July Garden Update

Didn't I just write an update for June?! Time really flies during the summer. Most of my produce is doing great: Some of the plants are dying, like some of the corn and beans. The plants in general need more food. I recently bought some more Fish Fertilizer and Kelp Meal. One big mistake I made this season was expanding the garden spaces without really planning for the amount of nutrients I would need. I just started some compost piles and called it good.

Therefore, I ended up doing a lot of pheno hunting: aka killing all of the plants that are undesirable. For example, a lot of the corn wasn't tall enough. You can tell at this point already that the final product will be underdeveloped. Below is the tallest stalk of corn, which as already highly developed. I planted 3 types of ornamental corn. I kept plants from all 3 stains, but the red corn is growing best. I had to pheno hunt the Quinoa anyways, because the seeds are so tiny. This is my new favorite type of plant to photograph because it's so beautiful. The Quinoa strain I grew also has lots of variation, so it's fun to pheno hunt and take photographs of. Below are some photographs of Quinoa plants that I am growing in the backyard raised beds. Which phenotype looks the best? Quinoa is a self pollinator: It has tiny flowers that pollinates itself. The grains are small, bead-like spheres.

Here are a few cannabis plants that I haven't shown in a while. They are clones that I got from a recreational grow. I call them the fab four. They aren't as tall as the plant I showed in my last post [@ferngully/taming-the-beast] but they are looking healthy and more of a large bush shape. I have the label for the plant names around here somewhere. I am very happy with these plants because I bought some clones late into the growing season and they weren't doing well. Look at the difference between the plants when they were younger!
[@ferngully/can-i-save-my-cannabis-plants]

There isn't much else to report. I wish there were more vegetables growing, but I had problems with my greenhouse and I tried a few new types of plants that didn't work out like carrots and tobacco. I honestly believe that it's so windy here that every tiny type of seed I tried to plant blew away. I also planted a few things too late in the season. The onions, garlic and potatoes are doing well. I have some pole beans that are growing vigorously up the property fence [below].
Last but not least, I would like to show my Sweet Potato plants. Did you know that sweet potato plants aren't related to "regular" potatoes? They are part of the morning glory family. You can tell they are different once you grow them. The color is completely different: More of a purple-ish green hue. They also have a more heart shaped leaf. This is my new favorite plant to grow. Growing up, there was a Burger joint near my house I would go to with some school friends. They had the best tasting side dishes ever including deep fried mushrooms and sweet potato fries. That's how I fell in love with sweet potatoes. They are easy to grow, just plant whole potatoes into the ground.