July in the Garden

I returned from Minnesota in late June to find my garden erupting in foliage. The tomatoes have grown to be at least as tall as me and they're now setting fruit.



Particularly beautiful are these tomatoes that I grew from seeds saved from a delicious Italian tomato we ate last summer in Le Marche. The other half of my tomato plants are San Marzano tomatoes, grown from Italian seeds sold in the U.S. There are fewer fruits coming on the plants right now but I'm hoping to use the San Marzano mainly for canning, while the other ones are for eating fresh.



Also looking good are my fabric potato pots. I was intrigued by the concept of filling a container in order to grow potatoes and I've read about growing them in bushel baskets, clay pots, etc. These collapsible fabric pots appealed to me since I can remove the soil after the growing season and store the pots folded flat (don't ask me where I'm going to store all the soil, I haven't figured that out yet). Not all my potato started this year but I think it's mostly the fault of the seed crop and not the new-fangled pots.



In the newly reorganized herb garden.



I put the little clay turtles in the mint pots. Someone else (the little girls next door?) decided they needed to be together and arranged them side-by-side, making their way to the rain barrel...