Giant Sunflowers and keeping mice out of my garden

I'm sorry I haven't written sooner, but I've been very busy at work. But that hasn't kept me out of my garden. Here's what's happened so far this summer:

My sunflowers are now 12-14 feet tall. I've never seen such large sunflowers. I actually harvested some seeds and ate them. Have you ever harvested sunflower seeds?
It's actually kind of gross. First of all, if you are organic, as I am, there are these teeny red mite like bugs that live in the head of the sunflower. I took a high powered sprayer and blasted the head to get rid of the bugs. Then I let it dry in the sun for a day. When it was dry and bug free, I removed the seeds. Once they were removed I put them on a pan and let them further dry in the sun. My husband said that all the work I put in wasn't worth it. But where else can you get organic sunflower seeds?

Now for the rest of the garden. Mice kept eating my melon plants (and my pepper plant) down to nothing overnight. Afraid that I wouldn't get ANY harvest from my hard work, I did two things: First I put an electronic mouse trap in the garden, and I've been collecting little dead bodies every week. And second, my husband made me four little "cages" to put around my plants. These worked great until I went on vacation and the zapper trap broke, and a mouse dug underneath the cage and ate an entire plant! Those darn mice!

Anyway, one of the cassabananas is doing well (I have three) and I'm hoping that I'll get flowers and fruit sometime this summer. I know, it's late so I might not get any. I did get some ground cherry flowers and I'm hoping that I'll be able to harvest some in a few weeks. I've never tasted them before.

Anyway that's the update. Sorry it's short, but I have to get back to work!

Happy Gardening!

Shoot! I think I killed one of the cassabananas!

I'm very blue.

This morning My cassabanana seedling was full of roots and so I didn't want it to stick in the felt so I moved it into a red cup, and added some peat moss all around the little jiffy pellet, and then gave it some water.

I looked at it about an hour ago and the poor little thing was wilted. Her two little seed leaves were looking down like it was crying.

I feel so sad. I moved her into the greenhouse, perhaps she needs more humidity. But the last time this happened the little cassabanana died.

So now it looks like I'm down to two of those plants.

Sniff Sniff. I think I'll have a glass of wine to drown my sorrows.

My Tiny Urban Garden

My mother was a gardener. When I was a child I always wondered why she did it... our family had corn growing in the front yard before it was "cool", and I was always embarrased about it. Because we always turn into our mothers when we get older, at age 44, I started a garden last year, by planting plants that I had bought at some local hardware stores. I had so much fun that I decided in 2011 I would plant from seeds. I went online to see what I should plant. I found a site called www.rareseeds.com and bought some seeds. Here's what I bought (everything is heirloom non-GMO):

• Sun flowers- Mammoth Grey Striped (for my peas to grow on... they are so much prettier than the metal stakes!)
• Wando garden peas
• Spinache-Bloomsdale Long Standing
• Peppers-Emerald Giant (when I bought them online I thought they were red)
• Artichokes- Purple of Romanga
• Eggplant-Ma Zu Purple Chinese 
• Asparagus- Mary Washington
• Spinache- Bloomsdale Long Standing
• Pack Choy-Oriental Greens EXTRA Dwarf
• Tomato-Cherokee Purple 
• Cassabanana--This is a tropical fruit that can also be used like a zucchini before it is ripe. I have never tasted it.

I received the package in the mail, and planted everything in my little jiffy pot "greenhouse" on 2/21/2011. I'm looking forward to letting you know what happens this year.