Posted on 08/26/2011 10:14:53 AM PDT by Red_Devil 232
Good afternoon gardeners. I hope all of you in the path of Irene heed the warnings and please stay safe! Not much gong on garden wise here in East Central Mississippi. I am just waiting to see how a few paste tomatoes do. And while I am waiting I decided to use some of my pears to make preserves. I am using the recipe I posted on last weeks thread, which calls for a little activity and a lot of waiting. I will be doing the final canning step this morning. This recipe may be way to sweet for my taste. So with all this waiting time I had, I needed to fill the time some how so I ordered a Beer making kit, which I understand includes a lot of waiting also. Now I am just waiting for FR to come back up so I can post this week’s thread. I have been doing a lot of waiting and it is tiring.
If you are a gardener or you are just starting out and are in need of advice or just encouragement please feel free to join in and enjoy the friendly discussion. Our Freeper community is full of gardeners, each with varying interests and skill levels from Master Gardener to novice.
I hope all your gardens are flourishing.
Perhaps these?
Cucumber, Lemon
HEIRLOOM. Lemon yellow cucumbers are tender and sweet, excellent for salads and pickling.
65 days. The 3-4” round and lemon yellow cucumbers are tender and sweet, excellent for salads and pickling. Normal-sized vines yield heavily and for a long time.
http://www.burpee.com/vegetables/cucumbers/specialty-cucumbers/cucumber-lemon-prod000691.html
Weyused to know all about that in Milwaukee, but either all the breweries have gone away, or they use different equipment. I remember when you used to smell the beer downtown from the freeway. Then the next aroma was chocolate, but the chocolate factory moved away too.
I need to post some pics of my Black Cherry tomato plant. It is on a trellis that I made a few years back. If it was stretched out to full length it would be about 15 to 16 ft in height. So far we have gotten several pounds of tomatoes off of it and have many more to go.
Quick recap: I have a spot on my land with a serious erosion problem. “Spot” may be a misnomer, it's between 3-10 feet across, and runs horizontally almost the entire width of the property. The soil is so full of clay that the day after a rainstorm, you can stick your hand in there and make pottery. It's facing south, and when the sun shines on it, the whole side of the hill bakes to a brick-like consistency, and when it rains everything that isn't solidly rooted gets washed away.
The chia seed's husk absorbs several times it's weight in water and forms a thick, sticky mucilage. In it's native environment (the southwest desert) this allows it to stick to the sides of sandstone rocks, where it grows. This is what inspired the “chia pets” you sometimes see in the store. My idea was to use this same stickiness and drought-resistance to control the erosion on my hill. I bought 2 pounds of chia seeds from a local health-foods store, mixed it with several borderline-invasive perennials like mints and other herbs (as well as several “free with your order” seeds that I've collected but wouldn't normally use), then soaked in water until they formed a thick sludge, and slung it at the eroded spot on my hill. This was several weeks ago. Wednesday was the first chance I'd had to see how they were doing. It looks like my coverage of the hill could have been a little more even, the chia was growing in stripes and splash patterns, but it was growing!!! And, mixed in here and there, were tiny baby perennials that the chia had sheltered enough to take root. Hopefully, the perennials will spread and hold the hillside in place, now that the chia is helping them get established.
On the way back, i stopped at a little store that specializes in locally-grown food, and was astonished to find they didn't have any cucumbers or zucchinis on their shelves! I told them about my Italian zucchinnis, and they're going to talk about it and might be willing to buy some off me. My two little zucchini vines seem to have learned the reputation zucchinis have, and they're trying to make up for their slacking earlier in the season. i might also see if they'd like to buy my cucumbers, they're long and spiny, but they're also sweet and burpless. I have trouble with digesting plants, so I kind of have to ration myself, and they're producing faster than I can eat them.
If you do not have- get a canning guide put out by your extension office, or buy a Ball or Kerr canning book. Did your pressure canner have any canning recipes?
How do we know it is pretty darn fine stuff, I think we should be able to test it out to make sure it is.
