Newbie Gardener: Apologizing and misc Garden

*****I posted this apology letter previously on my family blog*****

I really hate apologizing. It means I was wrong, and I hate to be wrong. But I think that I have to do it this time.

Dear Birds,

I am sorry to have accused you for being the responsible party for the "Great Edamame massacre". I still blame you for all of the missing ripe strawberries, but I think that another guilty party may be to blame for the edamame. During one of my morning garden inspections, I noticed one of the edamame sprouts I had protected from the birds had been "de-seeded" and a little slug was curled up next to it in a food induced coma. Let's just say that slug won't be bothering the garden in the future. So.... maybe it was slugs and birds, because 19 seems like a lot for slugs to accomplish overnight. The edamame seeds I planted in the raised container seem to be doing well, so let's hope that we will be eating fresh edamame beans later this summer.

So please stay away from the strawberries and I'll stop accusing you of eating my edamame seedlings.

Sincerely,

Apologetic Gardener

Well, that was a relief to get off my chest! So here are the plants in containers that are thriving so far.

The edamame are the broad plants in the middle and the others are radishes planted to try and keep up with my son's voracious radish appetite.

Here are the two edamame that survived the first planting.

Don't they look sad? All alone and small?

Well, they have friends close by, a team of burpless cucumbers, a scalloped squash (photo below) and some arugula.

In a container on the patio are these beauties.... Cherokee Purple tomatoes. I am really excited to taste these! They are supposed to have a deeper/richer taste than plain red tomatoes. Yum!

I bought this plant for the hubby, it is a "Tomatoberry" which I hope are very similar to the Strawberry Tomatoes we used to find at Costco. Looks like he will be able to let me know if the plant is a hit or miss very soon.

And this curious guy is my Green Zebra tomato. I'm sure he is very tired of me feeling and prodding daily to see if he is ripe yet. This tomato should be green and yellow when ripe. So I think the feel test may be the only way to see if he's ready.

This little one has 5 female flowers and not a single male in sight. Thankfully there are many more squash in the garden to help out.

We've got some figs growing. Yum, I can't wait to bite into one this summer....

And about 5 grapefruit have set. I know that I really should pinch off the fruit and give the tree a chance to set deep roots, but I just can't. I really want to see these guys grow up to be big grape-fuit!

Well, I put some of the arugula to good use tonight. I had a craving for one of my all time favorite meals: pasta with shrimp, arugula and lemon. It was so nice to be able to come up with a meal plan and walk outside to get some ingredients!