It’s been another blustery week here in Central Missouri. Rain, rain, and more rain. Lots of wind. Big mess but no expensive damage.
I dug the last of the Yukon Gold spuds yesterday. Should have done it sooner. Lots of nice taters half eaten by vermin.
Pole beans are flourishing. Been picking every third day. Got two gallons on Saturday.
The 2nd planting of sweet corn is up ~5” tall. With a bit of luck it will be ready to harvest before we get a hard freeze.
I didn’t plant any zucchini in the spring so I’m thinking that I should stick some seeds in the dirt for a fall crop. No zucchini means none of Mrs. Augie’s zucchini bread during the winter and that just won’t do!
Cukes are done. Spaghetti squash are junk. Vermin chewed all of the Ambrosia cantaloupes. Every tomato that was past the breaker stage exploded from all the rain that we’ve had lately. I loaded the wheelbarrow yesterday and gave them all to the chickens.
I pulled all of the torn up plastic film off of the hoop house yesterday. I’ll wait until the weather cools a bit before installing a new piece.
I’m going to take some cuttings from a couple tomato plants after work today and see if I can get some new ones going for the fall.
A few of the cuttings I took from my Arkansas Black apple tree after the wind broke it off are starting to show signs of root nodule growth. A buddy of mine has a mature Arkansas Black in his orchard and is doing an air layer process on a couple of small branches so if my cuttings all fail to root I’ve got a backup plan that doesn’t involve sending money to Stark Bros.
“I’ve got a backup plan that doesn’t involve sending money to Stark Bros...”
I used to crack up when people would ask me for grafting supplies at my garden center. Yeah. Sure. I’m in the business of SELLING you fruit trees, NOT in helping you make your own for FREE! ;)
I was polite and professional. My standard response was, ‘We have so FEW requests for those items that we don’t carry them. Now, let me tell you all about this latest and greatest apple tree.’ ;)
I've never had a problem with anything eating my taters, including some I find the next year. Still perfectly good eating after 8-9 months in the ground too. I didn't plant any this year but had three volunteers pop up from tubers left in the ground last year. I've got some store bought Yukons starting to sprout and I've got some leftover compost from the truck load I bought. Might just put them together and try for some Fall taters.
We lost electric a few times over the past few weeks. Looking at the co-op outage map and it's been anywhere from 10-20% outage on every storm. Thousands out.
Creeks that were down to trickles are back up to a good flow. It wasn't until the last rain that I had tomatoes split.
Mid 70s right now so I guess I'll go build a goat shed.
Re: Potatoes.
Remember when ‘Yukon Gold’ was the New-New Thing and everyone wanted them, but no one sold them commercially, yet?
Well, we moved out wood pile, and of course it left behind an AWESOME spot of rich humus, just PERFECT for growing potatoes. I got a hold of those Yukon Golds and planted away.
Everything was fine for us until harvest. You’d dig up a hill and those were the most GORGEOUS mouth-watering potatoes for 100 miles around. But, turn each one over and they were totally demolished on one side.
Lesson Learned. The vermin that lived in and under the woodpile returned to defeat us! :(
But, that was the one and only time that ever happened in all my decades of tater growing. ;)
This year I planted an 8x4’ bed of ‘German Butterball.’ The plants are dying back now, so I’m going to dig around in there and see what I’ve got that’s ready to harvest.
Is there SOME REASON that everything is ready at the same time? Yeesh! I’ve got more grapes than ever before - they’ve loved this dry season. Tomatoes are coming on fast and furious, as are the peppers and Jalapenos. I have peaches up to my ears, and I’m dreading the future apple harvest!
Wasn’t I the one that insisted on making life EASIER for herself as she aged? I need Minions! :)