Category: Garden

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Prize Tomato 2026

It’s a sad year for prize tomatoes. What should have been the flagship brandywine ended up stunted from a heatwave that hit while I was in Wisconsin and unable to attend to its needs. Here’s a recap of prior champions:

  • 2019: 24.8oz
  • 2021: 16.8oz
  • 2023: 19.3oz
  • 2024: 14.2oz
  • 2025: 17.2oz
Prize Tomato 2025

This year? A paltry 10.8 oz:

And to rub salt in the wound…

Blossom end rot!

This nefarious condition arises when a tomato fruit receives insufficient calcium during its growth. My soil is not deficient in this micronutrient, as my tests have confirmed. In my case, it’s simply another consequence of hot weather fluctuations. Sudden heat spells interfere with nutrient uptake. I lost a few tomatoes, but the plants always stabilize and recover. It just happened to coincide with the prize tomato’s development. Inconvenient timing.

This is not the year of the prize tomato, but it is looking like the year of tomato quantity. I made some strategy and soil amendment changes this year that are showing much promise. Photos of harvests forthcoming.

–Simon

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Garden: Summer of 2026

A momentary pause in drama gives me an excuse to post garden pics. Nice, peaceful garden pics. No drama here.

Herbs
Squash, corn
Indeterminate tomatoes
Cucumbers, garlic, determinate tomatoes
Rhubarb

I do enjoy the transition from June to July. The gardens show promise of harvests to come, before the plants begin to turn ratty.

–Simon

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A Couple Garden Photos

Just that – some photos:

A purdy clematis on the back trellis.
That stupid mulberry the neighbor wouldn’t cut down before his wife kicked him out is fruiting now. Bird crap inbound.
Followed by Zone Rouge, 2025 edition.

–Simon

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Wine Cap (Pt. 2)

I assumed these would come back, judging from the quantity of embedded mycelium that remains in the straw. And they did.

Wine Cap

I did not, however, harvest them. I should have, to give to my dad, but I didn’t get around to it. Oh well. Still neat to look at. If not palatable, they’re still aesthetic, and it’s an interesting concept to consider that I now have a multi-year self-sustaining mushroom colony, provided I keep feeding it wood and straw. I’m still holding out of the blue oysters!

Blue Oyster

–Simon

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Blue Oyster

My last mushroom farming attempt was successful, however the variety of mushroom I found to be unpalatable.

Wine Cap

So this year, I’m attempting Blue Oysters. I like oyster mushrooms. I hope this works out. This variety came as plugs, which I then embedded into chunks of a freshly-cut maple branch lost to high winds.

Here’s hoping! If they don’t take, I’m sure the wine caps will be back. The straw in the bucket is heavily packed with mycelium from last year.

–Simon