Left: the garden on July 10th

When plants have good soil and steady water (well, and the expert care of Ryan Casey, our test garden coordinator), they can grow like  fairytale beanstalks. That’s what seems to be going on in our feast garden recently. A few weeks ago, it was just making do, inching along, and then Ryan put in the long-awaited gentle drip-irrigation system and—ka-bang. It was off to the races. The sight of our garden, after several days of not seeing it, was downright thrilling. The once-puny melons now carpet the ground. The pattypan squashes have leaves as big as baby elephant ears, with small bright yellow squashes clustering underneath. Teeny cucumbers are poking out from the  plant’s stems like toddlers behind their mother’s knees. The potatoes seem practically possessed, using the energy stored in their big starchy seeds (actually whole small potatoes) to explode up out of their trench. The corn is up to my knee. I can’t believe it’s all a 3-minute walk from my desk…more proof that California can be paradise.

Here’s what the garden looked like on June 15.

Left to right: row of edamame; row of squash (corn is off the right); row of yukon gold potatoes.

Here it is on July 10.

Left to right: Edamame (with chiles in background); squash and corn; yukon gold potatoes.