Summer Harvest

This year I'm re-evaluating some things, and evaluating the new ones.  

I haven't had any luck with melons in the past and had given up on planting the.  But then, for some reason, this year I tried a canteloupe type melon I'd never heard of:  French Charentais.  This one is the variety 'Savor'.  I read that you know when to harvest them because the tendril associated with the melon will dry up.  I was watching closely. What they didn't say was, the melon will suddenly turn yellowish all over all at once, and that's your clue to get them before the wonderful aroma attracts raccoons and bunnies to eat them about halfway - enough that you won't want what's left.  Experience is the best teacher for some things, eh?

It's been a very nice melon with firm flesh and a mild, musky flavor.  The plants I put inside a large tomato cage produced several nice-size melons, and the ones that I left free on the compost hill didn't produce much at all.  Of course, they weren't watched over and watered like the ones in the cages inside the garden proper.

French Charentais melon 'Savor'

I think I'll plant two cages worth next year and leave the compost pile for something else.  Maybe compost.  

I harvested what will be the last of the rhubarb for this year.  Three whole plants have given up the ghost.  One more looked like a goner, too, but has put up a couple new little leaves .  I don't know if the others will try to come back next year or not.  The aggravating thing is that one of them was the beautiful red-stemmed plant I paid $10 for this spring.

The packet of 'Rainbow' bell peppers I purchased from Morgan County Seeds said it was going to be an assortment of various colored sweet bell peppers.  Not knowing which seed would produce which color, I just started a few and set them out.  One plant has small dark purple bells that are almost black, and the others all seem to have large fruits that are themselves a sort of rainbow color.  They may have turned red or orange if I left them longer, but they look like they're ready to start drying up, so I harvested them.  Juicy and mild flavored, and very pretty.

I think I'll forego planting zucchini next year.  When I grow them in the cages, they tend to be misshapen, but when I let them sprawl, they take up way too much space.  Also, they're always heavily infested with squash bugs.  This year I tried sprinkling the plants with diatomaceous earth which is supposed to kill soft-bodied insects that crawl across it.  Maybe it would work with worms, but it didn't seem to interfere with the squash bugs.  It did, however, make an unsightly white mess on the plants.

Also, the plants I've put out the last three years have borne fruits that are mostly green after the first couple of yellow ones are harvested.  (Even though they have names like: 'Easy Pick Gold' and 'Golden Squash'.  For now, I have enough frozen from last year for winter soups, and I've frozen some more from this year.  I'd rather use the space next year for another planting of melons.

The extreme heat has done a number on the tomato plants, as I feared it would.  Actually, I thought I might not get any tomatoes at all.  They did set fruit early, and I've gotten several nice fruits.  But then, they just put on tons of lush foliage.  

One of the free packets of seed I got from Baker Creek was a tomato called 'Black Vernissage'.  I set out a couple of plants on the compost hill just for the heck of it, even though the reviews weren't all that great.  It's a pretty little speckled salad-size tomato (in the picture below they're next to a 'Missouri Pink Love Apple' normal size tomato for comparison).  The taste isn't anything special, so I won't be taking up any more space for those in the future.

 As for the cherry tomatoes which I collected seed from my neighbor last year:  I planted out two plants from the seeds of large golden, super sweet cherry tomatoes, and one produced (smaller) golden tomatoes, but the other produced red ones.  You never know what you might get from collecting hybrid seeds.

Not even the ones from the purchased packet of 'Sun Gold' grew to much size, and none of them are super sweet like the neighbor's were last year.  I can't judge them this year, though, because it's been such a brutal year weather-wise.

One thing I didn't have much of this year - thank goodness, and surprisingly - was tomato hornworms.  Here's one I did manage to overlook until it grew gigantic.  

Sadly for her (I'm guessing), she didn't live long enough to lay eggs.  Or, at least, I didn't see any.

The sunflower seeds I planted were pictured as something quite interesting, and unique.  This is the picture from Johnny's Seeds of 'Sunfill Purple':

Neat, isn't it?

Here's what all of mine look like:

Slightly different.

