Garden Update, about 7 weeks in.
Tomatoes: The most exciting and amazing growth is here -- I think all but one of the six plants in the bed is taller than me now -- they look like trees! I haven't pulled any suckers, so there are branches growing all over the place, and it's kind of a wild tomato thicket, which I find charming. No ripe tomatoes yet, but all but one plant have fruit. The sungold is definitely way in the lead -- last time I counted was 75 green tomatoes, but it's probably gotten closer up to 100 by now. Sun sugar has many, but still a fraction of the sungold. There are around three big growing green ones on the supersonic, and a similar number of little tiny guys on the brandywine, green zebra, and great white. I'm very very excited for my first ripe sungolds -- they don't look quite the right size yet, so I'm thinking it may be a week or two, but they're moving along well.
Pole Beans (String Beans): My first real produce success -- this guy started producing weeks ago, and hasn't stopped -- I can reliably pick 5-10 beans every few days, and they taste great for snackfood! My only quibble with it is that it was supposed to vine up, and has been more like a very small bush. Seems to have no interest in vining whatsoever. Seems like a very easygoing plant.
Lemon Cucumbers: These guys are going nuts vinewise -- they're vining up the chickenwire, the ivy fence, the tomato cages, and the squash plants. Tons and tons of pretty little yellow flowers all along the vines, both male and female, and lots of new growth. I've been doing hand-pollination when I can, but haven't noticed any fruit growing yet, which has been a tad disappointing.
Pattypan Squash: The plants have grown to absolutely monstrous proportions -- leaves much bigger than my hand. They've kind of been taking over the bed. Lots of male flowers blooming -- huge orangey yellow blooms that last only a day. I've had two females bloom and done hand pollination. The first was a failure, and the second one I can't quite tell yet, but doesn't look terribly promising. Many more female buds on the plants, so I'm hopeful the plant or I will figure it out. I've seen a bee or two in the flowers, which is a great sign, if I screw up its job (:
Eggplant: Unfortunately, the snails and slugs took a strange interest in these guys, and so they are very stunted, and losing the competition for sunlight with the squash. Still alive, though, and I'll let them fight for it.
Sweet Peppers: The three plants in the bed are also suffering from shading by the squash. I have a fair amount of buds and flowers, and one medium size pepper on one plant, along with a handful of very tiny babies. The plants haven't quite been growing as much as I would have wanted. I think next time I'll pinch early buds to get more bush out of the plant.
Blackberry and Raspberry: Both of these are actively producing tons of new foliage (the raspberry in a roughly spherical way, and the blackberry in random enthusiastic shoots), but no flowers or buds. I'm hoping they'll come around again for a fruiting season sometime this summer or early fall. I've heard it sometimes takes a couple years for berries to really get going, though.
Strawberry: The plants have been basically healthy and produced a small number of strawberries, though they were not too sweet. We'll see how the season goes.
Lemon Tree: The lemon tree has produced one flower and has about four buds. It's grown about double since I got it and seemed very pleased with itself. Here's hoping I get a lemon!!
Miniature pumpkins: I grew these guys from seed and they are doing pretty well -- have started producing many many male buds and started flowering -- no females yet, though.
Poblano peppers: Grew these from seed, and they were freakishly slow... but steady. They are little seedlings now, with about two or three sets of smallish true leaves. In a couple weeks, I'll transplant them. Here's hoping they'll have enough time to grow and fruit before the end of the season.