Veggie Garden All-Stars 2016 Edition

I decided to revive my garden all-stars edition, which I started last year. In this now annual tradition, I take stock of failures and celebrate successes over the first half of the summer gardening season. I borrowed this idea from Major League Baseball which takes a mid-season break to celebrate it’s best and reflect on the season thus far.

And since I mentioned the MLB All-Star game, I have to note that my Cubs locked down the entire starting infield. This is only the second time in the 87-year history of the game this has happened. This is a big deal people! For those of you hating on my Cubs, deal with it. They are incredible good.

Anyway, let’s get to it.

All-Star Performers
IMG_2032-1
IMG_2027-1My cucumbers were the first vegetables to ripen. They’re thick and coming in at the perfect shade of green. I picked the first one yesterday and placed it in my vegetable basket. Although lonely now, there will soon be plenty more cucumbers to keep it company.

Haven’t Reached Their Potential
IMG_2031IMG_2029My tomatoes, peppers and squash are still in the early growing stages, but are coming along nicely. In just a few weeks, they’ll be fully grown. Baby vegetables are so cute!

Poor Performers
I’ve planted lettuce twice now with no luck. The first seedlings sprouted and didn’t really progress. The second batch of seeds were starting to doing a little better. Unfortunately, we got a major thunderstorm and it destroyed the immature plants. I haven’t decided if I’m going to go for round three.

I’m going to add myself to the poor performers list. I had planned to have everything planted by mid-April. But I got behind and due to a long spring vacation, I didn’t get to plant until mid-May. I’m disappointed that the garden is a month behind of what I originally planned.

But hey, you can’t win them all. Unless you’re the Cubs! I’m just happy that this year’s mid-season report is much better than 2015.

Veggie Garden All-Stars and Poor Performers

I can’t believe it’s nearly been three months since I prepped the garden and planted strawberries and vegetables for the summer. Since it’s about halfway through the growing season; I thought I would pause and reflect on successes and non-successes, like Major League Baseball does with its mid-season All-Star Break. Much like MLB teams at the halfway point, there are clear winners and losers.

IMG_1293All-Star Performers

The tomatoes are the clear winners at this point in the growing season. I purchased four plants and all have produced nicely. I’ve enjoyed the flavorful tomatoes in sandwiches and salads. There are many more unripened tomatoes on the plants so they should keep producing into the fall.

Haven’t Reached Full Potential

IMG_1289Just like my Cubs team, the cucumbers took a little longer than expected to come in, are in various stages of growth and doing well. The cucumbers will be used inĀ cuc and tom salads, perfect for summer

Peaked Early

The lettuce came in as planned. I pulled the leaves off four plants and they were delicious. Since then, the leaves have been slow to grow back and it’s been a waiting game for more.

I was excited when the strawberries first sprouted. Due to battles with slugs, I lost quite a few but I picked the equivalent of a couple handfuls. In the last couple of weeks, nothing has come off the vines.

Poor Performers

The peppers and carrots in this category are because they didn’t bother to show. Not in the athlete didn’t even make a decent effort, but in the literally never showed up sense. I’m not sure what happened, but I never saw a hint of the carrots and peppers I was looking forward to.

I’ve got some things to work on, so we’ll see how the rest of the summer goes.