![083010Butternut](http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4102/4942072785_a3524f70a0.jpg)
The funny thing is that I never intentionally planted any. The composted alpaca manure I used to fill the raised beds for raspberry and sweet potato just happened to have some squash remains that had been thrown on the pile. So I ended up with three totally unplanned vines that have spread over a big chunk of the sideyard and over the compost pile. This one is growing between the slats of one of the pallets we have to enclose the compost.
![083010Squash02](http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4081/4942074313_5bdfd7e092.jpg)
Not quite sure how I'm going to cut it out of there. And then there's the third variety.
![083010Squash03](http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4139/4942661100_8f11e83023.jpg)
I also have a little stand of sunflowers that I think were planted by our resident chipmunk.
![083010Sunflowers](http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4078/4942662110_909f8016bf.jpg)
One crop I did plant that's been going at it gangbusters are my crowder peas. The description says they "have a tendency to vine in rich soils". Apparently my soil is very rich! They've been rather Jack-and-the-beanstalk-ish, and it's been sort of a constant effort to keep them trained up the rather strained poles I put up, rather than sprawling all over the walkway. I've already saved some early seeds for next year and expect I should have a decent little crop for eating by the end of season.
![083010Crowder_peas](http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4118/4942077357_a9d91b743f.jpg)
My tomato plants are also loaded with green tomatoes. I set them out a bit later than planned, so they've needed time to catch up, but I'm expecting they'll ripen up before frost hits. Long season crops are always a bit of a challenge here, but being by the ocean and having a south-facing hillside keeps us effectively as a USDA zone 7 microclimate, even though we're nominally zone 5 or 6, depending on which version of the map you reference. Since that designation only looks at minimum winter temps, though, we still run into the issue of a short season, but as with knitting, it's more about the process for me than the final product.
10 comments:
I too love that gardening is more about process than about eating - that's why we aren't frustrated or disturbed when there grows very little that's actually for the table. I love to water, plant, watch, look after, trim, and then whether or not they fruit tends to be of little concern.
I hope I didn't harm your harvest by reading this post. I have such a black thumb that I can kill plants just by looking at their photos! Sorry!
Love the photos!! Makes me wish I had gotten a little more gardening done this season but our weather was super-funky, broke both cold- hot-weather records. In the meantime, though, I can enjoy your hard work!
Squashes are such volunteers... but if you have the room, it's a good thing!
I do not like it when squash surprises me. I want to know when the squash is lurking about. I like crowder peas, though. They are welcome to sneak in any old time!
The restaurant I used to work at [read as: cry in the bathroom at] makes amazing butternut squash soup. They drizzle some brown butter on that shit, top it off with a twist of sage and then pour it down my fat gob until I become completely engorged and vomit it on the customerz.
So funny about the squash! I always thought you needed a kickstart on the season by buying plantlets. Not so much from what you are showing.
The best volunteer I ever had was a mini pumpkin that grew up the mulberry tree. It was so cool to find those little pumpkins hanging in a tree.
This summer seems to have been a good one for squash. We love Butternut squash and plant it every year but had a bumper crop this year.
We are also big fans of plant it and see gardening. Seeds are pretty cheap. This year we got a lot of musk melons, for example (though some years they don't fruit)
Your photos are inspiring me to go to the farmer's market.
That's a good looing butternut squash. What a happy accident : ).
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