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Harvest Monday - August 23, 2010

Posted on August 22, 2010 at 9:08 PM

Each Monday, Daphne’s Dandelions hosts “Harvest Monday” where everyone submits links to their blog posts summarizing their harvest for the week.   It’s fun to see what everyone else is harvesting from gardens in so many different regions.     

    

The bush beans have taken center stage and gave me several good pickings over the course of the week.   Some of it was eaten immediately as part of our evening meals, but the vast majority of them have been blanched and frozen for winter use.   The runner beans and pole beans are starting to produce now too and should be really productive just about the time that the bush beans fizzle out for the season.

       

 

 

 

 

Thankfully the zucchini seems to be slowing down quite a bit.   The plants must have been reading my mind, as I was actually giving serious thought to just pulling them up and planting another fall crop so I would not feel so guilty about not using all that we were harvesting.   I was running out of people to give them to and getting tired of eating them at every meal.   Now that they have slowed down though I will keep them in place, as the lighter harvests are just right for our needs.    Coming along nicely this week were the cucumbers, which are starting to provide a steady and increasing harvest. I am expecting in the coming week to be able to harvest enough pickling cukes to do a batch of our favorite dill pickle relish next weekend.                         

 

         

  

Some of the tomatoes really want to ripen up but our brief bit of warm weather last week quickly cleared out and we got quite chill and damp again. I still managed to get one good ripe tomato this week, and have several more breaking color such that if the weather warms up for the first part of this coming week (as forecasted), I should get several ripe ones in a hurry. There is a sizeable amount of full sized tomatoes on the vines that have not broken color yet, but look ready to anytime.   Just a little warmth and sunshine is all it will take to move these along to ripening.                     

      

    

   

Harvested some more potatoes this week too for fresh eating needs.          

  

      

  

I did not get pictures of the few strawberries we harvested or the kale that I harvested for the chickens to enjoy.             

                

Harvest totals for the week of August 16th through August 22nd (rounded to the nearest ¼ pound).

  • Green Beans 8.75 lbs
  • Berries 0.25 lbs
  • Carrots 0.25 lbs
  • Cucumbers 1.25 lbs
  • Kale 0.25 lbs
  • Potatoes 3.75 lbs
  • Tomatoes 0.25 lbs
  • Zucchini 2.00 lbs

Total For Week 16.75 lbs

Total Year To Date 158.25 lbs        

        

We now have two hens laying eggs and we got 6 eggs for the week -  primarily from just one of the girls, but the second one started contributing on Sunday and I expect our egg production is about to start climbing soon too.       

 

Happy Gardening and Harvesting!                     

 

Laura

kitsapfreedomgardener

Categories: Harvesting, Vegetables, Chickens

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16 Comments

Reply Dan
11:10 PM on August 22, 2010 
The royal burgundy beans really are productive! I'm beanless this week, I am feeling the same about my beans that you are about your zucchini :-)
Reply Mike
11:51 PM on August 22, 2010 
What! Pull the super productive zucchini's...don't do it.:) It looks like you have had a fine harvest once again. How on earth did you get that cucumber to conform to your tomato like that? Seriously though, all your veggies are looking really good...very nice potatoes. Enjoy those eggs.:)
Reply kitsapfreedomgardener
12:16 AM on August 23, 2010 
Dan - The bush beans always go into overdrive for about a two week period and then fizzle. I have probably one more big picking before they wash out for the year. When I know there is an end in sight it is easier to attend to a harvest glut.

Mike - I was definitely seriously thinking about it! I really do not like zucchini frozen or preserved in any fashion so it is a fresh eating vegetable for us - and our menu has been dominated by zucchini for quite a while now. Not to worry though, the production has slowed way down and it has earned itself a pardon! The eggs have been delicious!
Reply hsheather
07:51 AM on August 23, 2010 
Have you tried pickling any of the zucchini? I've heard that is a good way to use them. Those beans are so pretty. Do they cook up green or stay purple?
Reply Thomas
09:31 AM on August 23, 2010 
Look at all of those beans! I have have to try that variety next year though I don't seem to have much luck with them.

Sorry that your summer has been less than stellar this year. We've definitely been spoiled with ours. Hopefully your tomatoes will start to kick in soon.

