In the Fall Garden

I made my way out to the garden yesterday to check in with the summer survivors and the baby fall things, and I came away with a happy heart and a full basket!

My marigolds are exploding everywhere we intentionally- and accidentally- planted seeds, and my bees have taken notice. There were multiple bees on each plant, and sometimes multiple bees on each flower! I love how focused they are when they're foraging... I was able to be within inches of them with my camera and they didn't take any notice.

Amazingly, I have one watermelon vine that's still trying to produce, and there's a baseball-sized baby out there now. I'm not sure if it'll be ripe before we get a frost, but no matter it's status my chicken girls will be glad it tried! There's a lemon cucumber attempting the same feat, but those babies are grape-sized, so who knows?

My new fall stars are currently French breakfast radishes, elephant garlic, and cabbage. They're all poking their fresh leafy faces out of their mulched beds with vigor, and we've even been able to harvest a few things already!

Oh, and did I mention my gnarly, summer-worn tomato plants...?

Along with a few peppers, my tomatoes have definitely won the prize for Best Summer Survivors, and we're hauling them in again, too (though much smaller ones compared to the summer generation). I'm having to pick them right at the first sign of blush, though, because the (curse word curse word) mocking birds are pecking at them as soon as they get any color.

The only bummer out there right now is the infested eggplants, which might just have to be cut out to rid us of the plague of leaf-footed stink bugs they're housing.

I get the heebie-jeebies every time I walk by. They're just awful right now.

I did one more check-in yesterday while I was out- Penny Hen is still sitting on those eggs! Look at that stink-eye she gave me when I peeked in at her:

The poor girl is looking so pale and dry, I hope something hatches from those eggs soon. She is one dedicated mama. She let me rub her face a little and she ate a few bites of baby cabbage leaves before she remembered she was supposed to be growling and displeased.

Aaaaaand that's the status of things around these parts.

Hatch, little ones, hatch!