Mid-Summer Garden Update – How’s 2023 Going So Far

It’s the beginning of August and I figured it is about time for a mid-summer garden update. I want to show you what’s growing well and producing in addition to what’s going bad.

It can be kind of misleading when you see all these pristine garden photos and updates on Instagram or in website posts. Everything looks like it is flourishing and beautiful without insect damage or diseased leaves in sight!

Well, I’m here to tell you and reassure you that isn’t real life no matter what they say! Gardening has its share of ups and downs, and I guarantee that not all of your plants will be growing the way you hoped. It’s just part of the process.

I like to ask, “Are you even a gardener if you haven’t killed a plant (or two)?” It doesn’t matter if you have been gardening for 20 years or for 2, you will still have failures along with your successes. As hard as it can be, you just have to learn to go with the flow and try again next year.

So to show you my failures and successes, I’m taking you on a “walk” around my garden and talking about how things are going as of the beginning of August on the semi homestead – The good and the ugly both!

My Mid-Summer Garden Update

For a quick background, we live in Illinois and are in Growing Zone 5b. Like many of you, we have had our share of good and bad weather. Of late, it has been extremely hot temperatures and a lack of desperately needed rain. I do hand water, so that helps some but the hot temps are taking a toll on the foliage and bloom production.

The Bad

Let’s start with the bad parts of my mid-summer garden update and get that over with, shall we? (If you want to see our garden issues from last year, check out, “The 2022 Garden Failures and Losses“.)

The Bunny

We have always had to watch out for critters where we live. We basically have timber on three sides of our property and are in a very rural community (we live on the outskirts of a small town).

Normally, we only have to worry about raccoons and deer coming in and destroying the sweet corn/popcorn. The coons and the squirrels also like to dig through my mulch, especially during the fall.

I have always had three strands of poly wire going around the garden and a solar electric fence charger to help with that issue and deter critters. We actually leave it on almost year-round until winter freezes the ground. (Here’s the wire I use – Product Link: Zareba Polywire.)

Unfortunately, the three strands and the gaps between them didn’t stand a chance against a tiny baby bunny that decided to take up residence in my garden this year. It was so small it could’ve fit in the palm of my hand at first. (Cute but definitely unwanted!)

At first, I wasn’t too concerned but then my kale started getting nibbled on. Then my green beans. Then my dill went missing. Until recently, I was seeing rabbit trails all over my garden. I felt like Mr. McGregor and Peter Rabbit with all I’ve done to try to keep the little guy out!

Well, long story short, I added more and more strands of poly wire. As of the first of August, it seems to be enough and has been keeping the bunny out. (I’ll update you with my end-of-season garden post in a few months though!)

Green Beans – Mid-Summer Garden Update

I tried growing two different varieties of green beans this year. I normally always grow Blue Lake bush green beans and they produce excellent all summer long. Last year, I was even harvesting late into the fall without issues of blemishes or pests!

But this year, I decided to try Contender beans as well as Tri-Color beans and skip the Blue Lake variety altogether. Both new varieties germinated well and had a great stance. However, they gave me such a tiny harvest.

I know the main issue was likely that darn bunny because I had several half-eaten beans, multiple ones totally gone, and hardly any blooms. We’re talking like ten blooms for 50+ plants. (The little pest even ate a bean right in front of me while I was trying to chase it out once! The nerve!)

Whether the bunny was eating the blooms or not is unknown for sure, but I decided to cut my losses and pulled out all of the plants. I went back to my old trusty variety and planted new blue lake seeds around July 20th.

They have germinated well but you can see in the photo above that once again, the bunny ate the first leaves off of several of the plants (it looks worse today as of writing this post). Hopefully, they’ll come out of it and the bunny FINALLY stays out of the garden. Fingers crossed!

Tomato Death Row

I had three miscellaneous tomato plant varieties planted in the back of my garden that have slowly one by one started to dry out and die. I have no clue what went wrong.

They were all three different varieties and all three have died the same way. (The third one is on its way out now but is still producing a tiny bit.) I pulled the first two tomato plants in early July and added mini pumpkin seeds in their place. Hopefully, the issue isn’t with the soil, but who knows?

Onions

I seem to struggle with onions every year for one reason or another. They don’t grow big no matter where I plant them and the leaves always flop over way too early.

