The only actual “fail” in this year’s garden has been the winter squash. And yes, it has been an epic fail. I mean, sure, the rabbit ate the chard and celery, and we only got two eggplant (but look at that beauty). However, I’m used to getting dozens of delicata and having butternut squash until April. Not so this year.
What happened is I just ran out of garden space. I didn’t get enough “good soil” to make a new bed, and just brought in bags of topsoil and compost and made a little rim to a large space for the squash vines to grow. Under that trucked in soil was a fairly compacted (tilled, but still) patch of land that had been sprayed and sprayed with Round-up in past years just to keep it from being a giant weed bed. Also, it’s shady. Also, chickens trampling the vines all the time.
This fall I’ll push to get it seeded in grass. I’m not interested in doing the work it would take to make it a better bed– especially since it’s inaccessible to machinery coming in and doing multiple tillings and dumping large amounts of compost. Next year I’m still hopeful that I’ll be able to move my tomatoes and peppers into the greenhouse and will have a few raised beds freed up for winter squash.
Or, I could always plant fewer potatoes! The potatoes have overproduced (like almost everything, it’s been a banner year). I started digging up the La Ratte fingerlings and after about 1/4 of the way down the road had a large bucket about 2/3 full. I freaked out and stopped. I actually went inside and lay down for a bit.
It’s possible it’s just a very good year for potatoes– I had no potato bugs for the first time ever, and it rained so regularly they were well watered. But it 
also could be that after four years of amending that garden plot, it is now in great shape. Not knowing means I can’t decide whether to plant fewer potatoes next year and put the rest in winter squash or not… I might try that, though. Because it’s nice to have winter squash in a place where the vines can spread unencumbered. And because, SO many potatoes!
As far as the winter squash, I got exactly ONE of every squash, and four delicata. One Canada crookneck, one butternut squash, one Sweet Dumpling, and one Lakota squash that actually rotted on the bottom so went straight to the compost pile. One teeny tiny watermelon that is unlikely to ripen before the first frost. One pumpkin. One pumpkin!! Good vines once it warmed up, and even multiple flowers, but the plants just couldn’t sustain the fruit.
Ah well, we’ll just eat more frozen beans and potatoes this winter! And I’m going to have 20-30 jars of tomatoes.
Also, I just have to share this photo. Walking up our front steps the past few weeks means being enveloped by Monarch butterflies. They, like the crops, have slowed down now, but there are still some fluttering on the Blazing Star all the time.
