It’s been a couple of weeks since the last Garden Update, and things have been moving right along. As we approach the end of July, the garden is beginning to yield more and more.

We’ve been harvesting and eating strawberries, lettuce and radishes for  quite awhile now. The strawberries have tapered off for the moment, but the salad items are still going strong. Added to the mix now are Gentry Summer Squash, Green Beans and we even got some cauliflower, both white and purple from the first planting.

This was the first try with DePurple Cauliflower, and it’ll be the last. While it looks nice raw, once cooked it looks very ugly on the plate. Seeing as it tastes no different than white, we’ll stay with the regular stuff going forward. So I’ve got nine DePurple seedlings here for anyone who wants them. Hah!

The onions are looking like they’ll be the next harvest of note. There are two beds of New York Early yellow and a single bed of Rossa Di Milano red onions. We planted about 100 seedlings per bed, and most of them made it this far. The yellow onions are ahead of the red by a couple weeks, so they’ll be the first ones out. Here’s how they look now compared to when they were planted as seedlings in May:

It’s amazing how something that starts out so small grows this large in such a short time!

Onion lore recommends that when the green stalks of half of the crop fall over, the grower should complete the job and fold over any remaining upright stalks. Then after waiting a few days, it’s harvest time. Some folks pull up the bulbs and leave them in windrows on the beds for a few days, but I don’t. As soon as they’re out of the soil I lay them out on cloth tarps in the basement for several weeks to cure for long-term storage. I’ll document this procedure later in the year.

All of the other plants in the garden are doing very well, and there’s a full complement (15) of new Green Magic broccoli plants sprouting and developing their first true leaves. Here’s a slideshow of photos taken July 24th:

Last weekend I cleaned out and reset the bed that had the early cauliflower crop. I think I’m going to try direct seeding cauliflower there, and leave some room for a couple cabbage plants. Then, once the onions are out, those three beds will be reset for the cauliflower, broccoli and Brussels sprouts seedlings that are in process. Here’s how those seedlings look at the moment:

More updates to follow- things will be happening pretty quickly now. Thanks for stopping by!