There's different kinds of "bang" for the buck. From a pure compared-to-supermarket-prices perspective: shallots. I've seen shallots go for a buck each around here. I bought a bag of sets for 16 bucks years ago and save some back for replanting every year, so my cost per shallot goes down every year even as my crop size grew. As the numbers are currently working, each shallot I grow this year will cost less than two cents. Plus they are terrific to have in the kitchen (especially when they are cheap) and offer long storage with no special effort. From a nutrition-per-square-foot perspective: potatoes. A ton of food from small spaces. Also superb in the kitchen, especially new potatoes, and interesting variety available. And also offer long storage without canning or freezing. From a gee-whiz-in-the-garden perspective: Swiss chard. Grows from spring to fall, is hardy and likes cool weather yet also yields in summer heat, yields all season from a single planting, is easily grown and rarely bothered by pests (in my garden anyway) AND is best thought of as two vegetables culinarily (leaves and stalks)...whew, that's an impressive list of credentials for a leafy green! Collards come close, but I find chard easier to care for and more interesting in the kitchen. But my overall champion has to be: tomatoes. Easy to grow. Prolific plants. Great compared-to-market value. Almost mythical quality when garden ripened. Tremendous variety to choose from. And, for me, without a doubt the most versatile vegetable in the kitchen. They can find a place in breakfast, lunch, or dinner. They can be raw or cooked a million ways. Consider the number of cuisines they are at home in, and the number of roles they play in those cuisines, and the number of ingredients you can marry them to - it's amazing. So for me they are an unbeatable combo of money bang, garden bang, and culinary bang.

Em, What a disappointment your fresh veggie meal turned out to be. Hopefully you'll soon be harvesting from your own garden. I hope your bowl of cereal was dirt-free and bug-free. With the weather turning sunnier and warmer this week, all the plants whose color is off or whose growth is sort of spindly and weak should improve. Part of the issue is that with lots of recent rainfall, the plants have had lots of cloudy days with less direct sun. Another problem is that excessively heavy rainfall, especially for days or weeks on end, clog up the plant roots with water, reducing their ability to absorb nutrients from the soil. Plants must have water to survive, but there is such a thing as too much water and that is what Mother Nature has been giving lots of us here lately....too much at once with no time for the soil to dry out in between rainy days. There is not a lot you can do to counteract that except be patient and wait for the rain to stop falling and the ground to dry up. With this week's heat, the ground should start drying out at a faster pace. I would have laughed at the leaf suggestion with the sycamore trees that have anthracnose too, but their point (which maybe they didn't explain) was that the disease persists on the foliage, so getting rid of the foliage as it falls helps get rid of the disease. Anyone who's ever seen mature sycamore trees would know they produce more leaves than mere mortals can rake up, pick up and dispose of. I assume there are some professional tree service firms that have the kind of sprayer that could reach to the top of your trees, but I don't know of any sprayer that a typical home gardener would have that would reach that far. Our neighbor across the road from us in Texas had a beautiful and very tall sycamore tree that had anthracnose all the time. My earlier cilantro plantings from February, March and April are either blooming or setting seed now. My later ones from May are stalled in their growth and also a light green. I think it is the rain. We have had too much rain lately after not having enough of it through early May. The heat is starting to arrive and cilantro isn't crazy about that either. My later plantings are in morning sun and afternoon shade which usually helps them tolerate the summer heat better. The white spots on the verbena might be something as simple as sunburn or environmental stress. Many types of tender plant foliage can suffer from wind burn and sun burn in spring and early summer. It looks about the same as the damage you see on seedlings that are raised indoors and then suddenly moved outdoors into full sun and full wind without being gradually hardened off. Sometimes, when a plant has been subjected to a prolonged period of persistently cloudy, rainy weather, it sort of loses its ability to tolerate full sun and wind. It also could be from water on the foliage as Susan noted, but I rarely observe that here,partly because I mostly water with drip irrigation that puts the water in the soil, not up on the foliage. I do sometimes see sun damage on leaves of annuals and herbaceous perennials if we have a solid week of cloudy weather and then suddenly have full sun again all day every day. It just takes them a while to adjust. Air pollution damage also can cause spotting on verbena foliage, specfically damage from sulphur dioxide. With verbena, if it is little tiny speckled spots, it also could be spider mite damage. I've already seen spider mite damage on some verbena bonariensis in my big garden. We are surrounded by pasture land and thus we have tons of spider mites blow into the garden in May of every year. When I lived in a regular, non-rural neighborhood in Fort Worth, I never saw spider mites until July or August. So, whatever you're seeing on the verbena shouldn't spread, unless it is spider mites. If you think it could be spider mites, hold a sheet of white paper underneath the foliage and thump the leaves. If little tiny dots about the size of the dot over the letter "i" falls off the leaves and starts crawling around on the white paper, then your plants likely have spider mites. Spraying the underside of the foliage with a good strong stream of water every 3 days for 3 or 4 times usually will drive them away. Or, you can spray the undersides of the plants with insecticidal soap or neem oil, but be careful using those once them temperatures are in the 90s. Some plant foliage burns easily when air temps are high. I cannot help you with the ducks, but I do know that some breeds of ducks are better garden weeders than others. George can tell you how his ducks behave. I let our free-range chickens into the garden to patrol for bugs at some points in the calendar year, but not when there are low hanging tomatoes that are within their reach. Dawn

This sounds like something we'll like, Angie, thanks.

I'm going to have to try this, I love anything with peppers in it!! I think I'll add another pasta/veggies/certainly-not-vegan recipe here, too... I posted this on the "cooking" forum: Here is one for Pasta Primavera: Diced mushrooms diced garlic dash olive oil 1/4 cup diced onion chopped basil to taste put in pan, heat with salt and pepper until onions are translucent add these to the pan: 1 or 1/2 carrot, sliced on the bias one head of broccoli, separated into florets half yellow squash, chopped fairly large handful of green beans, chopped a bit larger than 1" 1/4 to 1/2 bell pepper, any colour, julienned 1/2 cup onion, chopped basil, chopped heat until carrots and broccoli stems are tender enough to your liking all the while, cook pasta. I used gamelli. Drain in a colander, place lid on top of colander/pasta to keep warm. In the pot you cooked the pasta, place the cooked veggies, scraping out all of them but leaving a little bit of mushroom stuck to pan. place on heat, add Almost a pint of half and half in (for you Canadians, that would be table cream) add 1/2 cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese add 1/4 to 1/2 cup gorgonzola cheese, broken or sliced let medium heat warm it up, raise heat if needed add nutmeg, about 1/8 to 1/4 teaspoon add pasta, stir/fold until sauce covers it add veggies, do same serve, top with more chopped, fresh basil Eat!! When re-heating the next day, use the last bit of half and half, a tablespoon of parmesan cheese, a little more gorgonzola and a teaspoon of olive oil, warm that first, then add the leftovers