It’s time for another garden update!

Some quick background for new visitors: I garden in NE Minnesota where we have a very short growing season (this year’s last frost was June 8th). I use hugelkultur raised beds and apply permaculture methods throughout my garden. Nearly everything I grow are heirloom varieties and all are organically managed- no chemicals, pesticides, or anything unnatural.

The past month has been cold and rainy. The average temperature was 60 degrees, with most nights in the 40s. The consistent rainfall has both its good and bad. Good because I never have to water the garden. Bad because it means slug damage. Between the slugs and the renegade chickens that get into my garden despite the fortress of a fence I have built against them, my green beans and cucumbers have suffered pretty terribly. They are just now starting to take off after being replanted a number of times. In comparison to this time last year, we’re a little bit behind due to the cold, wet month of June. Except for the potatoes, which are ahead of last year as I was able to plant them a little earlier.

The tomato plants are starting off beautifully. They were all started from seeds saved from a variety of my heirloom tomatoes from last year: Cherokee Purple, Boar, Paste, Cosmonaut, and Brandywine. At this point in the season, I pull all of the flowers from my plants to encourage plant growth rather than fruit growth. It’s also time for me to do some pruning to keep any leaves from touching the ground. I do have one random plant that I discovered a cluster of paste tomatoes on and I’m letting them go ahead and do their thing…but as for the others, they must wait. And so must I :).

The potatoes just started flowering, with a few purple heads opening up to the world. I typically bury my potatoes several times before flowering. But this year, I only buried them once when they were about 12-14″ tall. Time simply didn’t allow for more. I’m curious to see how this impacts my yield. In total, 30 pounds of seed potatoes were planted, the varieties including Chieftain Red, All Blue, and Viking Purple.

Grasshoppers were one of the issues we dealt with last year when it came to the potatoes, but thankfully the plants were quite mature by the time the grasshoppers also matured, so they had no impact on production. I’m noticing grasshoppers once more, just recently gaining in size. But seeing as the potatoes are so far along, they again shouldn’t present a problem. If they do, I’ve heard that flour sifted through a colander over your plants will gum up the mouths of the grasshoppers and eliminate them. A good organic option to try.

I was so excited to see the first peas starting to form! It won’t be long now…

Some of the green beans, just finally starting to beat the battle against the slugs. Probably the #1 downfall of hugelkultur in a cool, wet climate like mine is slugs.

The corn has been slow, again due to the weather. But it’s plugging along. As are the cucumbers, after being replanted.

The garlic scapes are just about ready to pick. I’m excited to pickle mine.

Some of the onions (front, with garlic in back). I planted close to 150 onions this year.

Lettuces, onions, carrots, strawberries.

And…a snake. Because why not?

Thanks for coming along for the tour of the garden! I will be posting another update mid-month. I hope your own garden is growing well.

Happy Harvesting! 🙂