today's harvest

[habitat_gardener]

I picked about 15.5 pounds of tomatoes today and a few other vegetables.

Here's what's in the photo, starting with the box in the upper left. (I've added some comments on the names below.) I pick at first or second blush, which is why some of them look a little pale.

box 1 -- 2 Croatia Joanna, 2 small Speckled Roman, 10 Cour di Bue, mix of Tommy Toe and Black Cherry, fava beans

box 2 -- 2 Black Pear/Siberian, 4 Palo Alto, 2 Pork Chop, 1 Tatume squash, 1 Prudens Purple, 3 Sicilian

box 3 -- leaf lettuces and 2 types of basil -- Italian Cameo and Violetto Aromatico

box 4 -- 4 cucumbers (Japanese Long and/or Tastygreen Burpless, plus an overgrown Persian), 12 Cour di Albegnia, Sun Sugar cherry tomatoes

box 5 -- pole beans (Rattlesnake, La Vigneronne, Waterloo Co. Mennonite, Purple Pole, Scarlet Runner, Trionfo Violetto, Musica, and maybe others), overgrown Odessa squash, and the last of the dried Pink Half Runner beans

About those names...I bought seedlings at a local sale and that's how they were spelled. I know it should be Cuore, not Cour, even though these tomatoes are not "cuore" shaped. But all of these tomatoes are wonderful! No duds this year.

Some of the Palo Alto tomatoes have been fused, with each part maturing at a different time, which is why it looks like there's a strange whitish growth on one of them.

[gnol]

Lots of lovely looking tasties there.
I was unfortunate enough to have store bought tomatoes in my sandwich for about the third time since March this year yesterday.

[SEAMSFASTER]

Best single day harvest to date - 239 lbs.!


Growing 420 plants of 280 varieties. The challenge is getting them to market! First year growing garden produce to sell.

[remy]

habitat_gardener,
You've got a nice assortment there, and neat and organized too. Have you got a lot of beans yet, or is it too early to comment on the year for them? Since you grew such an assortment, I would love to hear your opinions.
Remy

[Keiththibodeaux]

Originally Posted by SEAMSFASTER

Best single day harvest to date - 239 lbs.!


Growing 420 plants of 280 varieties. The challenge is getting them to market! First year growing garden produce to sell.

How is that working for you? I have often considered doing the same.

[SEAMSFASTER]

Originally Posted by remy

habitat_gardener,
You've got a nice assortment there, and neat and organized too. Have you got a lot of beans yet, or is it too early to comment on the year for them? Since you grew such an assortment, I would love to hear your opinions.
Remy

I tried growing 12 varieties of beans this year:

FAVA BEANS (time consuming to prepare properly)
- Windsor, productive, large pod, excellent flavor
- Banner, very productive, smaller beans, excellent flavor
BUSH BEANS
- Contender, my standard green bean, extremely productive, 10+ pickings per year, very good flavor, especially the early pickings (Planted June 1st, first harvest July 28th).
- Dragon Tongue, planted just a few, one very small harvest, given to customer
- Tiger's Eye, planted just a few, got fewer beans than I planted, saving seeds
- Royal Burgundy, modest production, most from first harvest, only given to customers so far
- EarlyServe, fair production, most from first harvest, only given to customers so far
POLE BEANS
- "Italian Broad" bean, variety unknown, production light, beans are almost ready to harvest now
- Christmas Lima, not a single one germinated
- Scarlet Runner, very slow growing, beautiful red blossoms (see pic), a few very small beans now
- Yard Long, slow growing, small plants, small beans so far
- Turkey (aka Turkey Craw), one of my favorites; aggressive, fast-growing vines could easily get 30' long if given a chance; moderate production, excellent flavor. I did not plant until June 24th and started harvesting on August 23rd.

Here's a 3-week old pic of the support structure for turkey beans. The uprights are 15' steel poles driven 3' into the ground. The vines are now over the top and headed back down!

I'm open to suggestions for next year - there are so many varieties to choose from!

[SEAMSFASTER]

It's been a slow start this year. Three weeks ago I had only one customer. But with tomatoes coming on like crazy, people are starting to appreciate what I'm doing. Word of mouth is bringing more customers every day. I've had to start telling people "no", which is not easy to do. I'll still likely end up with an overall financial loss for the year, however.

Next year I should be in decent shape. It is rewarding work in non-financial ways, however.

[habitat_gardener]

Originally Posted by remy

habitat_gardener,
You've got a nice assortment there, and neat and organized too. Have you got a lot of beans yet, or is it too early to comment on the year for them? Since you grew such an assortment, I would love to hear your opinions.
Remy

Yes, I've been picking lots of beans! I'm growing 15 varieties and about 125 plants this year. I started the season by eating them raw in the garden, when I was picking only a few handfuls at a time, and I haven't kept them separate when cooked, so I can tell them apart best as raw beans. And I chose mostly purple-streaked beans, so some of them are hard to tell apart! I haven't been keeping tabs on the productivity either, though for a while it seemed the Trionfo Violetto was outproducing the others, but maybe that's because the solid purple stands out and I was eating fewer of them in the garden. The only roundish green bean I'm growing this year is McCaslan 42.

I love them all but my two favorites this year are

1--Waterloo County Mennonite, which stays crisp even when quite large, and is even better than my old favorite, La Vigneronne, or Rattlesnake, both of which it resembles.

2--Helda (a romano type), which is even sweeter than Smeraldo or Musica this year.

I'm growing a few varieties for beans to shell, and I haven't cooked any of those yet.