Summer Gardening (or lack there of...)

This summer was not ideal for my garden in general, but especially our vegetables. The weather in the Bay Area has been particularly cold with only a handful of days I’d even consider calling summer. Due to my work and vacation schedule this summer I was also away for a solid month, so while my brother graciously kept everything watered, no weeding or other yard work and very little harvesting happened. Once back from my time away I was able to wrangle parts of the yard, but there is always more weeding to do. And of course now that it’s started raining again the weeds are all coming back again!

Luckily the pole beans seemed relatively unfazed by the temperatures and produced a hearty crop for most of the summer. Unfortunately no one was harvesting them so most were left on the vines to mature and then collect for seeds for next year. Who would have thought the yellow ones had purple beans and the purple ones had pink beans when they dry.


Because of the weather instead of feasting on tomatoes like we did last summer and early fall, the plants never reached maturity and produced maybe 5-6 edible tomatoes. The squash in general, both summer and winter, have also struggled a bit this season. They did fare better than last season and produced some edible fruit but still succumbed to both slugs and powdery mildew. Below are the only winter squashes the plants produced, one tiny butternut squash and wee little pumpkin.


Hopefully the winter veggies will fare better. The plan is to put in more peas, lettuce and kale when the time is right and maybe even some brussel sprouts!