Of Cucumbers, Radishes, Carrots and Sunflowers

I mentioned last post that the cucumber had set fruit. These are Spacemaster, a bush variety that I have planted in an old recycling tub.

This week the lettuce and alleged spinach made it into the compost bin and carrots and radish seeds went in their pots. The carrots are Romeo Round Baby Carrots, radishes are Easter Egg II Rainbow. Not sure if it may be too warm for these crops so it's definitely an experiment.

A watermelon seed I had planted earlier that hadn't germinated came up near the bell pepper I put in its place. I gently dug it up and placed it in a tiny pot but I'm not sure I have room or a sunny enough location for it.

There are lots of zinnia and cosmo seeds coming up and I am diligently attempting to keep the birds and snails away from them by keeping overturned berry baskets over them until they get big enough to defend themselves.

I am eagerly awaiting germination of of the sunflower seeds, a Mammoth variety, that I finally planted after deliberating where to put them. I was hoping to find another packet of Strawberry Blonde sunflowers that I planted last year. I purchased them at Target but didn't see any when I looked there yesterday. I may try another Target store because these are very pretty, described on the package as "a beautiful soft lemon yellow brushed with rose-pink." A few seeds I had left over went into the ground earlier this year but either did not emerge or were taken by snails. Unfortunately, I never did get a photo of these in bloom last year.