It's a jungle out there! In about a week the bronze fennel will be towering over everything else and all the sage will be in full bloom. The roses (mostly rugosas and heirloom varieties) are just starting to blossom. The peas are blooming. Might have some to eat in a couple weeks. Not much growth on the tomatoes, but they look good. A few cabbages have been chewed on by the slugs, but mostly they are surviving. I'm guessing in about a month I'll have enough raspberries to eat all I want, preserve all I want and still share. Raspberries have pretty much entered weed status in the garden. It's, well, a jungle.
And then there is the container collection. The potatoes in the garbage can got ahead of me. The can is about 3/4 full of compost. These are by far my healthiest looking potatoes. It will be very interesting to see how many potatoes it produces.
My cut-and-come-again lettuce is ready to cut in two places. Salads will be featured prominently on the menu this week. The wash tub also has some carrots and strawberries. After the lettuce is cut a second time, something different will be planted in this space that will give the carrots room to mature.
The other hanging basket has cucumbers in it (these are organic starts that I bought). My goal here is to remember to water them frequently and to keep pests out of the cucumbers. Last year something (a mouse?) hollowed out a couple of the cucumbers completely. The cucumbers will get plenty of sun this way too.
One thing I want to keep track of with the cucumbers is cost effectiveness. I'm figuring $3.50 for the start of this project (1.50 for the starts and 2.00 for the organic potting soil). The basket is being reused from last year so I'm not going to figure that in. I'm going to water the cucumber with water saved from waiting for the water to heat up for dishes or collected rain water, so water won't be included in expenses either. What I want to do is compare how much my basket produces against how much it would cost to buy the equivalent amount from the farmer's market or the grocery store.
As for the jungle, there are six crops that are visible (apples, rhubarb, potatoes, fennel, garlic, plums) plus 6 more that aren't (strawberries, beans, tomatoes, a tomatillio, raspberries and roses), and two spaces cleared in the back for where a patch of corn and a couple sunflowers are going to go and a space for the hull-less pumpkins.
My corner of the world is approaching our drought season. About two to three months of little rain fall. Over the last couple years I’ve been experimenting with how much water the garden really needs. I try to reserve water for new shrubs and perennials that have been planted the current year, plants in containers, and vegetables/fruits that need water to grow. 
