteers who make this endeavor possible.
[Written by Jan Green]