Vacation

When you go away for a week in August your garden will explode on you.  Just about got most of the weeds back in line, harvested the last cuke yesterday (the vine's dead)  Hopefully i'll get some mulch down today, and thinking about planting some lettuces for the fall...

Lord Erec teaching about medieval gardening at Pennsic

 Here is a temporary garden set up at the East Kingdom Royal encampment at the Pennsic war.  Thanks to my lady of course for her continued support.  Thanks also to Vienna de la Mer, who planted this seed in my head, and to Jadwega who's plants really helped fill it out.

Here is a detail of the backside of the garden, shewing one of the turf-topped bench, the wheelbarrow and the medieval spade.  The plants were also displayed at the A&S on monday.  The class was very well attended, and I think the garden looked very good too.  If you were there, i'd love some feedback and ideas for improvement.

Disappointment

So many things which i planned did not come to be:

calendula - difficulty in transplanting for pennsic cost most of these.
chard  - cut off at soil level, one plant hanging on, one regrowing from the root
chervil  - can't even tell where this was.
cucumber - looking a bit piqued, but still getting fruit from it.
foxglove  - had lovely flowers for a bit but it is no longer with us.
hens&chicks - doing well, lots of chicks
hollyhock - put out some nice flowers, but gave up the ghost
lavender grosso - this one is doing ok.
lettuce green ice - gone to seed
lettuce green towers - gone to seed
lettuce mesclun mix - gone to seed
meadowsweet - hanging on but doesn't look too good
parsley  - poor thing never stood a chance
rocket  - gone to seed
savory summer - doing well, about to go to seed
shallot  - This did well, i harvested them yesterday.  Will have a pic soon.
skirret  - doing well, as far as i can tell.  Don't know when to harvest...
squash summer - july did this guy in, we did get fruit off it though.
st john's wort - couldn't take the heat
strawberry - doing well, lots of flowers
strawberry blite - dried up in the july heat
thyme english - died in july as well.
tomato better boy - slow to ripen, but looking ok...
tomato cherokee black - big fat tomatos that something has been eating.
tomato sweet bell pepper - leaves wilted and plants died.
however, the new world plants are doing great.  What I thought was acorn squash is in fact pumpkins, and the corn is doing well also.