Good morning to you all. Very cool this morning and we expect the high will be in the very low 80s. Nice and comfortable. I thought I would show a little of what we are getting out of the container gardens. The first picture shows the Zavory peppers. These are among the earliest of them to ripen and there are a lot more on the plants. Small (only about 2 to 2 1/2 inches long) with a bit of a kick and an interesting over all flavor. We used the first two in the first batch of stewed tomatoes. I definitely plant to plant these next year. This is a new hybrid Burpee introduced this year.

All of these came out of the garden either today or yesterday. At the far left are the same three Zavory peppers I showed above and below them is the first of the False Alarm. Those are a very mild jalepeno style pepper. Good flavor without much of the bite. I have grown these for three years now and been very happy with them. Another Burpee hybrid. The white blob at the top is the last of the Dragon's Egg cucumbers. Planted for the first time this year, I will definitely plant them again. Small (about the size of a turkey or goose egg when fully developed), thin skinned and sweet. Mom doesn't care much for cucumbers for the most part but she likes these. Wonderful in salads and we have three pint baggies of the spicy pickles from them. The seeds for these came from Bakers Creek which specializes in heirloom varieties. The red tomatoes are Brandywine an heirloom variety. This is the third year I have planted this variety and this is the best harvest so far. The yellow are Big Rainbow, another heirloom. It is delightfully sweet. Also the third year for this variety. I got the seeds for both from Burpee. The green tomatoes are a mix of Brandywine and Rainbow I picked accidentally while trying to clean up the vines.
These are the Giant Marconi peppers. It is a new variety for me. I got the plant from the local Home Depot and was really surprised at the variety of tomato and pepper plants they carried. The peppers are about 10 inches and were bred to be grilled. We don't grill but the flavor works very well fried with potatoes or put into omelets. Usually you harvest these green but they surprised me. Actually, we really like the flavor of the red ones better than the green. I will keep this variety in mind for rotation in my gardens.

Today I hope to start getting some of the transplanting done. The lemon verbena and rosemary are not hardy for this area so they have to come inside. I need to get the ground cherries out. This was another new plant for me. I got the seeds as a freebee with my seed order from Baker Creek (I think--it may have been Jung's also) so I planted them out of curiosity. According to the descriptions (on line and on the package) the size made the plant an ideal candidate for a container garden--about 2 feet tall with a two foot spread. The fruit does have a slight strawberry flavor--and, for me, the emphasis is on slight. If I want a strawberry flavor I can plant strawberries. So I won't be planting these again. I will be planting strawberries and I found a small blueberry that grows only 2 feet tall with a 2 foot spread. I will put those in instead. That's all for today.