My Darrow blueberry that I found at Lowes a few months ago for $3!!! It's been sitting in it's pot for months, so I planted it today. I'm not too worried about transplant shock since the rootball was still completely intact when I removed it from its container. I have 3 other varieties planted a few feet away for it to cross-pollinate with.Carmine Jewel bush cherry. Arrived in spring as a very small specimen. It was thinner than a pencil. Only about 7" tall and you could see the wrapping of the small plug that they placed in a 2" container. Not nearly worth what I paid for it. Lesson learned about ordering from that company again. Today I planted it in its permanent spot. Again, I'm not too concerned about transplant shock since the rootball stayed intact.Sunshine Blue caryopteris is now in bloom. The bees love it!
Autumn Joy sedum is starting to blush and the bees are really taking notice.
Fireworks goldenrod starting to bloom.
Mystery plant. Just popped up in the newly added section of garden. I'm not sure what it is, but it is getting prettier and prettier each day. Amaranthus?
My back bed. Walker's Low catmint, Autumn Joy sedum, and an aster that is nothing but ugly all season....until just a few days ago when it shot out healthy green foliage. I was going to toss it at the end of the season, but now I think I'll relocate it behind other plants.
Two Caroline raspberry plants are beginning to fill in my 3'x3' raised bed. Oklahoma red zinnia are blooming their hearts out in the bed behind them.
My three Fat N' Sassy bell pepper plants. They made a delicious stuffed pepper supper yesterday.
Oregon Sugar Pod peas. Even though you can eat the whole pod, my daughter insists on still shelling them. Guess I'll go back to just planting shelling peas from now on. I have to admit, I do enjoy popping open the pods and eating those tasty nuggets.
My new raspberry patch. First homegrown raspberries ever. Fall Gold and Carolines.
One of several containers of potatoes that never died. After weeks and weeks of drought, then flooding rains, these potatoes don't know what to do. They were planted back in April or May. They should have died back, but I think the potatoes resprouted after all the confusion. I figure I'll wait and see what happens.
The "shell" garden due to its shape. In the back are my tomatoes. Spirit pumpkin in the middle. Sweet basil that overwintered is front and center. Tango celery, that is passed it prime, to the left of that.
My homegrown jack-o-lantern still remains a possibility. The vine produced three nice pumpkins in early August then quickly declined. Luckily, after the drought was finally over, the vine put down new roots and took off for the second time.

Photos of Today's Garden

Cherokee Green, Stupice, and Lucky Cross tomatoes. It rained very hard the night before I picked these, so the big ones cracked. Still tasted good though!My new birdbath! It looks solid, but it's very light-weight. Love it! It's a Pedestal Bird Bath for Wild Birds by Gardman. It says it's frost and weather resistant. At $30 bucks, it felt like a steal.
A portion of my backyard bed. In the front is one Walker's Low nepeta with Autumn Joy sedum behind it. To the left are two "leftover" tomato plants that needed a home. I believe the front one is Stupice. No clue about the other until it matures. The ugly plant on the right is some sort of aster that I purchased from Jung. It's always been ugly. It puts out flowers though, so I think I'll move it in the Spring back behind other plants to hide the hideous foliage.
A few weeks ago the kids started some cabbage, lettuce, and radishes in the empty spots next to the Caroline raspberries that I added in the Spring. A few of the raspberries didn't survive, so now I'm just making the best of the space until the replacements arrive next Spring.
Fiesta del Sol tithonia. I am absolutely in love with this plant. It hasn't even reached two feet high and is so lush and healthy....Love it!!!! It handled the drought and 100+ days without skipping a beat.
Fat 'n Sassy hybrid bell peppers. Now sold under the name King Arthur.
Two more Spirit pumpkins. Some of the Oregon Sugar Pod II peas I started several weeks ago are planted along the front edge of the bed.
Winona Strawberries that were planted this Spring. They are sending out runners and filling in nicely.
Common milkweed that I started from seed in late winter.
Carmine Jewel bush cherry that I just purchased this Spring. The tips appeared to have some sort of blight in the beginning of the season, so they were cut back a bit to remove the funny looking foliage and stems. Now it's putting on some new, healthy growth. I will be transplanting it in the fall to its permanent position in the garden.
Yukon Gold and Red Norland potatoes that are just starting to show signs of dying back.

