In late May/early June (prime planting time), I took a vacation. I returned June 12 and, a day later, came down with a nasty case of stomach flu whose effects lingered for a couple of weeks.
Needless to say, all this activity destroyed my summer vegetable planting timetable. So I decided to forego planting seeds, went out to buy a tomato plant, and hoped for the best.
Before long, I noticed small cucumber vines growing in my compost pile. Then a few pepper plants.
So I watched the pile to see what would happen. As of late July, I have three small round cucumbers—not a lot, given all the vine activity, but it’s something, nonetheless. These babies likely came from seeds of the round cucumbers that I planted three or four years ago.
As for the pepper plants, they probably sprouted from seeds of peppers that I bought at the store in past years. They currently have little bitty buds on them.
The tomatoes, planted intentionally, aren’t as mature as some of my neighbors’, but that’s to be expected.
Then in my strawberry patch, some Swiss chard popped up from previous plantings.
The Swiss chard tastes fine as long as I don’t let it grow too large. As for the cucumbers, they’re too small and hard to harvest yet. And the pepper plants still have a long way to go. Given Colorado’s short growing season, I’m not holding out much hope for the peppers.
So if you ever want an easy science experiment, just let some of those little seedlings stay in your compost pile and other garden areas to see what happens.
8/10/2022 Update: Last week, I tasted one of the cucumbers. It wasn’t bitter, but it wasn’t very tasty either. So I didn’t add it to my salad.
Fall 2022 Update: I ended getting several nice green peppers, as well as one fairly decent cantaloupe from my volunteers.
Blossoms & Blueprints 