A Year is Round...

     It's not Fall yet, but my garden is officially in "Fall" mode.  The temp hasn't gone much past 60 in the last few days.  My eldest has been complaining of the cold.  Poor kid really seems to be affected by the seasons here.  But more than the cold, my garden is now shaded all day.  All Day.  I was hoping the very edge would get a few more rays, since that's where my tomatoes are, but it just isn't going to happen.  So I'll be eating some green tomato food, I guess.  Whatever that ends up being.  I'm thinking fried and/or chutney...

The Bad:

• The birds ate all the slug bait out of my garden (twice) and with it all my carrot seed (twice).  I read in a couple of places that August was still not too late to replant with seed for an Autumn harvest.  So I did.  But I'm thinking there won't be enough sun to produce anything of consequence.
• I got a grand total of three large tomatoes to ripen, one of which was hollowed out by a slug and another was recently eaten by a deer.  

 This is where my deer eaten tomato used to live... =(

•  He also ate half of two green tomatoes...

Didn't learn from the first one, apparently...

• and then he danced in my carrot seedlings...

All those round divot marks are deer tracks!

• The 6 beets that grew out of the million or so I planted (birds again) are the size of golf balls.  
• The basil got devoured by slugs the instant I planted it and the parsley went to seed (shouldn't until the second year, shame on me for buying old plants).  
•  The garlic disappeared, I have no idea what happened to it.
•  I'm pretty sure some of my beans interbred.  I was supposed to have two beans with purple pods.  Out of four different kinds of beans, three had purple pods... Hmmm... This is only a "bad" thing because I plant heirlooms and now I don't know what this means for next year's beans... Probably nothing...  Except, you know, mutant beans. o.O
•  Neither of my pea plants made more than 6 peas.

The Good:

• I got a handful or two of cherry tomatoes this year which beats the zero I got last year.

• The chard went crazy this year.  I had one plant last year survive, but I got an entire row this year.
• The kale did beautifully this year, too.
• I got purslane to grow, finally!  (OK, I bought starts from the farmer's market, but hopefully it'll seed itself for next year.)
• I think one salsify plant survived.  If it is salsify and not grass, it should grow and spread on its own.
• The beans did pretty well considering they were under supported and got shaded out early by the tomatoes because I overestimated how fast the beans would grow and underestimated how fast the tomatoes would grow.

(These are supposed to be purple...)

• I had a volunteer tomato pop up and has even produced a few tomatoes.  They will never ever, ever ripen, but I admire its grit.  
• Ditto the volunteer vined thing that will never produce fruit big enough to tell whether it is a cucumber or a pumpkin or a squash.  I'm just happy it happened.
• I have a darling, beautiful, sweet little volunteer sunflower that bloomed this week.  I am in love with it. 

Conclusion:
Hope springs eternal

Additional Conclusion:

If a deer eats this, I'm buying a pellet gun.