I went to check my container garden and to my horror saw one of the melons laying on the ground, broken off the vine. Absolutely not ripe or ready. It had suspicious claw or maybe teeth marks. Hm. This melon was the closest to the top of the fence and I can imagine an enterprising raccoon or squirrel trying to abscond with the fruit. Or a curious cat deciding it was a play thing (most likely). Once the orb fell into the yard, I imagine the risk was not worth the reward. I did have it in a netting sling, but it was not as protected as the other melons. We’ll see if any of the others make it to fruition.

So after writing this post, I investigated my remaining two melons and discovered a gaping hole eaten into one of the unripe fruits. Sigh. Maybe the last melon will make it.

I put some temporary fencing up around my container garden because the tops of my carrots kept disappearing. I suspected rabbits. It was not rabbits. Shortly after the leaves came back, they were gone again, despite the heavy wire guarding them. Maybe grasshoppers are the culprits. I don’t think I will be getting any carrots this year, although they valiantly keep trying to produce leaves. (Yes, I’m growing them in a feed bag, which isn’t very deep, but they are globe carrots, so they don’t need depth. But leaves would be helpful.)

The melon vines that I have been training up the fence have budded fruit! How exciting! But now, as the fruit swells, how to support the vine so the globes can ripen? I tore off some netting from last year’s Halloween decorations and made a sling around the fruit and the vine. I used round clips to secure the corners, both because they can be adjusted as the melon grows, and because they were already hanging on the fence from my makeshift green house. I am also pruning down to one melon per vine, to give the remaining ones their best chance.

Mint and strawberries are prolific spreaders. I need some ground cover for erosion control on a slope in our yard so have been encouraging the chocolate mint plants to go wild. I recently was given strawberry plants from my uncle who has an amazing strawberry patch. I planted my bare-root plants in a circle around the mint, where it is sunny and they will get watered well. Mint is rumored to repel slugs, which would be good for strawberry production. The hope is that they both continue to propagate and fill in. It will be interesting to see, though, if I end up with a battle of the rhizomes.