Your cabbage and artichoke plants look positively wonderful, Xuan! They must love the humidity! I can hardly believe the cabbage is forming heads already! My veggie seeds, besides the radishes, haven't even made an appearance yet! We've gotten plenty of rain, but the raised beds dry out faster than the ground, what with all the wind we've gotten lately... they needed to be watered yesterday, for the first time this season. Due to the different soil types in different garden areas, some beds are still a bit muddy while others are beginning to dry out a bit... we have heavy clay soil in some areas, and others have been amended with compost, peat, topsoil and sand. A few areas are rather gravelly, as well, and I'm constantly picking out small stones and pebbles. The other raised beds by the barn were filled with a combination of topsoil and rotted horse manure... by next year, that soil should have broken down even more and become quite beautiful! I should still add some sand to the beds... maybe some peat, too. When I hear about overly dry conditions and wildfires raging, it's usually in California... I normally think of Florida as being humid and wet! It must be difficult to find edibles to grow that can take both wet and dry extremes... Mulberries sound delicious! When I was a kid, we had a good sized mulberry tree in our yard... we would pick tons of berries and enjoy them with cereal in the mornings! I've got Tithonia "Torch" seeds planted... I can't wait to see the flowers! Your bouquets of them always look so pretty, Cindee! And you're so right... fresh picked home grown fruits and vegetables taste so much better than anything you can buy at the larger grocery stores... most of the commercially grown food, unless it's organic, is rather tasteless! Especially the tomatoes! I look forward every year to harvesting fresh pea pods and green beans, tomatoes and bell peppers, and all the other delicious things we plant! This year, Larry is going to make pickles! Yummy!

Depends on how much sun this area actually receives. I grow tomatoes in containers on my east facing patio, which receives sun in summer until early afternoon when it is screened by the house and large trees in my backyard. The tomatoes do great. If you are getting at least 6 hours of unobstructed sunlight (eg. from daybreak until midday), that is sufficient for sun loving veggies.

When freezing vegetables you need to blanch them in boiling water to stop the enzyme actions that cause loss of flavor, texture and color. See link below for more information. FREEZING RAW VEGETABLE JUICE Michigan State University Extension Preserving Food Safely - 01600682 08/03/99 Raw vegetable juice must be blanched to destroy enzyme activity. To do this, simmer juice for two minutes at a minimum of 190°F. Start 2 minute timing when the temperature reaches 190°F, NOT BEFORE. Pour into freezer containers. Seal, label, date and freeze. -Grainlady Here is a link that might be useful: National Center for Home Food Preservation/Freezing

Skipley farm here, I collect and ship my scionwood sometimes directly from the tree but most of the time I store dry in ziplock bags, 10 to 40 in a bag, refridgerated 32-38 deg. F. I've always added a ~3x5" sheet of paper towel splashed (not dripping) with 5% bleach water. Only once in 7 years did I have mold in 1 of 80 bags. Packed in fridge fairly tightly and then accessed a few times per month helps stir-up the air around them (guessing here). I think it's really important that scionwood stay dry but humid. A hydrometer would be useful as I really want to be able to store in open containers and access more easily in a walk-in type room. For me easy access is accomplished here in Western Washington by storing open air (without plastic bags) 95% of the time as we tend to have perfect refrigerator temps and humidity. I hold, sell and graft these into June with 98% success from a January-February cutting. I live and farm in Snohomish WA where winter temps are typically 41 degrees with coldest around 10 deg F. I grow about 300 varieties -mostly apples. It's a lot of work maintaining 300 varieties. Procuring, storing, shipping earns about $12/hr.-a good income in the off season. Gil