I've had to fight Japanese beetles on the okra so much that I'm not getting to harvest a lot.  Spraying with Sevin means you can't harvest for three days, and in that time, the pods can easily get too big.  I figured I could use them for seeds next year, but I've decided I hate fighting those beetles too much.  This year, the farm land that's way too close to my garden is planted in corn, and the beetles aren't attracted to that, but last year it was soybeans, and they came in hordes. Horrendous, horrible hordes. Next year it will be beans again, and so I think I'll not even bother giving them okra to boot.  So sad.  I do like okra.  Maybe every other year.

Foregoing okra won't help with the roses though.  The nasty little buggers love roses maybe more than anything.  In order to have any flowers at all, I have to keep spraying with Sevin, which leaves a white residue on the leaves, and even at that, it's nearly impossible, because they burrow down between petals.  And this is what just a few will leave within an hour or so:

And when this many attack, it's a matter of minutes until there's nothing left but a nub:

Makes me so mad.  If I want roses while the beetles are present (from June through September!) - and I do - I have to spray the buds with toxic insecticide as soon as they start to show color, then spray them again when they begin to open, and then cut them and bring them indoors when they're open enough to keep opening.  Grrrrr.

I'm going to look for an insecticide that will kill them which has a different mode of action from Sevin next year, as I've already sprayed that three years in a row, and I'm concerned about the development of resistance.  

But, on the bright side, I have been getting some pretty bouquets: 

'Neptune'

'Dark Desire' and 'Winter Sun' with white Lisianthus

'Neptune' and 'Winter Sun' with blue Delphiniums, 

purple Yarrow, and purple Lisianthus

'Neptune' and 'Winter Sun' with blue Delphiniums, 

purple Yarrow, and purple Lisianthus

The Queen Lime series of zinnias has also made for some lovely bouquets (and the Japanese beetles don't care for them as much).

And, glory of glories, we're having a spell of normal hot summer weather - in the 80s!  What a relief.

 Cheers.

If this keeps up, we'll become a desert

No rain.  Temperatures every day in the upper 90s.  Fortunately, the nights are in the low 70s - for a little while.

I'm getting anxious to try one of those French melons.

Cucumbers are plentiful, and the vines still look good on the trellis.  I thought they might be browning by now.

The runner beans I planted to grow over top of the cucumbers to produce beautiful pink blossoms didn't do it.  I don't see any signs of the few flowers they did have producing any beans, either.  So, I'm grateful that the cucumbers look so good.

Tomatoes are starting to ripen, but the plants are lush with foliage and not many tomatoes. No doubt, from the extreme heat ever since the first of May.  The peppers are doing the same.   I wasn't going to plant 'Moskvich' tomatoes again next year because they were supposed to be early and late both.  They aren't very big, and they weren't early.  Hopefully, they'll go on producing late. On the other hand, they're pretty tasty, and look at their beautiful red color.

Left: 'Moskvich'; right: 'Missouri Pink Love Apple'

I may have to reconsider.

The okra is producing, but I didn't plant much this year.  I have to spray it for Japanese beetles periodically, much to my dismay.

The 'Violaceo di Verona' cabbage plants grew huge but failed to produce heads.  I have a second planting of that variety and 'Kalibos' as well, and I'm hoping they'll decide to form heads in early fall.  I did get a few nice heads of 'Early Jersey Wakefield' but I didn't start any new ones for fall harvest.

Onions are all harvested and drying in the cellar.  I have a fan on them in hopes they'll cure without rotting, which has plagued me in previous years.  The lack of rain didn't hurt them any. 

The garlic is also all harvested.  I don't plan on growing it again, as I never get big enough cloves to make it worthwhile.  They were better this year than previous ones, though.

Beets still look good.  I pickled two pints the other day and have had some nice helpings of steamed greens.

I have to go out by 6:00 am to be able to stand doing any work at all.  Fortunately, with the type of no-till, dense planting I do, there aren't many weeds at this point, and there is minimal work necessary aside from harvesting.  And watering.

Several days ago, I stumbled upon a rather large blacksnake in the garden.  I gave her a wide berth, and she sat still with her head up and tongue flicking.  After a few days, I forgot about her.  And then one day I started turning over the soil in the empty onion bed and turned up ten eggs.  They're leathery and kind of squishy - rubbery - at the same time.  Much larger than I would have imagined.

