What’s in Our Garden?

This is a post I originally came up with last fall, but it was too late in the growing season to make sense. This post is going to be regularly updated to share what we’re currently growing. It’ll be a way to keep everyone in the know with what’s currently in the garden and containers.

Beans

Our beans are being grown in two sections of our property. We have the majority of them growing in the ground in one of our garden beds alongside our corn. These are our bush-habit beans, so they won’t grow too tall and don’t have to be trellised. They’re growing along the perimeter of the bed, alongside the fence. The 7 varieties we’re growing here are Cranberry (shelling), Missouri Bill (shelling), Black Turtle (shelling), Maxibel Hericort Vert (snap), Blue Lake 274 (snap), Beurre de Rocquen (snap), and Cherokee Wax (snap). All of our bush beans have germinated, with the majority of the plants about 2 inches tall. These were planted close together and shouldn’t need to be thinned.

We also have 3 pole beans growing elsewhere on the property in the trellising containers that I built. These are located alongside our garage and by our potatoes. The varieties are Iroquois Skunk Pole, Cherokee Trail of Tears, and Grandma Nellie’s Yellow Mushroom. I’ve had some difficulty getting the pole beans to germinate, apart from the Iroquois Skunk Pole beans. Those ones germinated within a couple of days of sowing and are starting to climb the twine. The Cherokee Trail of Tears and Nellie’s Yellow Mushroom beans have been slow to germinate. I thought they failed to germinate after a couple of weeks, but this past Sunday (June 7), we saw that they have germinated. I’m still a bit dubious of how successful they’ll be, though.

Corn

We enjoyed growing corn so much last year that we wanted to expand upon the 3 varieties we planted, which we did by buying 9 varieties for this year’s garden. As mentioned above, our corn is growing in the same bed as the beans, which was intentional since they are companion crops and are two-thirds of what the Native Americans called the Three Sisters, along with squash. In the right circumstances, corn stalks can be used as the pole that beans will climb, eliminating the need for a trellis system.

The 9 varieties are Hopi Blue (flint), Painted Mountain (flint), Northern Lights (flint), Country Gentleman (sweet), Luther Hill (sweet), Stowell’s Evergreen (sweet), Sweet Iroquois Black Mexican (sweet), Hjeirleid Blue (sweet), and Bear Paw (popcorn). Of these, we grew the Hopi Blue and Sweet Iroquois Black Mexican last year. Everything else is new to us. We’ve also never grown popcorn before, so that’ll be exciting.

The flint and popcorn varieties were planted in full rows since they take a lot longer to grow than the sweet varieties. The sweet varieties were planted in half-rows to start. In late June, we’ll plant the rest of the rows so that we get a late batch of corn instead of having it all mature at the same time. The plants are currently 3 to 4 inches tall, and the majority have already been thinned out. They’re on pace to be taller than our knees by the Fourth of July.

Cucumbers

We’re only growing 2 varieties of cucumbers this year. One is called Bushy, and it’s a non-vining variety that produces cucumbers that can be used for slicing or pickling. I started four of these inside and transplanted them into our garden. They’re currently about 4 inches tall with a second set of leaves.

The other variety is the Mexican Sour Gherkin, also known as the Mouse Melon cucumber. These put out vines and need to be trellised. The cucumbers are small, roughly the size of a golf ball, and look like baby watermelons. We’re growing these in one of the planters I built from the Ikea chair. I started the first batch of these inside and transplanted them. Unfortunately, they didn’t transplant successfully, so I had to restart them by direct sowing. They have yet to germinate.

Eggplant

We greatly enjoyed growing and eating eggplant last year. We bought an Asian variety from our local greenhouse and enjoyed slicing and roasting them all summer. This year, we again opted to buy 2 starts from the greenhouse over seeds. They were a couple of inches tall when purchased and have grown since being transplanted into the garden, but they aren’t looking the healthiest. Some of the leaves turned brown at first, which I think is the result of a watering issue (Too much or too little? Who knows?). We also had some small flying bugs that were causing damage, but I think these have been addressed with Sevin spray. Currently, the plants are about 4 inches tall.

Leeks

I don’t understand how to grow onion-adjacent vegetables. I’ve never tried to grow bulb onions, but I’ve never been able to get spring onions to reach maturity so that they can be harvested. They start out looking great and eventually die off. This year, we passed over onions in favor of leeks, but it looks like it could be the same result. I started 12 cells of them inside and transplanted them when they were 3 inches tall. They looked good at first, but I don’t believe they’ve grown since. I later directly sowed another batch of them, but I don’t think they’ve germinated yet. I’m guessing that our soil is the issue. It’s pretty compact and not as loose or sandy as you’d prefer for root vegetables.

Melons

Pennsylvania isn’t the first state that comes to mind when you think of growing melons, but we had decent success last year with them. We grew heirloom varieties that weren’t native to the region. They also weren’t bred for cool climates, yet we still harvested a half-dozen or so fruit. This year, we focused on varieties that were bred to have success in cool areas. They are Cream of Saskatchewan, Montreal Market, and Pride of Wisconsin. We are growing 4 of each, and all were directly sown into the garden bed.

All 12 locations have germinated, have been thinned, and are about an inch tall.

Molokhia

I also struggle to grow greens. I’ve never been able to successfully grow lettuce. Last year, we grew mustard greens with some success, but they quickly got out of control. Molokhia is the only green we’re growing this year. It’s a vegetable that is popular in Middle Eastern and African cuisines and is also known as Egyptian Spinach. Molokhia plants enjoy hot weather, so I started the seeds inside to give them a head start. They germinated well, and I was able to transplant 6 plants; however, in the first days after being transplanted, they began not looking so great and have since died. I directly sowed another line of seeds, which have germinated, but it’s still too early to know if they’ll succeed.

