Garden Update 17 August 2012

Wow.  It's been a couple weeks.  Things have been busy at the homestead lately.  Here are the latest garden happenings:

We finally have some peppers setting fruit.  These are a couple of tiny peppers that will eventually turn into this:

I found this beautiful orange pepper hiding behind the swiss chard when I decided to pull out the greens and get them in the freezer.  Those greens were beautiful!  Even with all the harvesting for fresh eating, I wound up with 12 portions of swiss chard in the freezer for wintry stir fry dinners.

There were a few random beets left in there also.  So pretty and so tasty.  I grew Bull's Blood beets and they are so sweet and wonderful.  My husband ate them and actually asked for more.  Win!

Speaking of beautiful things...the eggplant has gone barking mad and has become super productive since the temperatures cooled down about a week ago.  I have so many eggplants, I just don't know what to do.  Fortunately, I hear my boss likes eggplant.  So I may have some brownie point material here.

The cucumbers have been producing like crazy.  I've put up a couple jars of 'Sun Dillies' and they just keep on coming.  They don't look all that good in this picture.  I think there is a fungus amongus.  But it doesn't seem to be affecting the fruits or the fruit set.  I'm almost tired of cucumbers.  Almost.

Here is my last pic of the day.  These little fellas are Tennessee Spinner Gourds.  They only get about 2 to 2 1/2 inches long and they are the cutest little things.  I planted four different kinds of gourds.  Two types actually germinated and only the spinners are producing.  But, I think I might be on the verge of actually getting luffa flowers.  There were a few male flowers today and a couple of female flowers that looked like they might be considering a courtship.  Time will tell.  I will report with pics if they have a successful rendevous.

Unfortunately, it didn't occur to me to take pics until it was far too late.  I harvested about 50 jalapenos today.  As an experiment, I sliced them all up and put them in a 50:50 vinegar:water solution with some kosher salt and I have the jars sitting out back on the concrete paver with the Sun Dillies.  No, I didn't put dill in the pepper jars.  I'm hoping they make nice pickeled jalapenos and I don't have to process them with a water bath canner.

Lastly, I have some pole beans getting close to being of a size to harvest.  Not many just yet.  But I'm hopeful.  There sure are a lot of flowers out there.