The tomato vines are producing some nice late fruit. Although it would be best to let them fully ripen on the vine, it is a timing challenge with the birds and other pests. So far, we are winning 😉

We may not have a true autumn as you may experience in the upper northern hemisphere, but this banana leaf has an array of colors as it ages, reminiscent of a north American fall.

There is not always something to harvest every day, but on many days there are a variety of items in small quantities that make their way from the property to the kitchen. For the last month or more, cucumbers have been part of that every day, but they have been joined by peppers, parsley,and as you see here, tomatoes and big thyme.

The orange trees that we treated earlier this year and where we pruned the dead branches have really rewarded us by bearing profusely. Although these oranges are not that good to eat, as they are not sweet, they are great for making juices, and for the past few days, there has been a bunch of them ready for picking.

Following the previously mentioned struggle with many tomato plants and few bearing fruit, we finally had a few which could be picked. It was a fine balance between leaving them to vine ripen, and saving them from the birds and insects. These three are healthy in size, despite the splits at the top, and will make a great addition to the meal in the coming days. There are about six or seven more not yet ready to pick, so the results are not quite as poor as it looked a month ago.

Our peppers have not been doing that well so far. Of the five or six trees planted, most are looking healthy, but there has been not very much in the way of peppers produced. Two of them were a little too close to the big thyme, and so they need to be moved, but the ones outside, seem to be producing a few peppers here and there. This was one of the first.

We stuck a couple of yam heads in the ground beside the old columns while working on something else. We promptly forgot about them. A few weeks later they have emerged and found the columns.

Well the cucumbers just keep on coming, and it has been a very productive year for them. So far. They are large and juicy and we have been giving them away due to how much we have produced. Added to this particular harvest was some beetroot and some wild callaloo. This is in addition to the almost daily harvesting of thyme and parsley.

For some reason, the very healthy looking tomato plants that continue to thrive are not bearing very many tomatoes at all. It may be soil acidity, or it may be the fact that this particular variety is not well suited to the climate. Either way, we only have this trio so far, which are looking great but could use some company.

It was probably inevitable that some Tanya (Cocoa to us Jamaicans) would make it into the raised beds. And so they did in numerous areas. Unfortunately, the big beautiful leaves will put anything nearby in the dark, so they have to be moved out once they begin to get large. They can get as large as they want in their new home environment….