I snapped a few photos this morning while having some coffee and getting ready for work. Our tomatoes are doing well, the peppers suffered every hardship after planting them outside you can imagine. Bugs, mold, a dog pissing on them, I have a half dozen or so left. I am heart broke!
Everything we direct sewed has sprouted, cucumbers, pumpkins, melons, okra and squash. My wife planted some herbs too and they have sprouted although I don't think they are very visible in the picture. She plants them in an old galvanized wash tub. This is pretty popular here in the south, but also popular is planting them in left over plastic containers that cattle feed comes in. She planted thyme, dill, parsley, cilantro and a couple others. We mostly make sure to plant the ones we will need for canning.
My garden is a raised bed, (sort of), that we built. It has a nice treated lumber wooden fence around it. At the moment the spring rains have turned it into a real mud hole and it went from no weeds, to covered in them in less than 2 weeks time. Will do some cultivating soon. Order some neem oil also, it looks like I may need it. I did add quite a bit of cow manure but other than that (and the few hand fulls of bone meal) I never do much else. I do check the pH usually, by mixing 100 grams of DI water with 100 grams of soil. Here in Arkansas almost all of our soil could benefit from some lime, although unless I'm planting onions I don't worry about it too much because it's pretty damn close to perfect where I live. I live in the Arkansas River Valley and the soil is very rich, drains well and has a desirable pH. An old trick if your soil pH is a little on the high side, dump the ashes from your grill in the garden. I will most likely add some 5-5-5 fertilizer when the plants just start to produce, but I never use much.
I am looking forward to the cucumbers so much! I love them just plain, not even peeled. I planted the Burpless hybrid. Pickling cucumbers are nice, as they stay firm when you ferment or can them, but they are gross raw, (tough skin and slightly bitter).
Pass, I wouldn't recommend water bath canning those fermented peppers for dry storage, (not sure if that's what you meant you were going to do after they ferment), in order for them to be technically safe the salt and pH have to be at certain levels. You could safely pressure can them though. Plenty of folks do water bath can fermented veggies, and I think your chances of actually getting sick are about as good as being struck by lightning, just thought I would mention it, I'm sure you've already heard that spill. I don't know if I'll be fermenting any of my peppers this year as I'm barely going to have enough to eat fresh, let alone make salsa. I will ferment cucumbers though, but I will also water bath can some too, along with okra, mmmmmmm love some pickled okra.