Oh, and I'm sure the eggs taste delicious!
Reply Mike
09:38 AM on August 23, 2010 
I heard a rumor that your chickens won't eat zucchini. Don't give up on them, ours would not eat anything like that their first summer either..now I can throw a whole zucchini, beat, even a raw potato in the field and they go at it like piranhas. they are still a bit nervous about watermelon on the rind though, I think that they perceive it as some sort of dead animal....really strange. Only the bravest among them will eat it.
Reply michelle
12:37 PM on August 23, 2010 
The purple beans are so pretty, I wish they stayed that color when cooked. Yay for that first tomato. There has to be more to come soon, at last...
Reply Daphne
04:30 PM on August 23, 2010 
Those beans look so beautiful. I love the purple. I still refuse to switch from Kentucky Wonder beans, but I wish I could get different colors too. I'm with heather. I wonder what you dill relish would taste like with zucchini instead of cucumbers? I hear it is pretty good, but I'm in the opposite boat. I have too many cukes and not enough zucchini.
Reply thyme2garden
07:16 PM on August 23, 2010 
Your beautiful purple beans are really producing well for you! I wonder if the brainy agricultural scientists can eventually come up with a purple variety that will stay that color even after cooked. I mean, if they can "make" seedless watermelons, they should be able to do anything, right? :)
Reply Holly
07:54 PM on August 23, 2010 
Wowzas! That's an impressive bean harvest!!
Reply kitsapfreedomgardener
09:48 PM on August 23, 2010 
hsheather - I dropped some spears of zucchini into the refrigerator dill solution and they turned out okay but not nearly as good as the cucumber dills - mainly because of the difference in their textures. The cukes are crisp and have a snap to them when bit into - the zukes are soft and kind of spongey. I think they would do in a pinch but honestly if given a choice I would go for the cucumber dills any day over the zucchini dills.

Thomas - I love it when the beans come on, no the picking of them certainly, but the abundance that they provide which helps to rapidly fill up the freezer for the winter.

Mike - The rumor is true (is it a rumor if I announced it! LOL!). I do keep trying but they have continued to turn their beaks up at zucchini. I guess I will try it again next season and see if a year makes a difference for them.

michelle - That is actually not the first tomato of the season, I have had several which has been good for fresh eating needs - this just happened to be the one and only for the week to ripen. It's just been too dang cold this summer to properly bring any of the heat lovers to maturity. The liklihood is that disease will take down the plants before I ever get my "big harvest" of tomatoes. In the meantime, I will keep nursing along as much of them as I can.

Daphne - I have not abandoned my favorite Blue Lake pole beans either. I just swapped my bush beans this year to the Royal Burgundy and I must say that these are not only good tasting but it makes picking the bush bean patch a lot easier because the purple pods are easier to spy. I think I will stick with my tried and true pole beans though because green is not such a disadvantage with those - easier to see and pick anyways.

thyme2garden - Be careful what you ask for! I am sure with genetic modification they can make green beans that swim like fish - but I would prefer to get varieties through breeding programs rather than frankenscience. The purple is good even if it does not stay after cooking - as it makes the picking of the beans a whole lot easier I have found.

Holly - The beans have been performing well despite our cool summer which is a small miracle as they like warmth almost as much as the tomatoes and peppers.
Reply Lori
12:54 AM on August 24, 2010 
Beautiful beans! Nice job on the potatoes. I think I'll grow some next year!
~~Lori
Reply vrtlarica
02:05 AM on August 24, 2010 
I love the color of those purple beans! Are they more productive in spring, when temperatures are lower or in summer?
We had 5 or 6 zucchini plants last year. I didn?t know what to do with all of them, that is why this year we are having only one - and it is enough.
Reply kitsapfreedomgardener
08:24 AM on August 24, 2010 
Lori - You should grow potatoes as they are quite rewarding.

vrtlarica - Beans in general prefer warmer conditions and will not germinate properly in cool soils. They give in to mildews easily if the conditions are too damp and cool. The zucchini overabundance I am experiencing this year was a factor of two things. First, I did not get my early plant die off like I normally do so all the plants survivied and produced abundantly. Typically I have some plants croack or stop producing so I plant a few that are insurance against that. This year there was no need for the insurance. Second, I planted my usual amounts forgetting that my daughter was leaving for college back east mid summer. So we have too many plants due to lack of attrition, and we reduced our household size by one just as they started pouring on the produce,. A perfect storm of zucchini!
Reply foodgardenkitchen
08:43 PM on August 25, 2010 
I'll keep my fingers crossed for warmer waether in the Pacific Northwest so you can get some tomatoes!

Our summer squash harvest wasn't so prolific this year that we got tired of them before they succumbed to squash vine borers. Of course a seed planting mix-up on my part resulted in us having only 2 yellow squash plants and some extra cucumber plants instead of the 2 yellow squash and 2 zucchini I had planned on... to this day I don't know how that happened - I'm usually a bit more precise than that :)
Reply kitsapfreedomgardener
08:45 AM on August 26, 2010 
foodgardenkitchen - I would have been giving you bags full of zucchini if you were a nearby neighbor this year! I have given away alot of the zucchini because I planted like my daughter was going to be home eating with us all summer - and of course she moved back east mid summer. And then I never got the usual plant attrition - everything live and thrived all season so I was swimming in zukes! I have not side dressed them with fertilizer and between that and the cool weather they are slowing down production considerably. The rate of produce is actually just about right at the moment. Dont' feel bad about the cuke mixup - I ended up with some swiss chard in my parsnip patch somehow as well? No idea how that happened.