Unusually warm winter, very dry spring, and rainy beginning of summer did a number on the garden. Plants are much smaller than they should be at this time of the year, especially seedling plants which have been practically dormant all through June. Few warmer days are interrupted with quick and strong rain periods which drop our morning temperatures below 10°C. With this kind of temperature, every warm liking vegetable is struggling. Luckily there are plenty of vegetables that like colder and rainy weather so the harvest period started almost as usual.
Orchard has been surprisingly good and there are plenty of fruits. The harvests started with cherries, red currants, and raspberries and are followed by blackberries and plums that have just started to ripe.
Blackberries have been giving us around 5 kilos every 2 days and we should get around 40-50kilos in total. The amount is a bit smaller due to the lower fruit count on the second net, but the front first one is doing excellent and giving big fruits.
Another vegetable that has been growing excellent is lettuce. It might seem weird to some gardeners but growing lettuce can be a real challenge here. In “normal” summer conditions our daily temperatures can reach up to 38-40°C. In these conditions, there are very few lettuce varieties that can form heads before they start growing flowers and seeds. Usually, they are some Italian and Mediterranean varieties while others start growing flowers on seedlings.
This is why I usually sow lettuce in very thick rows and pull it out while it’s still small. This way I can be sure it will not form seeds. This year it’s different. Lettuce is growing like mad, especially on the shaded parts of the garden and I’ve been harvesting it for over a month now. I even got some lettuce from my unexpected veg box, it’s completely healthy and very delicious.
Brassicas are also growing nicely, especially kale. Curled and Nero di Toscana kale have been a great addition to the garden and became my must-have vegetable. I’ve already harvested them 4 times this year and so far I got around 4 kilos in leaves, which is a huge amount considering that there are no leftovers from the baby leaves, everything is edible and there will be plenty to harvest.
There have also been some chard, carrots, kohlrabi, peppers, and cucumbers, most of them have just started and haven’t been producing many fruits yet so I’m hoping they will give more fruits soon.
Beans have been excellent this year, bush beans and pole beans gave me 3 harvests already, each over a kilo. All of the bean varieties have been great, no variety has been falling behind, all are blooming and growing many fruits.
The last harvest I did yesterday was pretty big. I’ve harvested kilo of different types of lettuces (Quattro stagioni, Dalmatinska ledenika, and a mix of chicory), 500gr of kale leaves, 3 kilos of blackberries, 2 kilos of beans, few baby carrots(thinning out the carrot bed with the needed amount), few cucumbers, peppers, kohlrabi, and a couple of plums and strawberries.
I already know that tomato, pepper, and cucumber harvests will be poor this year. I’m also not hoping for any zucchinis but I guess beans, lettuce and kale will make up for the other vegetables.
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