Sunday 6 September 2009

What's growing at Reads Retreat

Welcome back to Reads Retreat, the home of veg growing in raised beds. Aside from the mornings work at the allotment, there's still a riot of activity on the home plot! This Butternut Squash(v.Hunter) is the pick of the crop at the moment - being quite huge in size and still growing. It's a first for the home plot, and one to be repeated at the allotment next year. There's a good few others growing here, but this is by far the largest. Needs a bit more sun yet to ripen it up. Fingers crossed eh !

The Dwarf Yellow podded French beans are still producing well. We manage to eat them a couple of times a week, and although they're getting fewer in number now, we hope to be cropping them for a good few weeks hence. This is another for the allotment next year. Must remember to save some seeds!




Our late sowed Courgette is still producing! We managed to cut another 6 incher today, but will be using it tomorrow. There's still plenty growing too, despite the white mottled leaves and the plants poor appearance. Might as well get what we can from it!





The even later planted Zucchini are growing well too, though the plants themselves are way smaller. I reckon if we get enough sunshine in the next 6-8 weeks, then we may be able to get a crop from these too. Nothing to lose by waiting a little while.





The toms are reddening up nicely. We're picking these almost daily now and loving the taste. The Yellow Pear ones are fruiting well, but I'm not as keen as Jen on their taste. Elsewhere around the plot we have a half dozen or so Moneymaker plants, which are currently full of trusses, but none of them are ripe yet!




That's about it for today's update - hope you've had a good read!

Dont forget to visit our new blog - Reads Recipe's - which Jen is updating on a regular basis.

Hope you are still enjoying your gardens as much as we are.

Take care all

TTFN

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

everything is looking good...I'm still getting plenty of produce off my plants to....at the moment I have cucumbers coming out of my ears...lol

Gary and Jen, and Ruby and Peter said...

Hi Tanya,thanks for your comments.
Maybe you could create a Cucumber preserve? We made Marrow preserve recently which turned out lovely.
We saw a recipe for Kiwi Fruit jam too, and the flesh of those is the same consistency as cucumber ?

Have fun,

Sue said...

You have such a mild climate....how lucky you are.
We've already had our first frost and another short garden season is ended. Oh well, that's what travel is for. Hope you get lots of tomatoes! They are so wonderful fresh off the vine, still warm from the sun.

Eight by Six said...

Your Butternut squash looks amazing, my two are half that size! Do you think they will mature? First time I've grown them.

Gary and Jen, and Ruby and Peter said...

Hi Amanda, first time for us too growing Butternut Squash, I've been told to leave them out until the first threat of frost, giving them time to harden up the skins, then bring them in. Also, cut with a large stem.
Will grow more of these next year at the plot. Love the taste of them!