I'm back now,
dragnlaw, so you're going to have to listen to me talking about harvesting in Jersey!
Speaking of skapes, I just harvested mine a few days ago.
Garlic scapes,6-16 by
pepperhead212, on Flickr
I've been harvesting eggplant already - 8 of them in the last few days, from
String, Ichiban, and Behold, which I just used today, for my first batch of Szechwan eggplant.
First eggplant of the season, 6-9, String on L, Ichiban on R by
pepperhead212, on Flickr
First Behold eggplant, next to some of the garlic from last season.6-17 by
pepperhead212, on Flickr
The String Chinese eggplants look almost identical to the Ichiban, even though they are lighter in color in the pictures, and skinnier. Also, they were the only two out of 8 to show a hint of seeding yet.
On 6-16 I saw the first ripe tomato -
Yellow Warren, and a number more on the same plant. Yesterday
Sunsugar showed its first ripe fruits. And today, they are almost totally ripened, but still the only two ripe varieties.
Sunsugars starting to ripen, 6-19. by
pepperhead212, on Flickr
I had never done this before, but I started trimming tomatoes A LOT, trimming almost all of the suckers off, and leaving 2 main stems. Of course, I'd miss one occasionally, but for the most part, this would cause the main stems to grow more, and flower earlier, and now, ripen earlier. Before this, the earliest tomatoes I had ripen were on 6-21, and those were started on 3-20 one year, and put out under WOWs. These were started on 4-5, and put out on 5-1!
This is also something I did, trimming cucumbers, and other cucurbits, only allowing a sideshoot off off the 5th, then again from the 10th leaf nodes, while there are more vines growing at almost every leaf node. A YouTube video about this from China was posted on a garden forum, which made me start doing this.