I need to do more research on how to grow them properly or find a better source for my onion sets or something. I’ll keep trying and give it another go next year since we do eat a lot of onions in our house. (If you have any tips or suggestions on what I’m doing wrong, PLEASE let me know! I’m all ears!)

Zucchini – Mid-Summer Garden Update

These plants have been both good and bad. We’ve gotten an ok harvest off of the 8 plants I originally planted. I’ve also been able to control the squash bugs mostly by checking them almost daily.

However, I’ve already had to pull one plant because I think bacterial wilt got it. One day it was fine, the next it was dead. The others seem ok so far, but look a little worse for wear since I have been trimming off the dead leaves (also to keep the powdery mildew from getting worse). Unfortunately, they have pretty well stopped producing at this point.

I do have several new plants started and placed here and there throughout the garden as well as “teenager” plants starting up as well. Hopefully, those will take off and start to produce more female blooms so we can have another harvest toward the end of summer/early fall. Zucchini is one of my favorite vegetables to eat!

Broccoli

While I was really hoping this one was going to work, the heat got the better of this crop. My broccoli was late getting transplanted and then I think it became stressed due to the high daytime and nighttime temperatures. They are only producing one tiny head in the middle of each plant.

While I haven’t done it yet, I will likely pull these guys and try sowing from seed again in hopes of a more successful late-season harvest. We’ll see. I loved using my galvanized buckets to grow them though!

The Good – Mid-Summer Garden Update

Alright, now that the “failures” are done with, let’s quickly talk about the good parts of the garden.

Most Tomato Plants

While they have been very slow to mature and ripen, the other tomato plants are all doing well. I even have two pink brandywine plants that I grew from seeds I saved from the last gardening season growing well and producing!

The indeterminate heirlooms aren’t producing a ton, but the fruit that is growing looks beautiful and is decent sized. I’m hoping to start canning and preserving all of the varieties soon.

Peppers

All of the peppers are doing well and producing. The bell peppers aren’t the biggest I’ve grown, but they are still good enough for freezing and preserving. The banana peppers, nadapeno peppers, and mini bell peppers are all going nuts this year.

Cucumbers

Another crop that has been slow to ripen but still looks beautiful is the slicing and pickling cucumbers. I am finally starting to get enough cukes to pickle, and the plants themselves still look mostly healthy. I planted a second round of pickling cucumbers where our peas were growing, so hopefully we can have even more late-season cucumbers to pickle and eat fresh in a month or so.

Popcorn – Mid-Summer Garden Update

I have five different varieties of popcorn and all seem to be doing well. The leaves have been curling lately due to the hot weather, but they are coming out of it fine when nighttime hits. We also have a few starting to tassel, so that’s always exciting!

Rhubarb

We finally moved our rhubarb plant to a new location in the garden, and it seems to be much happier! It’s growing well but we only harvested from it once this year since it was just relocated this spring and we want to give it time to adjust and become established.

Potatoes

The potatoes have been harvested and did decent. I always keep them in grow bags. While we don’t harvest a lot, they are still a fun crop to plant and consume. The grow bags have been cleaned up and put away for the year and the potatoes are currently curing in our basement.

Garlic

The garlic did excellent this year! I harvested it around mid-June and the cloves on some of them are massive! It’s our second year using the same hardneck seed. Each year it should just get better and better as it adapts to our soil and growing conditions. We enjoyed lots of garlic scapes prior to harvesting and have been using the cloves here and there for cooking. I plan on saving the biggest and best cloves for planting in the fall.

Flowers – Mid-Summer Garden Update

Even though some of my zinnias didn’t germinate, the others are doing well and pushing out flower after flower. The sunflowers are short but that is because I purchased dwarf varieties this year since we typically have strong winds in this area that can make the taller ones take a beating. The lantana, snapdragons, marigolds, phlox, portulaca, and strawflowers are also doing well and adding beautiful color to the garden space.

Alright, I think I’ve hit the main parts of the garden at least! We have a few other crop varieties that I haven’t mentioned, and they are either doing ok or are just there (like our strawberry patch and herbs). Neither great nor bad.

Hopefully, this little mid-summer garden update shows you that gardening isn’t perfect and some years you have great success while the next will be a fail. Just be sure to not give up and try again next year! Stay tuned for the final garden update that will likely be posted around late fall.

Until next time, thanks for stopping by!
– Chelsea

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