I spent the morning mowing the lawn. It’s a beautiful day here, and even riding the mower was a pleasure. I don’t often write about my lawn because I really don’t care that much about it. I’m not one of those people who think of the lawn as part of the garden. We don’t really do much to it except mow. Don’t get me wrong, I love the look of a lush, green, well-maintained lawn, but I don’t think a person needs to spend time and money to have that. It’s not worth it to me, I guess.
Well, with my son now in school, I’m back to the garden. It’s so hard to believe Labor Day is behind us. Late last week, I harvested the last of the cucumbers—enough to make one more batch of pickles that I haven’t actually made yet—and pulled up the vines. Zucchini plants bit the dust two weeks ago, so they got yanked, as well.
I just put my son on the bus for his first day of kindergarten. As is probably the same with all other mothers, my head is filled with mixed emotions. Part of me is so very proud of him, as he stepped onto that big bus like he owned the joint; another part is so sad to be loosing my best bud.
Stupid stinkbugs have ruined my corn! I was so excited to harvest my Jade Blue sweet corn, but when I peeled back the husk, the kernels are all shriveled and warped. The foliage is completely covered with stinkbugs and the white splotchy damage caused by their feeding.
We just picked our first two melons of the season and enjoyed them with our dinner. I couldn’t remember what kind they were so it was kind of thrilling to cut into them and find out what was inside. The outside looked nothing like a cantaloupe, but that’s exactly what the inside looked and tasted like, only not quite as sweet.
It’s been so very hot around here—too hot to do much more than water the garden. The deadheading remains undone for yet another week and the weeds continue to grow. Such is my garden in summer.
Ugh! The stink bugs are in full force now. I knew it would happen, but this is crazy! I have finally started harvesting my tomatoes, and they’re all covered in stink-bug nymphs. The skin and flesh of the fruits is completely corked from their feeding.
I harvested the first cucumbers of the season tonight—39 beauties! I could barely lift the basket when I was finished. I planted about five different cucumber varieties hoping that if some of them died from bacterial wilt, I would still have others continue to produce.
When you grow your own food, you can take steps to prevent food-borne illness from creeping into your crops. Here’s how.
I recently wrote an article on coleus for my weekly newspaper column in the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review and found out about a terrific mail-order company that I had never heard of before. Now, I have always liked coleus and I grow several different ones in my garden every year, but I had no idea how many hundreds of different cultivars there are out there and just how stunning some of them can be.
I headed to the raspberry patch last night to pick a few berries for dessert and couldn’t help but notice how alive the plants were. All sorts of insects were out and about and I was struck with how many different insects were in one 8- by 8-foot patch of brambles—and these were just the ones I could see!
Things are looking beautiful in the garden, thanks in large part to the sprinkler. It’s been terribly dry here, and I have been watering nearly everyday.
