What kind of gardener are you? I am the kind that likes to plant and tend, but harvesting is overwhelming. I would rather weed than pick produce, which means I often get distracted when out gathering the harvest. Maybe it is because gathering in only the beginning of hours in the kitchen. Weeding, on the other hand, has a sense of completion and bringing order.
Nonetheless, it is time to start really keeping an eye on the warm weather crops. My tomatoes are starting to turn pink. Little ½ by ¼ inch cucumbers are growing. Peppers are ripening.
My garlic was pulled almost 2 weeks ago. I researched storage options again and decided to try to dehydrate some of it, since it only stores optimally for 3-4 months. I do need to remember to set some aside for fall planting. I also just brought in all my patient onions. The tops had mostly dried up and the corn was making them hard to get to. I plan on dehydrating some of them and freezing some, to compare how I like to use them. (click on any photo to enlarge and view all photos at once)
Dear husband helped me by doing some garlic chopping in the living room theater again. Last year was the first time this processing venue was tried. It takes some of the tedium out of the chopping and some of the guilt out of being a couch potato. Not that I’m calling anyone a couch potato. He uses the term to refer to himself!
There is still insect control being attempted. I am definitely past the live and let live mentality for those destructive buggers. Some of them I can see and know when I am making a difference, but something is eating huge chunks out of the tops of my beautiful cabbages at night. I would expect a cotton tailed rodent to be more thorough, but I could be wrong. It did seem like the diatomaceous earth slowed them down some, whoever they are. I need to just go salvage what I can and make some coleslaw. I have some other cabbages maturing later that still look very good.
Some of the other things I have been doing are:
- Pulling spent and seeding larkspur plants. I’m sure enough seed has already dropped to the ground for next year’s display. Might as well avoid as much unnecessary thinning in the spring as I can.
- More hoses were repaired. Specifics on that in next Wednesday’s post.
- I watched little yellow birds eat seed from my volunteer sunflowers in the front chicken pen. (My edible sunflowers have just barely begun to open up)
I think they were Common Yellowthroats, but they never held still for very long! Can you see it in the middle, kind of upside down on the flower? -
The jalepeno plants interspersed among the petunias are loaded. The black tepary beans along the right hand side of the row have a way of looking delicate and robust all at the same time. Monitored frequent hawk activity low and directly over my whole acre.
- Caught another skunk.
- Learned more options for stripping romex wires thanks to my electrician! I only observed his method of carefully cutting a circle around the outer rubber casing, so haven’t tested to see if I have the strength to pull that long of wires out.
- Noticed that the fruit tree sapling that suffered weed whip damage looks very rejuvenated. My research indicated that there was nothing to be done that would help it, so I just had to wait and see if it healed itself.
- Enjoyed the visual of my black tepary beans that are interplanted with jalepenos and petunias. It seems to be a perfect combination in a great location, with everything thriving.
- pulled lots and lots of weeds and sort of tweaked my knee….
- Side stepped the hapharzard dive bombing by a neon mint green, lace winged bug.
neon mint green flying insect with no apparent destination
