How's your garden harvest?

Started taking gardening seriously 9 years ago and this is the worst year yet. Lucky we were not counting on it to survive or all the deer on the property would have been shot this year. We had a warmer summer than normal and you would think that would be good for growing, but all of the plants matured very slow and did not produce the normal amounts. Water was not an issue. Talked to other people around here and they all say the same thing. Anyone have an explanation of what's going on???

 

We had the best year ever for green beans and a good crop of sweet corn. Potatoes were Okay but not real big. Got a few accidental Melons that came back from last season. Im not sure there is any over all problem. Some people did well others did not. KF

 

My garden did not produce like usual, I know it was not water either, just possibly too darn hot. Tomato's are producing again, and I'm still pulling jalapeno's out. All my cucumber, bean & bell peppers succumbed to a mole. Don't know why, but this year I could not keep the moles out of my yard/garden.

 

Corn did not come in. Potatoes about 200 lbs, onions 20 lbs, carrots 70 lbs, some squash, pumpkin, 40 lbs tomatoes, cucumbers, broccoli not our best year. Weather started off really bad.

 

Have you tried giving your garden a sun shade? Just get the rolled plastic at HD (I use the same pieces I have cut to protect the plants from frost) and some 1x1 wood (cheap bundle at HD) stick 8 foot 1x1 in the ground and staple plastic to boards.... gives them plenty of filtered sun while keeping them cooler. I live at 1800' and the sun can bake my garden 115*, all my bell peppers were burning. Then I learned this trick!

 

I had an interesting 2012 garden. This was my 5th year doing a garden, yet was home the least amount of time. It showed. It also was year I rotated what I grew in each bed. Tomatoes 30#, Bell Peppers 20# Egg Plant 15# Onion #25, Strawberries 5# (had mold issue), 20 heads lettuce, Peas 2#, String Beans 2# (don't know what I'm doing wrong with them yet) Artichoke 0# (grew just nothing produced) 6 Sunflower (birds ate), 8 Cantaloupe, 2 Watermelon (the deer ate the rest), had 24 stalks of corn, (were doing great...then the water malfunctioned while I was gone and they died) 34 lime (3 year old tree) 1 lemon (1 year old tree) and tons of herbs. New trees this year, apple, peach, pomegranate, tangerine, orange, blueberries, & cherry (I think died, damnDeer )

2013: learning to prune plants to get maximum size in yield, not letting them grow wild as big as they can get... and my working my new "greenhouse"

 

guess this is where i belong ---so far I'm still getting greens-mustard,turnip,collard,kale,arugla and broccoli rab -ganning mixed greens and air drying some to put in my soup starter

 

Evil artichokes can take a couple years to produce. Put hay over the plant and let it winter over they will come back in spring if the roots dont freeze. Put metal fence posts in a triangle and use wire fence around the fruit tree's so the deer dont eat them. I have the same problem with deer and elk.