I used to raise Sugar Baby watermelons, and they are so good and sweet. Let us know how you like them. I haven't had a garden since I moved here, 22 years ago, because the soil here is such heavy clay. At my old place, it had been a dairy for generations and the soil was so good you could dig it up with your fingers. I am looking forward to having a garden again when I move. The first thing I will plant next year will be Sugar Baby watermelons.

I planted tomatoes, green beans, cucumbers, green peppers, potatoes, lettuce, summer squash, carrots and celery. The lettuce, celery and carrots are in a raised bed with a wire cover and are doing good. The deer ate my tomato plants. Should have cucumbers any day now. Squash is beginning to blossom. My garden was planted late because it kept raining and the ground was too wet for my son to roto till it. I live in NW Pennsylvania.

I don't have a large garden, but even with all the rain the veggies are doing well. Harvested cucumbers and zucchini so far. Waiting for the tomatoes to ripen and the green peppers to grow a little larger. The pumpkins have awhile to go till October harvest.

I just had tomatoes but the heat has about done them in.

Sorry about your tomatoes, Ravencajun, they are one of the things I look forward to all year since the grocery store tomatoes are so awful. I never buy them fresh anyway. Canned only.

Harvested the first green bean/zucchini/raspberries yesterday. The garden sure looks lush but it's produce is thin compared to other years. We had a pretty late spring and then very cool start so not sure what's happening.

My little garden is doing well. For years I had it way out back and a huge one but now I have a smaller one right next to the end of my house. I have been getting green beans out of it and tomatoes and some zucchini. The onions some of them could be used. My butternut squash was planted late but looks to be doing well. Tomatoes, sweet peppers and zucchini are planted in the ground with cardboard around them and stump grindings on the cardboard. We don't have all the stump grindings down yet but they are doing really well. The rest of the things are in big raised planters and big pots. I also have planted strawberry plants this year in a big raised planter. Next year I am hoping to plant more in the ground. So nice no weeds. The tomatoes that have ripened are mostly Sun Sugar and they are really good. I have some other varieties but don't recall what they are. I have 9 tomato plants, 3 sweet red peppers, and 3 zucchini plants.

Sue in Central Indiana

I always wonder how folks get to harvest so early? But I grow from seed, and maybe that's it? That is, my plants don't mature until much later than plants bought at a store? Dunno!

I have incredibly small and green tomatoes and peppers. We wanted to try a different hot pepper than our beloved Thai Dragon, so we have a habanero, cayenne, jalapeno, Mexibelle (mild heat, tastes like a bell?!), and one other that escapes my memory.

Herbs are another story. Those, I harvest year-round. Except basil. All my plants are tiny!

I planted a few days later than our recommended date this year. Could have planted much earlier because the weather was perfect but I was involved in volunteering that week at our big plant sale at our Botanical Garden.

I scaled back a bit in that I didn’t plant as many tomato plants, all grown from seed. I have Sun Sugar, Sweet Million and Black Cherry and they are all doing ok but not producing as many as usual this year. For large tomatoes I have Cherokee Purple, Better Boy (not grown from seed) and Lemon Boy. They are all doing ok finally but the dang crows are eating them and actually pulling some green ones off the vines. I also have sweet red peppers, cucumbers and black eyes peas. My squash and okra never did well this year and I don’t know why, so I’m just buying from the farmer’s market as needed and don’t have to fight the bigs on the squash.

A lot of my gardening friends tell me the heat and humidity have affected their gardens here this year too. We switched to an irrigation system this spring, so my plants look very healthy and disease-free, just not producing much. I use the no-till garden method now so very few weeds. I just add compost in the fall/winter. And usually we have raccoons or possums stealing a few tomatoes. First time for the crows.

I don't have a large garden any more, but use the "self-watering" containers,which are large totes. I do have one of the original Earthboxes that was a gift many years ago, but I have made the rest. I only have tomatoes and peppers in them, and they all have little green fruit. I have cucumbers in couple of tubs with old huge tomato cages over them. They are sending forth lots of inch-long cukes. Then in the corner of the hosta bed, l have two tomatoberry tomatoes. These are sized a little bigger than a cherry tomato, but have wonderful true tomato taste. I never plant out until Memorial Day so I'm very pleased with how well they are doing.

We have a pretty big garden, much to my surprise, I keep adding to it as the years go by, lol. Most are directly sown into the garden, but I do start a few tomatoes and peppers inside my garage growing chambers to get a head start. I also grow all of my own annuals (and plants used as annuals) in cell packs and flats. Mine are larger than what is available in the retail trade and the varietal selection in the seed catalogs is fabulous!

We begin sowing greens and other cold loving varieties as early as January, some under low tunnels of spun fiber. Many kinds of baby greens, mesclun mixes, sweet sugar peas and a new fave, hypertendril peas. I'm missing those!

Now we are feasting on heat tolerant greens, different kinds of summer squash, green beans, tomatoes, and peppers. We're still sowing mesclun seeds but they aren't loving the heat, of course. Leaf lettuce, chard,and New Zealand spinach make a wonderful salad when mixed with grocery store romaine. I'm growing purslane as a veggie for the first time and everybody loves it.

The rat tail radishes are producing prodigiously and I've been pickling them in different brines as well as eating them fresh.

I order a truck load of mixed wood chips from my favorite arborist every winter which are distributed over the garden area and all of the ornamental beds. We have that infamous hard, red clay soil here, formidable at first but I've grown to love it. The large population of earthworms till the soil, eventually taking the chips down into the soil . It's quite amazing, really. We never use a rototiller in the garden, that would destroy the natural channels made by worms, soil insects, and plant roots.

No chemical pesticides used by me but I do keep biologicals, botanicals, and mineral products in my arsenal. My most useful product is something called Surround®, an emulsifiable kaolin clay that coats foliage and fruit, making the vegetable plants undesirable to pests of all kinds....chewing, sucking, or egg laying. The coating also protects from heat stress and sun scald, prolonging my harvest time and protecting the quality.

I have one tomato plant full of green tomatoes , but I am hopeful they will ripen soon. I also have one volunteer vine planted by a squirrel. It looks like a squash of some kind. It will be interesting To see what it produces. So far just a lot of blossoms.

Rob333, start your own plants and use wall 'o waters for tomatoes. I used to have some but am thinking of getting some more so I can have earlier tomatoes.

White sapote is getting ripe, and I have to pick them before other animals get to them. I also have Eureka lemons but Meyer lemons are out of season for me at this time.

Southeast Wisconsin here, we had a cold and wet spring and now a hot and wet summer. I have large raised beds for which I am very thankful. My broccoli did well as did the rutabega's. Carrots are doing great, I should have green beans this weekend. Tomatoes are doing good, lots on the vines now and just waiting for ripening. I grew the sugar baby watermelon but I'm not sure I'll get anything from them. Cucumbers are doing good, should have some in a couple weeks.