Sunday, August 30, 2009

The flesh of the Israel melon is cream-colored and juicy sweet. This one weighed 7 lbs.; our biggest one was 8 lbs. This has been our most productive year for melons, as we have had six melons from one plant. A couple more have been eaten, either by a mole or the resident rabbit.

We bought the seeds a few years ago at the St. Louis Botanical Garden. They had a good variety of interesting and unusual seeds in the gift shop.

Brandywine tomato and a Pink Grapefruit tomato. There is nothing better than a Brandywine tomato. It is a constant in the tomato garden every year. The Pink Grapefruit is a good tasting tomato, very mild and sweet, low acid flavor.



I think this tomato is a Golden Pineapple. By the time I get them in the house, I have forgotten which plant they came from. It weighted in at 1 1/2 lbs! Wonderful flavor, very juicy. Another constant in our tomato garden is the Snow White Cherry. They are sweet with a slight tartness that is irresistible. One plant is so productive that it is almost impossible to keep all the fruit picked.

The vegetable garden is about to come to an end for the year. The cucumber plants are finished; The squash plants have just a little life left in them. The tomato plants didn't do very well at all this year. They produced a lot of fruit, most of which either got eaten by the rabbit (if I ever catch the little rodent we will be having Hassenfeffer for dinner) or rotted on the vine. Extremely disappointing. We have had about the right amount of rain this year, but it has been rather cool, and I don't think the tomatoes liked the cooler weather at all. It is very discouraging to have seven tomato plants and still not be able to count on have fresh tomatoes everyday. Only the Snow White is doing well, but still not as well as it should be. Next year I will probably put chicken wire around the tomato patch. Hopefully I can find a way to make it look semi-attractive for they sake of the neighbors. I just can't have half my tomatoes get eaten by rabbits. They can have all the cucumbers they want, but the tomatoes are mine!

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