Fourth of JULY Celebrations.

Here are a few pix of our family get together this year for July 4th. 

 

 

 

Today's garden adventures

Pix of the Garden with my Iphone

the iphone takes good pix but not wonderful pix but this will give you an idea of my growth since July 4th.  

JULY 9th, 2014

Not sure what kind of flower this is but it's very tiny 

This is bee balm!  Really thought this plant would be pretty.  And the flowers are but the plant is very scraggly. 

 

zucchini!

 Sweet Success and now Let's EAT!

And yes hunny those are your sissors...I couldn't find mine :0/  

NOTE TO SELF.............Next year don't plant onions this close together.  I've stunted them..I think.  And why are they falling over.  Look how pretty these are that I replanted over by the chinese 5 peppers...

 

I think the onions and peppers like each other.  look how amazing they both look!!!  I will remember this for next year.     Also I found out that you do NOT break the top of the onion over you wait for it to do that on it's own because the onion will stop growing if you break it over.  Also if it's bent over you can tell if you need to pull it by feeling the base of the stem, if it's spongy they go ahead and pull it and let it dry or it will rot and we don't want to waste any of the onions where there is salsa to be made. :)  

Remember the photo I took of the baby cucumber on July 4th???? Um hello guys this is 6 days later.  WOW talk about a fast grower.  When the conditions are perfect I'm going to be in over my head with cucumbers.  I was talking to a lady from our church the other day and she said the season for making sure your car is locked at church is NOW  so people don't pawn off all the extras from their garden on you.  LOL   Isn't that the truth.   Trying to decide if I want to pickle any of these or not.  I'll keep you posted.  

Honey suckle is starting to bloom again and I'm really glad.  I started to worry that it was finished for the year.

 

Sweet Potatoes are growing I sure do hope they start to climb the trellis.  They are such a pretty plant.  

 Look at that Anaheim pepper!  Yummmy

Here is a recipe I use these peppers for. 

 http://www.foodlve.com/food/Stuffed-Pepper-Poppers-Recipe#.

Ever-bearing strawberries are producing again.  We had a ton of rain and very little sun thru JUNE and it zapped all my strawberries. 

 

Morning glories look great.  They have reached the top of my harbor and are trying to go across the top.  Hope it makes it before they bloom.  Can't wait to have color as you enter my garden gate.  

Growth and EGGS!!! Hooray!

Aquaponics JULY 2014

 If I had to quess the size of these tomato plants I would say 7-9 feet.  One is closer to 7 and the other has to be 9 feet tall.   So something is working right.  However, I'm trippng with the filtering.  I'm not loving the cleaning process right now so I am researching a few changes right now.  I will keep you posted on this.  I have a lot of build up and sludge that I'm dealing with.  

This is a snapshot from a video I was taking trying to get a look into this fishes mouth.  LOL  See those white dots in her mouth.....?  Those are eggs.  We have successfully had two female blue tilapia with eggs in their mouth.  The first one made it two days before I noticed she no longer had them and the 2nd one made it 3-4 days before I noticed she was no longer "HOLDING".   Sooo we are doing something right and might be doing something wrong.  LOL  We know that they are laying eggs so conditions are good for that, however I'm not sure if they are eating them or loosing them, if they are stressed out or just learning the process.  This is a first for any of these females so we will continue to press forward and see how things go. 

THE HEAT IS ON...Bring on the Growth.

JULY 4th, 2014 

One Sunflower so far is beautifying my garden.  Look what amazing color it has.  LOVE IT!!!  

The pepper are really growing nicely.  I took these pix right before running off to a big 4th of July celebration with the family.  So I will update again soon with more detailed pix.  But for now this is it you can see the growth is wonderful in my opinion.  ;)

 

 

Cucumbers are double the size in this photo but they are looking amazing.  

 

 Chinese 5 Pepper is beautiful!!!!!!!

 

This picture doesn't do it justice.  I found a photo online of what it should look like.  I'm hoping mine eventually looks like this one I found on the internet......

 

Here is a link if you are interested in the plant...  http://www.rareseeds.com/chinese-5-color-pepper/

 

planted green beans in the place that I pulled sugar snap peas from.  

Green beans, Spaghetti Squash, zucchini, kale, acorn squash, and tomatoes. 

The Potatoes are taking off on another growth spurt.  I thought they had stopped but I'm going to have to add more straw.  We had a really good rain at the beginning of the week and they are blooming again.  

Yellow wax beans looking very pretty in the garden.  I can't wait to add these to my canning so that they decorate my shelves.  LOL it's not just about self sufficiency it's about making the pantry pretty too.  hehe.  I had a neighbor tell me my garden was a "Foo-Foo" garden!  Let it be.  

Learning more about asperagus I found a website that sounds like it might have some interesting information.

http://www.asparagus.org/maab/homeGarden.html?id=771http://www.asparagus.org/maab/homeGarden.html?id=771