goodbye zucchini plants, we hardly knew ye

My zucchini plants all died. :(

I think it was a two-part problem. One, the hellish, unrelenting heat of the Phoenix desert. Once the temps started hitting the 100s every day and not cooling off below the 80s at night, the plant leaves started looking drier, browner, and wiltier. I watered as much as I was able, but my research showed me that most people who get their plants to survive the summer around here have a combined approach of constant watering misters and shade cloths, all stuff I'm too much of a cheapskate to shell out for.

Secondly, in the last couple weeks of their lives, the zucchini plants had a growing squash bug problem. I killed them when I saw them, but I'm sure plenty hid from me, and I saw they were laying eggs everywhere. And, apparently, no poison can kill them? The zucchini had stopped producing fruit at this time so I decided the best thing to do was just rip them all up and try again in the fall, once it's cooler. And I'll try to see if there are any squash bug preventative measures I can take.

Also, here's a fun fact about growing your own zucchini that nobody ever tells you: the fruit contain a substance that secretes when it is cut, and this substance, if it gets on your skin, dries it out and makes it tight-feeling, and eventually it peels. Almost as if your fingers are coated in dried glue, but it's just your skin. I haven't been able to find much info about this reaction from the zucchini, because a lot of my googling led to crazy talk about how it's the pesticides that cover the zucchini or it's a result of GMO or whatever. Considering I grew this myself and put no pesticides on it whatsoever, I know that's a falsehood. I saw a lot of people think it is a allergic reaction/contact dermatitis, but I've been eating zucchini bough at the store for a long time and that never happened to me before. It was only with my own zucchini. I managed to find a few sane people who put some thought into it, and their conclusion is that it is some sort of defense mechanism from the fruit. It turns out the fresher the harvest, the more likely the fruit is to have this reaction. So eventually I learned to keep my zucchini in the fridge for a week or two before cutting into it. (And that explains why store-bought zucchini never does this, since store-bought probably sat in a crate for three weeks before hitting the shelf!)

My zucchini and I had some educational and delicious moments. Here is a small photospam of the good times we had together, in memoriam:

a typical harvest off my plants. so pretty!

the first meal made with the first harvest. a chicken leg and herb-roasted zucchini

made "zucchini boats" with tomato sauce, sausage, and cheese

unbelievably delicious. and also, super filling. i could barely finish this.

me with the first harvest. RIP zucchini

squash: finally!

We got so lazy about planting the squash after I prepared the garden bed for it, it became too late. It's getting really hot every day now, and I was wary of planting seeds out in the full sun. My research tells me squash like heat, but, I tend to interpret that as "non-Arizona heat" because the heat here is about an order of magnitude worse than everywhere else.

So! Instead, we got some pots to plant the squash in, and placed them in the shade. Once they have sprouted and strengthened a bit, we'll transplant them to the ground.

I'm all about squash

We got 8 pots, and planted 4 with spaghetti squash (my favorite) and the other 4 with butternut squash (my second favorite). Both these squashes are delicious but also both so expensive to buy at the store. I'm not here for $3/lb squash.

increasing my odds of success

I'm still pretty new to gardening and I kind of scoffed at first at the instructions on them all stating to plant multiple seeds close together then weed them out later, but judging by just how many seeds I've planted so far that haven't sprouted, there's like a 60% success rate when it comes to sprouting.

in the glorious shade

Crossing my fingers this works!

work on the second garden plot begins

Today it was a scorching 91 degrees, so any sane person probably would have stayed inside with their sweet, sweet air conditioning. Instead, I grabbed a shovel and went to work outside, in the sun, on the second garden plot I've been meaning to get started for two weeks now.

Here's the before photo. You can see the edge of the first garden plot in the corner, and the outline of the area to be tilled, drawn in a box in the dirt. The first plot, Chris and I dug together, so it went pretty fast. Also, two weeks ago, it was at least 10 degrees cooler out during the day. But today I tilled this box all on my own.

Aww yeah. Look at all that tilled dirt! Sadly this took me an hour (due to needing to take several water breaks in the shade) and after that I was so hot and tired that I couldn't finish the rest of what needed to be done (mixing in soil and wood chips, and of course planting things!). That's on the docket for this weekend, though.

At least things are going nicely in the other plot.

The zucchini (bottom half of the plot) is doing awesomely. In fact, there are too many growing. We're going to have to pluck out a few to ensure all the plants have enough space to grow.

The zucchini were planted at the same time as the peppers (top half of the plot), but there hadn't been any action on those seeds while the zucchini were doing great. I was beginning to wonder if all the seeds were duds... until today!

A tiny, adorable little pepper sprout! There's actually two growing, so I guess they just needed a lot of time to get going.

So far, the garden is a success! Yay!