The Fun Truly Begins Now! {Garden Update May 2022}
Hello friends! What a spring it has been! Lots going on in my world, but luckily just as the garden is heating up things seem to be slowing down some otherwise. I am thankful for a bit of time this afternoon to put out a quick update as to what’s growing in our backyard haven at the moment. More than anything, I really enjoy having these monthly updates to look back on each year to see how we’ve progressed in our gardening skills and remember what we grew each planting season. Also noting some failures along with the successes!
This time of year starts getting fun in Atlanta for growing. The weather is finally getting consistently warm, so all of my seedlings are really popping. Of course patience is needed since there won’t be much to harvest for at least another month or two, but at least you can definitely see progress since March. As usual, we’ve had to do a few plantings since some items I started early didn’t make it. We have quite a long growing season here, though, so plenty of time to keep sowing for a bit to have fresh produce all summer long.
So let’s see what’s growing…
As you may have noticed in my cover photo, we have peas! Green Beauty Snow Peas to be specific. I planted these towards the middle of March, and happily they made it through a few late cold snaps. We are just starting to see the flowers pop, with lots of peas coming along behind. I only planted six, so these will mostly go to pulling and munching as snacks. They are so crisp and delicious!
Along with a few snow peas, our wee baby strawberries are starting to produce. They won’t give us more than a handful here and there, but again, so sweet and fragrant to enjoy when the pests don’t get to them first. We have already gone picking at the local farm twice for a larger haul. Strawberry season truly is one of my favorite times of year!
Otherwise, most everything is still in the seedling stage or just beyond. Lots of the usual suspects…
Beans. At least three this season, all from last year. A yellow wax bean, soybean and some Borlotto beans.
Tomatoes. Of multiple varieties, though mostly cherry as the smaller sizes tend to work much better in terms of getting a proper harvest. A new one for this season was a Black Strawberry cherry tomato. Because why not try something new?
Pumpkins. I hope. I’ve tried at least two times for pumpkins with no luck in getting a plant to make it to producing fruit, so third time’s the charm, perhaps?
A volunteer. Not quite sure what this baby is–a squash or a cucumber is my early guess. We seem to always have at least one volunteer pop up in the beds or from the compost. There is another volunteer tomato plant that came up between the peas, as well. Sometimes those are the plants that do the best!
Some more squash (including the epic Zucchino Rampicante from last year–just one or two lest I be absolutely inundated again!), cucumbers, watermelon and cantaloupe are also in progress. Using lots of recycled items for seed starting.
In the front yard, our third year fig tree seems to be hale and hearty! Hoping for a good harvest of fresh figs this year. I bought four new fruit trees to add to our collection from a local nursery this year–two plums, a different variety of fig, and a persimmon. We potted all of them before figuring out where to plant them in the yard. A few big pine trees really need to come down at some point before we can really add some more, but I have dreams…
Both of the Au Rosa Plum trees started sprouting new growth pretty quickly after potting, so we have since planted those in the ground. We will need lots of patience for those as it will be anywhere from 3-5 years before we get any fruit. It’s still exciting to have that to look forward to, though! The new fig is finally coming to life, but I’m not sure if the persimmon made it in the shipping. They nursery has a one-year guarantee, so if it doesn’t wake up soon I may request a replacement. I REALLY want persimmons!
Overall, I’m feeling very confident for the season ahead! It is always so rewarding to sprout these little goodies from tiny seeds and nurture them to life. Of course you can’t beat the taste of produce straight from your own soil, but the journey itself is its own reward. I’m sure I’ll be singing a different tune when I’m fighting the critters yet again for ripe fruit, but as long as they share some of the bounty with us, we’ll be doing alright.
What are you planting this year? I always love to continue to learn from others and share in the common joy of digging in the dirt. Or finding yet another recipe to use up that bumper crop of zucchini…
Happy gardening!
