The Garden Fails of 2010

Bah.

Just….BAH.

I had 4 varieties of tomatoes and the only ones that fared well were the Lemon Boys, which I featured in my gardening hits post.

The rest? The Beefsteak, Early girl and whatever the hell else it was, bombed.

Green most of the summer, unless they ripened in the house.

I did get green tomato chow out of the deal, something I was pleased to be, in essence, forced to make. I discovered I loved it and it’s an amazing little relish. I would never had made it without my overabundance of green tomatoes, so that is a silver lining.

Anytime I am forced to hone my canning skills makes me happy, because it’s not always my first choice, to be honest.

But still. I wanted red, juicy tomatoes that we could eat like apples.

These are NOT that.

I didn’t have a close up, but the big leaves you see are pumpkin and zucchini.

Zucchini, being the weed it is, was wonderfully prolific.

The pumpkins were horrible.

I had two small, orange mini pumpkins. All those leaves, and two 5 inch pumpkins.

The cauliflower was a 50/50. The ones that grew were amazing, just look at my princess taking a bite outta that beauty.

No. It’s not washed. A little dirt -chemical free of course- never hurt any kid.

I only had two large out of six, though, not great odds. I will still attempt them next year and watch them a little closer.

These almost worked…so close. The sweet potatoes were too tiny at the end of the summer….I am thinking of starting them very early and then planting them in the front next year, so they get hotter sun and an better start.

Everything was very “meh”   this summer. The wax beans grew, but not that many. Peas, same thing.

Celery was ok, just mediocre.

Cucumbers? Don’t make me laugh. Horrid.

This was the most mediocre year for gardening I have seen in a while, not that I am an expert. But everything was so slow growing, the weather was awful, rainy as the devil then hot as Hades, and not for the lengths of time we needed. One week of rain and then one nice hot day is not the ticket for successful gardening in these parts.

Then we plain just got cheated at the end of summer, the coldest August yet. Just when everything should have one wonderful last blast of heat for ripening, we got squat.

I’m as bitter as my almost non-existent cucumbers were.