By Darlene Clausen

We’ve been busy in the garden trying new ways to keep plants growing. We have been able to send a bit of produce every week to the CommUnity Food Bank. Take a look at what a week’s donation looks like.  Most weeks we send zucchini, patty pan squash, a variety of herbs, Swiss Chard, and peppers. 

One week we were able to send plums. There weren’t a lot of plums this year but they were very tasty. Our garlic harvest was good. We will save the best to replant this fall and give the rest to the food bank. The sweet potato blossoms are really pretty. It is easy to see that sweet potatoes and morning glories are in the same family.

We had a deer visit.  She really liked the morning glories, beans, beets, carrots and pretty much everything except herbs and lettuce! It only takes an evening to devour all the morning glories. They come back okay though.

We tried shade cloth over the eggplant as they were baking in the sun. It was a fun project. Intern Celeste Ptak had some antique poles to loan and Intern Angela Lambertz used her sewing skills to make a nice sailcloth that helped protect the plants. 

Fence work was halted in July due to heat. During that time, we realized we had trapped a bunny in the garden. He’s been growing by eating beans and carrots. We were able to get one harvest of beans before they were completely eaten. We’ve tried chasing him out with the gate open but he just zips by the gate. He is getting bigger! 

Our repaired gate looks nice but a bit more work is needed to keep it closed without using a brick stop in front of it. 

We plan to resume work on the fencing the first week of September. We’ll start on the west side of Grandma’s Flower Garden and work our way to the front as the blooms die down. The gate needs a little engineering to stay closed. Some days it opens by itself. Fortunately, the west side fence is in good shape and only needs scraping and painting. There is a post to replace at the gate, maybe that’s why it sometimes falls open. We can hope the gate is tight enough to stay closed once the post is replaced. Once Grandma’s is complete, we will install the new post in the Wildflower Garden.

Images from Friendly’s Garden at Plum Grove include harvests, the garden gate and sail cloth cover for shade. Photos courtesy of Friendly’s Garden volunteers.

Images from Friendly’s Garden at Plum Grove include harvests, the garden gate and sail cloth cover for shade.