Gardening where there isn't much summer...

    When we lived in Utah, where the summers are long and hot, I grew a huge garden with everything imaginable in it.  Fresh garden tomatoes are one of the best foods in the world.  I learned how to can, and freeze, dehydrate, and put up all the excess to eat during the winter.  It was work I enjoyed very much.
    Then we moved to Montana.  At first we tried to grow a big garden, but it didn't take very long to figure out that things are different here.  After a few years of failure, I gave up for a while.  Not long ago, we decided to give it another shot.  My husband put in a great rain water collection system for watering, and built me a big raised garden bed.  We planted seeds, of crops we knew would grow here.  I also put in two tomato plants (wishful thinking).  The radishes were delicious.  The beets have grown well, and I've already done one batch of sweet pickled beets.  Yum!  Lettuce, good, carrots, good.  Beans?  We chose to do pole beans, something we've never done before.  They wouldn't budge past 5 inches high.  I'd mostly given up on them for the year, vowing to amend the soil and try again next year. 
    This morning I discovered about a third of the row, on the west end, has started to climb and grow.  Go figure!  I have no idea why that section of plants has suddenly realized its purpose after months of stagnation, but I'm not complaining.  My daughter and I drove posts, and ran twine, and now I'll sit back and cheer on the vines.

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