The Taming of the Tomatos

It seems we go from one plant to the next in which we have to somehow get under control. For a while, we were overloaded with spinach, giving it away to anyone who showed interest to keep it cut back and off the strawberries! The stalks were so thick I almost couldn't get my scissors through them! And now, they've pretty much fallen off and starting anew. There is hardly any salvagable spinach right now. Not sure what happened or why, but it's starting itself over now.


But in the meantime, now the tomatos are taking over our small little garden. Crazy, insane tomatoes. They are going everywhere! I've already had to cut them back from one side to keep them off the bell peppers and out another row off the jalapenos! But then they started going taller and taller and taller, so we had to re-vamp our stake situation. We thought we made them pretty tall originally. About chest high or so, but they have taken over that! So this weekend, we added in some taller stakes to tie them up and give the heavier ones some added stability. We were also able to 'clean up' the area and organize some of the viney stuff. Brad compared it to un-tangling Christmas lights. He's right on with that!


So, anyway, here he is, hard at work untangling and staking the strings of Christmas light, .....er....tomatos. And stealing a few bites of fresh tomatos along the way.





And here's a pic of one of the few squash that are starting to produce...And the watermelon/cantaloupe "area". My plan this year is to let the mess happen, weaving the vines in and out of the fence (it is actually paying off to have put that little picket fence up even though it was originally to keep Barkley out). Then when a watermelon or cantaloupe begins to form, we'll tie it up to keep it off the ground, either to the picket fence or chain link fence behind the garden. That's the plan, anyway. ;-)And below is a picture of an example of one day's worth of pickin's (after Brad's sampling of course). We are starting to get the big tomatos as well now. We've gotten one and the others are following close behind and are turning orange now. These below are all either cherry, grape, juliet or similar variety. Along with a few jalapenos thrown in and beans on the side. I also pick a few strawberries each day, which says a lot since we only have about 4-5 strawberry plants that are actually producing anything. And this doesn't count the stuff that I could go out and pick/pull at any point when we need something - onions, cilantro, or other herbs. We're also fortunate in that we don't have a bug problem yet. I rinse the garden occassionally with soapy water (my secret trick is to turn on the bubble machine...Brooke can play with bubbles and I get the garden sprinkled with soapy water at the same time!), but I really haven't noticed anything torn up by bugs or noticed any bugs out and about. (Knock on wood!) Hopefully it stays that way!