Weekly Garden Thread, Aug 27-Sept 02, 2007

We did manage to get six tenths of rain last weekend but it looks like I'm going to have to irrigate again this coming weekend. Our rainy season is very sporadic this year. Happened last year as well. Low hurricane activity in the Atlantic/Caribbean seems to equate to low rainfall across Florida, at least my part of it anyway.

I've still got some grapes on the vine that haven't matured yet, but I'm eating those fresh, the ones I can get away from the danged squirrels anyway. I've made all the jam I'm going to make from them for the year.

The squirrels also started eating my winter squash so I hurriedly harvested and processed them all. So many of them had bite marks that I decided not to try to keep them whole but just went ahead and made puree for the freezer.

If we can catch a day that stays under 90 I need to do some serious weeding and fertilizing in the orchard and start the garden cleanup. It's supposed to be pretty cloudy this coming weekend so maybe I'll get a chance at it.

How's the gardening week coming for you folks?

.....Alan.

[peacebaker]

We're over 15 inches of rain for the month! Today seems to be the last day with forecasted rain for a bit, so hopefully things can dry out a bit. We actually mowed twice in one week! (if you knew how much we like to mow, you'd know that was a rare occurance )

Funny thing--we have spring bulbs coming up! I think the unusual moisture has convinced them it's the wrong season! It will be strange to see what happens, will they bloom do you think?

We picked pumpkins this week, and our lone watermelon. I'm on a quest with the neighbors to gather enough grapes for jelly...

We've had some sun between rainstorms, and the tomatoes are starting up again. They seem to have adjusted to the water and are no longer splitting. Fall raspberries are continuing to produce enough for snacks.

[Ravenlost]

Garden's dead. I still have one eggplant with two eggplants on it and some peppers. Getting a scrawny tomato here and there. Mostly struggling to keep fruit trees and the strawberry bed alive. We've gotten less than an inch of rain this month and less than two inches in July. The grass is dead, even the weeds are wilting. Hopefully we'll get some rain tomorrow as they're giving us a 60 percent chance.

[MadAussieInUSA]

my garden is a grass patch. time to hoe it back under this weekend I think and do some slash and burn.

[Tirzah]

I am finally picking about 3-4 tomoatoes a day. Zucchini are also doing well. Each day I am harvesting green beans and yellow wax beans.

I was looking at my Cinderella pumpkins and it looks like something got ahold of one of them Probably a vole or mole or prairie dog) Off to the feed store for smoke bombs!

I am really looking foward to having a more organized and productive garden next year.

The growing season here is very short and late. Planting usually starts after Memorial Day for fear of frost .(from what everyone here says) and lasts until mid-late September Last year I was so excited when my tomatoes started ripening only to have that quelched when we got a frost I ended up with 20 pounds of tomatoes on my counter tops waiting to ripen.


Alan, what kind of grapes are you growing?

Muscadines and one muscadine cross (Southern Home). This is the first year they've made enough grapes that I could do anything with.

.....Alan.

[Lynne]

The tomatoes and squash are slowing down; cucumbers gave up the ghost weeks ago about the time I picked my last string beans. Peppers – sweet and hot – are still going strong. The fall planting of squash is starting to produce already and the second planting of string beans are blossoming. Figured out why I didn’t have any swiss chard the first planting – thought that I had weeded them – no, it was because the seed is not good. The second planting of chard has not germinated either. There some volunteer onions growing – guess I missed them when I pulled them earlier this summer. Planted some potatoes eyes last week from some that were sprouting in the pantry. The grapes are almost done and I have picked the last of the blackberries yesterday.
All in all I am pleased with what I have gotten from the garden this year since I didn’t buy anything this spring and only used left over seed from past years.

Adding that I did get a wheelbarrow load of gourds and pumpkin like things from the manure pile this year for fall decorations.