Some August Lunches in Pictures
Category: Tomatoes
Today’s Harvest
August
First Tomato of 2025
It is a Stupice, yay! Tomato season has officially started. I also harvested my first (pickling) cucumber today.
Communal Bed Update
Yesterday was the last cool-ish day before we are now entering a stretch of days with temperatures in the 90s and mid/upper 80s, so I decided to sort of finalize the preparations for the outside communal flower bed. I spent three hours weeding, sowing (annual & perennial wildflower mix and cosmos), transplanting, and mulching with salt marsh hay. I still have some seedlings that will go in this bed, mainly zinnias and okra.
This year, the bed will look different. We sadly won’t have as many dahlias as last year, and we had to remove the blueberry bush as it had died (probably from overwatering, or from dog traffic …). The walking-path section of the bed is planted with Black-eyed Susans, lavender, many annuals (calendula, hibiscus, nasturtium, zinnias, cosmos, wildflower mix, sweet alyssum, celosia, okra) and a few dahlias. There also is Swiss chard, and a volunteer squash or cucumber, that I transplanted. Most of the plants are still tiny.
In the narrow center part of the bed, we planted tomatoes, hot peppers and several types of basil. The tomatoes are all cherry types, which will make it easier for the neighborhood to enjoy. There is also a healthy sage plant, anise hyssop, marigolds, and a tall yellow-flowering perennial (a donation of which I do not know the name). Towards the fence, we planted two types of climbers.
The perennials corner close to the street is looking really good. Everything came back vigorously, and the Corepsis and Bluestar are flowering. The perennials are interplanted with strawflowers and sweet alyssum, and the calendula self-sowed and will show up in patches throughout the bed.
June Lull
Just five days until the official beginning of summer, and things have been slow in the garden. The weather has been cycling from the mid-60s to the upper 80s back to the low 60s, which has been stressing the plants, so everything seems to grow slower. Nevertheless, the plants are getting bigger, the zucchini is starting to flower, and I have my first summer flowers – self-seeding Calendula (also known as pot marigold). Those happy little flowers will bloom until the first frost.
The lettuces have been benefiting from the cold weather. The tomatoes, cucumbers, peppers and basil not so much. In fact, I lost all but one of my slicing cucumber plants. Not sure what happened there. It is going to be warm again starting in two days, with temperatures predicted to be in the mid-90s early next week. I hope the plants can tolerate those changes.
All Planted
This morning, I (almost) finished planting my plot. Everything is now in the ground, except the sweet potatoes and okra (I will wait a few more days), and I still have to sow flowers and cilantro. I planted 5 cucamelon plants, 5 pickling cucumbers, 4 slicing cucumbers, 1 zucchini, 4 delicata squash and 3 butternut squash. I also planted two jalapenos, which were a gift. The Sweet Thai basil was planted in between the lettuce seedlings, and the Siam Thai basil along the border of my bed, next to the tomatoes. I also moved some calendulas to different spots in the plot, staked the tomatoes and secured the plants to the stakes with garden velcro. I harvested a handful of strawberries, yay! Usually the slugs, birds or pill bugs get there before I do.
2025 Garden Plot
This morning, I planted my tomatoes (11 plants total, 8 varieties). I interplanted them with Italian basil (6 plants) and marigolds (5 plants). I also sowed nasturtium (Alaska Red Shades). I still have to plant the Thai basil, leeks, curcubites and flowers (strawflowers, gomphrena) as well as sow cilantro and flowers (borage, cosmos, zinnias, more nasturtium). I also harvested my two overwintered leeks. The rhubarb is still going strong (three harvests so far), the garlic looks great and the shallots are coming up as well.
The Blighted Mildew
Today, I started my cucumbers, squash and cucamelons: four slicing cucumbers, six pickling cucumbers, two zucchini, three butternut, three delicata squash, and a six-pack of cucamelons. I always plant two seeds per cell (except for the zucchini), and thin them after germination to leave the strongest one. I won’t need as many seedlings as I started, and I plan to give away any extras.
Over the past few years, I have been battling fungal diseases in my garden plot, specifically mildew with the cucumbers and zucchini. The cucumbers in particular have been succumbing early in the summer to disease. So, over the winter, I did some research on disease-resistant varieties and decided to only plant mildew-resistant curcubites this year. By selecting resistant varieties, I hope to extend the harvesting season. For slicing cucumbers, I went with Diva; for pickling cucumbers with Max Pack. Both are resistant to downy mildew and powdery mildew. For Zucchini, I went with Costata Romanesca, a striped Italian heirloom that is resistant to powdery mildew. For winter squash, I opted for Waldo butternut and Bush Delicata, both resistant to powdery mildew.
I also looked into the tomatoes I am planting this season. Three of the eight varieties that will go in my plot are resistant to several diseases: Stupice (late blight), Black Krim (unspecified “disease resistance”), Green Zebra (late blight, Septoria leaf spot). So is Mountain Magic, a cherry tomato I am growing for the communal bed, which is resistant to early and late blight as well as several types of fusarium wilt and other fungal diseases.
