Spring in the Garden - Part III

It's still spring but just barely. In just a couple of more weeks, the solstice will bring us the beginning of summer. But, for now, we are still enjoying the spring weather. We have June gloom. It's overcast and cool in the morning and then gets sunny and warm in the afternoon. And, this weekend we are even experiencing a bit of heat wave with temps in this part of Los Angeles up into the high 80s and low 90s. The veggies are loving it. We have harvested our first little bunch of bush beans. It wasn't that many so we combined them some from the farmer's market to make a full side dish for last night's dinner.

Oh, that's not a bush bean. It's a shelling bean. Or we hope it will be shelling beans. They are Jacob's Gold. They are supposed to taste similar to Pinto Beans. We are cautiously optimistic that the plants will produce enough so that we can actually use them for chili at the end of the summer.

Our Dwarf Meyer Lemon has started producing fruit again. I've counted 10 of them so far. And, we are hoping for a few more. Unfortunately, they won't be ready to harvest till late fall or early winter but it is fun watching them grow.

And, last but not least, we are trying to grow at least 9 tomato plants this year. We did end up ordering seedlings since the ones that we have been trying to start from seed were not doing so well. So, this is a photo of an Isis Candy plant that I picked up at the farmer's market. Isis Candy is a yellow-gold cherry tomato with red marbling. They are supposed to be rich tasting and sweet. They are an indeterminate variety, so we are hoping it will produce well all season long.

And, I have good news about some our little starter seedlings, a few of them look like they are going to survive. I may even be able to start transplanting them next week. The more tomatoes the better! I dream of being able to can some my own homegrown ones.