"Winter" Garden

It's a glorious day here in the Sonoran desert. The recent 100-degree-plus temperatures are becoming a dim memory and our 70- and 80-degree afternoons remind us why we live here.  The vegetable seeds I planted on Sunday have almost all sprouted and popped up their little green heads.  The turnips and radishes were first, with full rows in view by Wednesday.  The only things that aren't  up yet are the nasturtiums (they always take longer), beets, cauliflower, radicchio, and cilantro.

All that's left of the summer garden are the eggplant, zucchini, and tepary beans.  The eggplant was the summer's best performer.  As for the zucchini, with the reduced number of honeybees I've gotten very good at vegetable sex.  Early in the season there were so many male flowers but no females, then for a short time there were equal numbers and as long as I made sure they got together, plenty of zucchini.  But now there have been mornings with female flowers but no males - so sad.  All those lovely golden blossoms doomed to spinsterhood!