June 14th, 2017

Planting is nearly accomplished! There are just a few more flowers to put in the ground, and the rest of the runner beans. However, my garden has been having a mysterious visitor the past several nights. Almost every morning I find several transplants dug up and either buried or left there on the ground. When it first happened to my runner beans, I suspected turkeys, as the ground looked like it had been scratched. But now that it has also happened in the flower garden right outside my bedroom window, I'm not so sure! Whatever it is, I'm not feeling too friendly towards it right now!
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The vegetable garden from the doorway of the greenhouse...it looks a little better than that since I weeded it!

Other than the nightly visitor, the vegetable garden has been doing very well. I am very happy that I haven't yet seen any signs of cucumber beetles on the cucumbers or squash. They were very bad the past 2 years. I will be harvesting lettuce today for the first time.

New England Sugar Pie pumpkin

Pumpkins

Tendergreen Burpless cucumbers

Peppers

We had a little bit of wind on Sunday! Besides ripping the plastic off the greenhouse door (which was soon fixed), the wind ripped out a few of my sunflower plants. 

The tulips are pretty much done now. Some of them are still holding on to their petals, but they look like they've been baked (which they have-it was 91 a few days ago!).
I didn't plan it this way, so it's kinda funny that all the flowers coming into bloom now are either blue or purple (along with a few white lupines and Bridal Veil Spirea)! Irises, mountain bluet, forget-me-nots (they are still in bloom but rather past their prime), lilacs, columbine, evening dames rocket, lupine, chives, and comfrey! The evening dame's rocket is very fragrant on cool evenings. 

Lilacs

Bridal Veil Spirea

Columbine

Evening Dames Rocket

Iris

Comfrey

Lupines

Chives

This is the view that greets me coming around from the side of the house. The garden is still best viewed from the sides right now because of the blank areas in the middle where the anuuals haven't filled out enough yet. I want to plant more biennials there this year and just tuck the annuals in so it will be full all season next year.

From the other side...

Flowers on the mountain ash tree in front of my vegetable garden.

Buds on my Benjamin Franklin peony after a shower...

Comfrey...I'm thinking about planting several more along the back of the garden. They are almost  indestructable, and anything else I plant there gets beat up by the wind (the sunflowers, for example).

The hyacinth beans are planted under the bean arbor, along with trailing nasturtiums that I hope will grow out across the path in imitation of Monet's Grand Allee! Other than that, I haven't planted anything there, and am planning to focus on improving the soil this summer. I'm very seriously considering turning this whole area into a  second vegetable garden, but with some flowers and shrubs added, too. I'd really like to plant lilac bushes at the entrance. 

I can hardly wait to see the Apricot Beauty foxgloves in bloom!

And now it's back to work for me. Have a great day in your gardens!