August, obviously, is all about the tomatoes. All together, I harvested just over 39 pounds of tomatoes in August, which is far from what I have done in the past, but which is better than last year. (Last year was 28.5 pounds of ripened tomatoes total; I'm still not done this year, so I'm ahead.) This is all nothing compared to the year I brought in 75 pounds of tomatoes in one week, so we are far, far behind on production, but at least this year I have tomatoes in my pasta, tomatoes to can (some), and tomatoes to eat by the plateful in slices and in salads.
However, the thought of how comparatively bad the tomato years have been around here gives me a bit of a sick stomach ache. I have to remember that we take the good years with the bad, but in the best years I know that we are hardly even buying groceries in August. This year was better than last, but it is far from what I would want to have.
However, rounding out the month was the harvest of onions, butternut squash, potatoes, cucumbers, and beans. I also continued to bring in greens by the handful, which certainly makes this the easiest and highest value-per-ounce crop that I grow. That's good, because I have greens aplenty started to move into the sunroom, where they will grow much more slowly over winter, but they will continue to grow. Last year, I grew the summer greens well into the following March, so hopefully I can do so again this year.
And, luckily, we are finally into profit mode for the garden. Even with the lackluster past couple of years, we are turning a profit with the gardening, which is certainly a help for that grocery bill even if I do still have to go shopping!
2012 Tally to Date
131.9665 lbs. total harvested
$195.62 value of harvest for August
$361.76 value of harvest for 2012
$196.65 expenditures for 2012
$165.11 profit to date
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