This morning I decided to bag some blossoms. I used bridal tulle circles to cover the blossoms. A bagged blossom. The clothespins are holding the "bags" together and their weight is supported by clipping them over the cages. I will remove the bags once I see tomatoes forming.
Fused tomato stems on my Lucky Cross tomato plant.
Copra and Red Zeppelin onions starting to bulb up.
Reliance Grapes
Blueray Blueberry
Newly expanded front garden. The entire middle portion was grass in the beginning of the season. Now it is filled with marigolds, dwarf sunflowers, lots of carrots, and other assorted annuals as fillers.
Scarlet Oklahoma Red Zinnia
Jacob Kline Monarda
Purple Coneflower

Bumblebee on bolting Golden Acre cabbage flowers.My bed of Yukon Gold and Red Norland potatoes. There are two Mucho Nacho jalapeno and two Fat N' Sassy pepper plants in the bed. Yesterday I added more straw mulch around the growing potatoes to keep them from turning green. Then I added even more straw around the strawberry plants to keep the berries away from the soil.
I purchased seed for Common Milkweed. Asclepias syriaca. Only one of them germinated. I hope it not only survives, but thrives and multiplies.Nepeta Walkers Low. It may be low but it sure isn't petite. This ONE plant that I added last summer is at least 4 feet wide. This is after I used a shovel to slice off a large chunk to plant out front. The bumblebees are absolutely loving it!Yesterday I placed some clothespins on the dwarf fruit trees I planted in the fall. It may not be attractive, but it will help with maintaining wide angles for the scaffolds. This is my dwarf Golden Delicious apple tree.I found apple aphid clusters on the new foliage of this apple tree. Their buddy, an ant, was hanging out with them. I didn't want to dig out the hose and haul it around the house to blast them off with water. I couldn't find my spray bottle either. What to do? Improvise. My kids' squirt guns came in handy. Not as good as a hose, but it slowly worked.

After a Week of Neglect Through a Heat Wave...

My tomatoes have started to ripen. As I've stated before, the Cherokee Green tomatoes were by far the most delicious tomato I've ever grown. Instead of just one plant, I grew two this year. Good thing, because as you can see from the picture below, my Cherokee GREEN is RED!!! I used the seed from the same source as last year. I guess it has some cross-pollinated seed or other variety accidentally mixed in. I won't be upset if it still tastes anything like Cherokee Green though...Well, I hope the other plant is green.

The garden held up relatively well without receiving any care over the last week. It endured the high heat and humidity with only a few setbacks.

A severe rain a few days ago really took a toll on the potato foliage. It's still growing strong though. I can't wait to harvest these!

We had a period of drought, high heat, and humidity last week. I failed to water my new blueberry bushes. I use the hose for all of my plants with the exception of the blueberries since our water is so alkaline. I use rain water for the blueberries instead. I forgot to go back and water them separately. One held up beautifully with the aide of some potato foliage shading it a bit. The other two didn't fair so well. They both had a severe reaction to the shortage of water. :(

STEP 1

The foliage has completely died back. This is so exciting!

STEP 2

Time to dump it. I feel like a kid again. Wait! Could it be?

STEP 3

I found potatoes!!!! I planted one seed potato and yielded about 4 times what I planted. My first potato growing experience has got me hooked. I can't wait to see how the other varieties faired. Especially the ones that were grown in the ground.

Amish Paste tomato with blossom end rot. The only loss so far this season.

I took a peek under my enormous Spirit pumpkin foliage from my two plants this morning. There are three pumpkins!I harvested all of my garlic today. Since I knew I wasn't going to be able to keep up with the watering of my hanging flower pouches full of strawberry plants last week, I improvised. I moved them out of the strong direct sun and hung them on a couple of pepper cages that were staked on top of one another. I decided that the top of the cages would be great to hang my garlic on while it cures. I think I might do the same when I start pulling up some of my onions.

I harvested over seven pounds of cucumbers this morning. This time I used my water bath canner to make these cucumber sandwich pickles. I also used the cukes to start the process of making sweet icicle pickles. For the first step they needed to be quartered and soaked in a brine for a week. I will finish them up next weekend.