My best crop is the tomatoes! This year I planted all ten tomato plants in large containers with the bottoms cut out. This way, the cut worms don't invade, and so far, there are no tomato horn worms. Each morning when I visit this incredible place there are ripe tomatoes- all heirlooms, and huge! The black krims are dark Harvard crimson, so juicy and sweet there is no comparison to what you get in the markets. There are striped tomatoes, yellows, tiny ones, funny looking ones - all wonderful!
I search under the leaves for ripe cucumbers and find dozens! I think about making pickles. The green beans are way ahead of me though I pick daily. Pickled beans? There must be fifty eggplants waiting to be picked. How many recipes are there for eggplant? Peppers are yet to come.
Growing your own food is just the best! It compares to growing kids when you go from all potential to maybe a great harvest. But growing a garden is much less fraught. You can dig down those unfortunate vegetables that never did anything; not something you could do with a kid.
All the critters here are celebrating the spring harvest. Bob and Emily, the resident sand hill cranes spend most of every day in the yard looking for grubs and worms, purring and hoping I will leave the garden gate open. The deer are enjoying the tips of the rose bushes, the new citrus and the camellias. The squirrels are enjoying digging up the seeds I plant. Raccoons are eyeing the grape arbor and marking their calendar to attack just at the point the grapes will be ripe enough to make jelly.
Last evening we sat on the front porch after the rain watching the rainbow emerge. At the end of it were Bob and Emily, oblivious to their good fortune of living in paradise.
You have got to be kidding about having ripe tomatoes already! Out here in SF bay area we are just putting our tomatoes in the ground!
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