They’re currently about a half-inch tall and will need to be thinned soon.

Peas

We grew one type of peas last year. They were a snap variety, which I love to eat. They were successful in that we harvested some pods, but we didn’t get the yield I was hoping for. That was largely because I planted them when I was feeling overwhelmed by all the other plants and didn’t give them the attention they deserved. This year, we’re growing 3 varieties: Green Arrow (shelling), Sugar Ann (snap), and Oregon Sugar Pod (snow). I was more careful with organizing the rows of peas this year than I was last year, and it’s going to pay off as the plants grow.

Currently, all 3 varieties have germinated, with the Green Arrow ones about an inch tall. I planted the seeds close together this year and won’t be thinning them after learning that peas, much like a good friend, will support each other as they grow.

Peppers

Peppers were another vegetable we had issues with last year. I started seeds and we bought starts, but none of the plants ever produced a mature pepper. Peppers can be tough to grow, and I don’t believe I was ready to correctly handle them last year. This year, we bought 4 varieties: Gochugarju (hot), Jaluv an Attitude (hot), Habanero (hot), and Takii’s New Ace (sweet bell). We bought the Takii’s New Ace largely because it can produce mature fruit quicker than other varieties, which is important in northern states where it can take until June to regularly get above 70 degrees. I also started a lot of cells for each variety and was intentional with developing a good root nest before transplanting.

I believe we currently have 12 pepper plants in the garden, which are divided among the 4 varieties. Some have transplanted better than others, with 3 of them looking great and 4 looking like they may not make it while the rest are somewhere in between. We’ve already had a couple of plants die after being transplanted. Plus, a rabbit got past our fence and dug one of the plants up. Luckily, I started more seeds, and they should be ready to be transplanted in a couple of weeks. Between the new starts and the ones in the basement, I think we’re in good shape to have a solid pepper harvest.

Potatoes

I recently wrote in-depth about how we’re growing our potatoes in bags this year and how well it’s going. If you didn’t read that post, I recommend checking it out. We’re growing 4 potato varieties this year: Red Norland (early season), Adirondack Blue (midseason), German Butterball (late season), and Magic Molly (late season). They’re all doing very well.

We split each of the 4 varieties into 5 grow bags for a total of 20, and they’ve all needed to be hilled with dirt to the point where we won’t be adding any more dirt to the bags. Within a few days of planting, some of the plants began poking through the soil. We were adding more dirt on a daily basis for a while until we decided to buy enough dirt to top off all of the bags this past weekend. I am shocked with how well and quickly they’ve grown. Still, we’ve had several of the bags begin to show plants poking through the soil, so we’re seeing a lot of growth and may only be a couple of months away from harvesting our first potatoes. From here on out, we’ll only have to water the bags, monitor them for weeds, and wait for the plants to flower and die off.

Pumpkins

We loved growing pumpkins last year and had a lot of success with them despite not knowing what we were doing. We harvested 3 of them, making pumpkin pie with them for Thanksgiving. They made the most delicious pumpkin pie we’ve ever had. We would have been able to harvest more of them had deer not broken through our fence and ate some of the pumpkins.

This year, we’re only growing 2 varieties—Winter Luxury and New England Sugar Pie, which grew last year. We’re being really intentional with how we’re growing our pumpkins this year, with 5 hills built for each variety. Weirdly, only 1 plant of each variety has germinated so far, and we’re going to re-sow seeds. The plants that have germinated, though, are about an inch-and-a-half tall.

Squash (Summer)

We are growing a ton of summer squash with 7 varieties: Black Beauty (Zucchini), Costata Romanesca (Zucchini), Early Summer Crookneck (Yellow Squash), Lebanese White (Zucchini), Ronde de Nice (Zucchini/Scallop hybrid), White Scallop (Patty Pan), and Yellow Crookneck (Yellow Squash). We love squash, if you couldn’t tell.

We directly sowed 5 of each variety, and all have germinated. Currently, each plant is at least an inch tall, with some of them developing their second set of leaves.

Squash (Winter)

We’re also growing 3 varieties of winter squash: Burpee’s Butterbush (Butternut), Turks Turban (Gourd), and Burgess Buttercup (Buttercup). We started 3 of each variety directly in the garden, and then our neighbor gave us 5 more buttercup starts. Three of the starts didn’t make it, but I replaced them with seeds from our stash, giving us 14 winter squash plants, assuming everything germinates. In fact, none of the winter squash that I directly sowed germinated, so we have to re-sow them, which we’re doing after work today.

Tomatoes

We’re growing a ton of tomatoes this year, so buckle up. After growing some rare and colorful varieties last year, we returned to growing all red tomatoes. The varieties are Aichi First (Slicing), Early Cherry (Cherry), Heinz (Paste), Korean Long (Paste), Large Red (Slicing), Little Bing (Cherry), Martino’s Roma (Paste), Mountaineer Pride (Slicing), Sub Arctic Plenty (Slicing), and Umpqua Beauty (Slicing). I don’t remember the exact number, but I think I started 6 cells of each variety and transplanted a total of 20 or so plants. Not all have survived, but we probably have around 16 plants, with 13 of them in the garden and 3 Little Bing plants in a planter. Immediately after transplanting our starts, I started more Heinz, Early Cherry, and Aichi First seeds, which have since germinated.

Currently, our tomatoes are a wide range of heights. The most recent tomatoes I started are about 2 inches tall. Meanwhile, the biggest ones in the garden are 7 inches tall already and are looking superb. We’re still a while away from blossoms and fruit, but it’s easy to envision a garden bed full of tomatoes this summer.