I’ve read that some jellies and preserves take up to two weeks to set. They may turn out fine. They sure look beautiful.
gotta love country life
Goodness you need a crash course in how to butcher cows that anialate green and growing. I can’t spell the word but you get the idea.
As a matter of fact, I joked with their owner when he called to tell us he was moving them off the property that I didn’t have time to talk to him at the moment; I still had a dozen cows to finsh butchering. LOL
They pay our property taxes, and keep the pastures ‘mowed’; and he keeps the rest of the fencing repaired.
Funny you should mention “testing” it. The collage aged son occasionally goes to wine tasting parties thrown by his contemporaries.
They all bring along store brought wines, he always brings one of my husbands. Our wines usually get second place, which I’d bet would be first place if those young folks didn’t know it was home made.
Your preserves look wonderful! The color is truly amazing! A similar thing occurred to me once when I was making peach jam. Never figured it out but it didn’t affect the taste one bit. Good job!
Home made is normally the best, still waiting for a the test pint.
The thing with beer making is you have to WAIT for the beer to age in the bottle or keg.
If it tastes bitter and think you have a bad batch, let it age for another week or more and I guarantee you it gets better with age.
Use brown bottles, not clear or even green...if you have to use other than brown, keep it in the dark or it will skunk on you.
I tried wine a couple of times, worked out well, but I prefer beer. I love the smell of grain that permeates through the house...LOL!!!
WAIT I can not wait I love beer too much.
When I was making beer big time I always had 4 batches going.
One being made, one being transferred for clarity, one being bottled/kegged and one being consumed.
Worked out well and if it wasn’t for friends I would have been drinking 20 gallons a month. Oh My!
Gloom, despair and agony on me-e!
Deep dark depression, excessive misery-y!
If it weren't for bad luck
I'd have no luck at all!
Gloom, despair and agony on me-e-e!"
Two attempts to translant cucumbers for the Fall gave me 18 dead seedlings almost overnight! And, I transplanted them into wet, well-prepared ground behind the struggling bell pepper plants to protect them against the afternoon sun. My Fall celebrity and bhn-444 tomatoes outgrew their 1-gallon pots. Four of the six had flowers. I put them in 15-gallon containers. The flowers shriveled up and two have caught some kind of leaf mold. The only things doing well are my three pineapple plants. If they ever produce a pineapple, that won't be for another year or so. I'm afraid to plant my pole beans, Georgia collards, and Ichiban eggplants.
Gloom, despair and agony on me-e!
Deep dark depression, excessive misery-y!
If it weren't for bad luck
I'd have no luck at all!
Gloom, despair and agony on me-e-e!"
But, hope springs eternal in drought sticken, heat scorched San Antonio.
Stopped by Shultz Nursery on Broadway this afternoon. Picked up a Diva and three General Lee cucumber plants, each with vines stretching out nearly two feet. Let's see if old Mr. Sun can kill those!
Meanwhile, have Katana, Virginia Sweets, Jetsetter and 4th of July tomatoes trying to survive in their 1-gallon pots. Plus, a tray of bell and jalapeno pepers and a tray of baby cucino, Shoyu Long, and MCI hybrid cucumbers.
If I don't run out of seeds, maybe when this heat spell finally breaks I'll get the chance to sing, "Oh, happy day!"
Our gardens have done well here in Southwest Virginia. It has been a little dry, and some of our beans have been tough. Is this from a lack of water? There are still lots of good ones, so it may be because of something else.
We have had bushels of cucumbers, squash, beans, and tomatoes. We grew extra thinking that neighbors without jobs could use it. I guess times are not as hard as we thought. Or maybe food stamps replace the need to gather. Whatever.
“We grew extra thinking that neighbors without jobs could use it”
Sadly, I think people are just too stuck up to eat home grown food.
Thanks handmade! I’ll read the squash bug lit from UofN. I sell at the local farmer’s market and all the natural growers here have been slammed this year with the squash bugs. (Area: Northern AZ).
I finally broke down and opened a can of whoop-ass poison to save my other pumpking patch. None of the organic methods made a dent. They did well for the other pests like the tomato hornworms. Used Bt and smote them.
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