I hope I got them all.  I know snakes are beneficial, but I really, really don't appreciate running onto them unexpectedly nor having them near the house, so I confess to dumping the eggs in the pond.  Do snapping turtles eat snake eggs?  Will the mother come back looking for them?

The cut flower garden is lush with beautiful blooms, and the roses are doing the best they can in the presence of Japanese beetles but require regular Sevin sprays to do it.  For some reason, the beetles don't bother the red roses or the little 'Acropolis' blooms.  They're particularly fond of the yellow roses.  Yellow seems to be an attractive color to many insects.

Queen Lime zinnias, 'Acropolis' roses, onion blossoms, 

Perovskia, Delphinium, with Baptisia & Lupine foliage

The Stargazers are fabulous.

All in all, things are pretty darned good considering the lack of rain.

The long, hot summer

This unrelenting, oppressive heat may be preventing me from being out in the garden, but the garden is happily taking good care of itself.

The cucumbers on either side of the entry arch have met each other at the top, and the cucumbers have been plentiful.

All the onions have been harvested and are drying out in the cellar.  Well, that's the idea, anyway.  The cellar is quite humid.  

The lima beans are now setting fruit.

The 'Savor' French melon cage is covered with vines.

Can't wait to get into those melons.  

The 'Bull's Blood' beets are lovely.  The greens are delicious steamed with a little vinegar in the water, and the beetroots are mildly sweet.  This variety has performed the best for me, but they don't make a dark red liquid when canned like the 'Shiraz Tall Top' and 'Detroit Red' varieties.

Insect pressure hasn't been so high this year, but the manageable Japanese beetle population is no doubt due to the fact that soybeans aren't planted up near the garden this year.  That doesn't mean I don't have to keep after them, and I missed this little rose: 

Another rose showed this funny feeding pattern:

That's a sign of leaf cutter bees.  Unlike the Japenese beetles, however, I won't try to stop them. They're pollinators.

While we're on the presence of insects, I got this shot of a tiger swallowtail on the monarda in the wildflower garden.

I won't be planting Zi Su again.  I didn't think much of the taste.  The leaves are pretty, but slightly hairy, and they taste like what I imagine weeds might taste.  I thought they might make pretty inclusions in cut flower arrangements, but they drooped and wilted quickly.

Purple Zi Su and red-veined dock

Foreground: Queen Lime zinnias and marigolds; mid-ground: lima beans and cabbage;

background left: beets, right: zi su

At last, the spicey bush basil is making a nice little hedge, and the 'Red Rubin' and 'Purple Ruffles' basil is finally filling in behind it.

The tomatoes are lush and full.  Several large green ones are on each plant.  It may be a long time before they're red, since, according to something I read, they ripen between the temperatures of 50 and 80 degrees.  The weatherman says it's going to cool down this weekend - to 88!

'Copia'

'Carbon'

 Foreground left: lima beans; right: carrots

Background: tomatoes

 
The cherry tomatoes - 'Sungold' and some from seeds I saved from a neighbor's garden last year - are producing tasty little orange-gold fruit.  They're a nice size on the plants in the garden, but quite small in the large pot I have on the patio.

The roses are doing well, but I have to keep them sprayed with Sevin to keep the Japanese beetles from destroying them.  I'm going to try a different insecticide next year for two reasons: 1) insects can become resistant to insecticides that use the same method of toxicity, and I've already used Sevin for three years in a row; and 2) Sevin leaves a white residue that's obvious on the leaves and on the dark colored roses.

'Grande Amore'

'Dark Desire'

'Dark Desire'

'Shazam!'

The cut flower garden is lush and lovely.

'Delphiniums' and 'Globe amaranth'

'Black Pearl' ornamental pepper

Queen Lime zinnias, clockwise from top left:  'Red Heart', 'Blush', 'Red'

Queen Lime assortment

Queen Lime zinnias, Zi Su, Perovskia, 'Red Rubin' basil

 Til next time, take care in this heat.