How really effective?

 I mentioned about the new organic methods for warding off aphids in my previous blog and it took about a month since the installation. Today I visited my garden to see how the methods were effective.

 I would like you to compare those 2 photos, the left one showing a tomato tree of other gardener, who has his garden next to mine, with no aluminium foil and silver mulching sheets and the right one my tomato tree with the organic anti-aphid methods.

 I was able to see clear difference between the trees in my garden and I hope you could see that through these photos,,,. The left tree is Tainted with more aphids while my tree have less aphid.

 I make sure that my organic anti-aphid methods are almost effective through the comparison. I'm very happy to ward off aphids but I have a new problem,,,,,,less rain in this rainy season!

This week's harvest

 I'm very happy to see the bumper harvest of summer vegetables but I and my wife are wondering how we can consume them? 

 Anyway, I sliced a cucumber harvested just now and enjoyed the sliced cucumbers with mayonnaise.

Harvesting onions and potatoes

 I mentioned about less rain this rainy season and it may affect the growth of my summer vegetables but sunny days brought me the precious opportunity for harvesting onions and potatoes. It's good to harvest them in a sunny and dry day since rain can perish harvested potatoes and onions. Today I harvested all of purple onions and potatoes.

 The onions leaves falling down to the ground show it's the time to harvest and they are not bolted. They are healthy and in a good shape with shiny purple color. I'll sliced a new purple onion to cook salad with cabbages.

 I'm not satisfied with potatoes since they were smaller than I expected. I think the planting ridge was not wider than the last season so it didn't much space for growing them.

The growth of my summer vegetables

 Now in Japan it's in the mid of "Tsuyu/梅雨", a early-summer rainy season and I and other gardeners were expecting a lot of rain but according to the latest weather report, this rainy season might bring less rain due to rain systems which are pushed down to the south away from Japan. Actually, we have seen no rainy day since the Japan meteorological agency had announced officially the start of the rainy season.

 Due to the less rain than average, I have to visit my garden everyday to water my summer vegetables before going to my office. That kind of routine sounds boring but the fruits of labor like flowers and growing fruits animate me.

 1. Eggplant

2 Cucumbers

3 Green eggplant's flower           4 Tomatoes

5 Basil