The Two Sides of the Garden

Time for another garden update!

Here in southern Ontario, it’s the start of prime harvest season. Early crops like raspberries are over, veggies are coming into their own, and my partner and I just bought finished eating our first basket of peaches – my very favourite fruit when they’re in season.

What does that mean for our backyard plot? Well…to be honest, we’re having a stressful summer.

First problem: the tomatoes. In past years, we’ve been given seedlings by the elderly Italians next door, and planted them quite close together. This year we bought them from a garden centre and spaced them farther apart. Suddenly they’re sprawling out all over. The main stem of each is staked, of course, but what to do with all the branches with fruit sagging to the ground?

I’m slowly building a weird-looking system of multiple stakes for each plant and also trying to prune them back. At the same time we’re battling hungry squirrels and an evil tomato ailment called blossom end rot. Right now the tomatoes are taking up way too many of my mental cycles.

Second problem: the bindweed. This is a perennial weed that builds a network of roots underground and puts out shoots of the same plant in multiple spots, so it’s nearly impossible to kill. And then it climbs, and makes flowers that go to seed in no time flat. Let’s just say it’s well adapted. This was my biggest stressor…until I noticed what was going on with the tomatoes.

Third problem: the squirrels have decided to nibble on the zucchini and squash stems. Not even the “fruit”, but the actual stems. Which means the plants haven’t produced any fruit yet. Yeah, zucchini, the ones that should be coming out of our ears right about now.

(Did I mention that I thought both tomatoes and zucchini were dead easy? I guess we’ve been lucky so far.)

Oh, and the Japanese maple is half dead and beetles are eating our roses.

I could deal with any one of these problems, but all of them at once? Oy vey.

Remind me again why this is fun?

Well…

I have a tendency to focus on the negative, or what isn’t done yet, and forget to celebrate the good bits. And good bits there certainly are.

First the potted pansies, then the snapdragons and delphiniums, and now the marigolds and calendula have been going like crazy, and they make me smile every time I see them. And the hydrangeas and hostas have been just trucking along without any attention, for which I am most grateful. Every time I go outside, I make a point of stopping to enjoy and admire the flowers.

The scarlet runner beans continually impress me, too – the size of the plants (there’s a wall of vegetation taller than me at the back of the veggie plot), all those bright red flowers, and now the huge bean pods they’re producing, up to eight inches long and an inch thick. They have also been not much work – just putting in stakes and then making a cat’s-cradle of twine for them to climb around on once they outgrew the stakes.

We’ve never grown beans or cooked freshly shelled ones, only dried or canned ones, so yesterday we conducted an experiment. We ended up with a salad that included both shelled beans and green beans (the immature version)…delicious! (Note: Scarlet runner beans, like kidney beans, are toxic when raw and must be eaten cooked. I was worried about this, but experienced nothing worse than the effects one would expect from beans.)

This weekend we chopped the tops off our lemon basil plants and made them into pesto, which is now waiting in our freezer – more patiently than I am, let me tell you.

Our carrot crop is small but delicious, making each carrot worth savouring. Even more exciting: we sowed a “rainbow” heirloom seed mix, so each carrot is a different colour. So far we’ve had purple, white, and plain old orange.

Still to come: bell peppers (the first few are maturing on the plants right now), white eggplant (I’d given up on it, but just spotted the first flower yesterday, so…maybe there’s hope), and on the flower side, cosmos and sunflowers.

And we finally managed to grab a few tomatoes just before the squirrels got to them, so they’re finishing their ripening on our kitchen counter. First tomatoes of the summer, coming to a dinner plate in my house in just a few days!

In other words, there’s a lot going on in our garden. We’re plotting how to scale back next year, because this year has been just. too. much. But it’s certainly diverting. There’s always something new happening back there. We’ve spent a lot of time outside digging in the dirt, which is good for both the soul and the body. And all that work (and research, and discussion, and visits to the garden centre for supplies) has made summer seem to last forever. Since I love sunshine and warm weather…I’ll take it!

Your turn! What’s going on in your life that has two sides to it? How can you shift your perspective to the one you want to focus on?