Squash Blossoms

first squash blossom 2012, originally uploaded by Bumble Lush.

My zucchini and summer squash plants have really come to life in the last week. This first flower appeared last week on a yellow crookneck plant.

 

I've seen many bees and butterflies in my garden, but I helped the pollinators along a little by using a QTip to pollinate some of the female flowers. (You can see that we re-use some of our containers; this yellow squash plant is in an old Endless Summer hydrangea pot). I've already seen small batches of zucchini and yellow squash at the farmers' market. I hope my little plants catch up soon. 

We started most of our squash from seed but bought a few plants as well. One of the new varieties I'm trying is this Astia zucchini from Renee's Garden, designed for specifically for containers, which is perfect for us because that's how we grow. I started two of these from seed and it looks like I may be picking some soon. The zucchini are very small, which I suppose is to be expected since they're designed for containers.

I always hear about people growing so much squash that they drown it and have to give it away or sneak bags of it onto their friends' and neighbors' porches. I have NEVER grown that much squash, but I would love to know what it feels like.

What about you? Are you growing squash? Do you ever have so much extra that you have to give it away?

A trickle and then a flood...

On Saturday we picked squash, about 5 grape tomatoes, and the first few purple pole beans.  I'm anxiously waiting for the rest of the grape tomatoes to ripen. Last year we had a small handful and then suddenly they were all ready at the same time, and we often found ourselves with more tomaotes that we knew what to do with.  I'm always amazed at how quickly things grow--one day we'll see a little yellow crookneck squash just starting to grow, and by the end of the week it's ready to be picked and eaten. I love it!

left to right: purple pole beans, tomatoes, 2 crookneck yellow squash, butterstick zucchini; all harvested 6/19

Now for the main event---the big squash harvest! Somehow between Saturday and today (Monday) FIVE more squash were ready to be picked.  I ordered a variety pack of squash seeds from Burpee (found here).  We harvested one of each variety today!

left to right: zucchini, yellow crookneck, sweet gourmet hybrid zucchini, zucchini, butterstick (another zucchini variety)--all harvested today 6/21

Now for the fun part--cooking them up to see how they taste! According to Burpee's site, the Butterstick and Sweet Gourmet Hybrid should have a light nutty taste. We'll see about that.

Other pictures--the first is the Butterstick growing in our raised bed. The second is of the crookneck yellow squash we're growing in containers.

2010 Veggie Crop

This year's planned veggie crop:
zucchini - from seed
yellow squash - from seed
tomatoes (including cherry and yellow grape) - some plants, trying cherry tomatoes from seed
bell peppers - will probably buy plants
green beans - from seed
cucumbers - from seed

Although we are planting the majority from seed, we also bought some plants to get a head start. These are the tomato plants (regular tomatoes--Early Girl and Better Boy for slicing/sauces; cherry; & yellow grape):

We're also growing green beans, yellow squash, and zucchini from seed:

one of these is also oregano

We're going to grow more vegetables from seed, but we'll plant them later. We also bought plants for our herb garden today:

We love Italian herbs, and in addition to the oregano seeds we planted, we also bought an oregano plant. We plan on having gallons of homemade spaghetti sauce in the freezer to get us through next winter.

We also bought spearmint, basil, and thyme plants. Last year my spearamint plant mysteriously turned brown over night and just died. Not sure what happened, and I'm hoping it doesn't happen again. This is also the first year we're trying to grow thyme.

spearamint

basil

thyme

Finally, check out this angry little peppermint plant. I planted this last year, and not only did it survive the harsh winter (3 blizzards!!!), it has come back strong. It smells soooo good....

Can't wait to try the mint in some dishes.

More vegetables

 

yellow squash

 

zuke squash blossom

 

herbs

green beans (and basil on the right)

 

A bountiful harvest!

An earlier post showed lots of pictures of the tomatoes and peppers we planted.  This one is a tribute to the other things--zucchini, yellow squash, green beans and herbs.