Be it summer squash, cucumbers or Winter Squash or pie pumpkins, my hay bale, rollout, hill, dryland planting Squash bed has outdone itself.. without a single doubt in my mind, it was the rock star of my garden this year.. my main garden got flooded out time after time, my one hugelculture did ok, and the new round bale one is coming along but it was done this spring, and so it won’t really come into its own till next year..

But this bed, was in a perfect spot, it got full sun, it got shelterbelts on both sides, it had around 1500 square feet before it hit the tree’s and being squash it just ran up them and around them for more sun!

Now the thing that did surprise me was that for the winter squashes, I didn’t get nearly as many as I should have considering the amount of blooms and vines, (but there is a second harvest out there still growing at this time) but what I did get is the weight.. while I might not have gotten as many large numbers as I expected, I got huge size.. massive, as in pretty much everything is at least double or in some cases triple in size compared to normal in my main garden.

Pound for pound, this garden just rocked it! Bring on the squash recipes, counties, benches, and all kinds of spare spots in the main floor are filled with curing winter squashes and pie pumpkins.. it feels so good to see them, that is food for the next six to eight months.. awesome!