Tuesday Harvest? 9.3.13

You know when a Holiday falls on a Monday it throws me all kinds of out of whack!

 

It's like Monday just doesn't exist or something. Don't get me wrong. I'm OK with this fact. It means I've had one less day sitting behind my desk at work. ;-)

 

This past weeks harvest is kind of important though so I wanted to tell you about it. Not in so much as what I harvested but what I didn't harvest.

 

My blackberry bushes are forming berries again. The second crop is always much smaller than the first. I'm pretty good with this as it's usually sweeter as well. The larger berries are better for juice/jelly and such but these berries are better for fresh eating.

To wit - this is the only berry I managed to remember to take a picture of. This time of year the stalks are longer and weep closer or even all the way to the ground so it's a fight with the chickens over these if I forget to tie them up before I let the hens out for the afternoon over the weekends.

Not to mention I have to fight with the kids and myself over not just popping them in our mouths and eating them. Actually getting them inside for a picture is a feat in itself. This one got mangled on the way in. Then no one wanted to eat it because it wasn't as pretty. Well - boo hoo to them. It still tasted just as good!

 

 

 

It being September means the sweet potatoes have been in the ground for seven months now and I like to pull them up sometime between September and October. So I rooted around and found a few potatoes. What I found wasn't very encouraging. So I stripped the plants of any formed potatoes. My hope is that if I give the plants another 6 weeks I might have a last round of sweet potatoes to carry me through. What I got out form under the plants? 10 pounds of extremely split sweet potatoes and about 2 and a half pounds of usable ones. I also got a rogue carrot, and a snake skin. LOL. Never know what you'll find in such dense vegetation 'round here!

Split potato in front (vast majority were this way) only usuable ones in back. Snake skin and carrot on table, too. The kids thought it was funny that the little carrot formed. It wasn't bad considering it was a summer carrot. The shade from the heavy foliage must have helped the carrot but it was still rather bitter. Snake looks like a rat snake or garter. Both are very common here.

 

Last but certainly not least the eggs. This is what my eggs looked like this past week on Friday...

 

I had been getting 3 every day. Just like usual with a skip by the large bird about once a week, sometimes twice. She's not meant to lay 7 days a week so that's just not a shock there.

 

Friday, Saturday and Sunday I got 2 eggs a day and this is what the nest looked like:

 

Oh, my. I guess we know what is going on here. It's just that time of year after all. Thankfully for my birds they are going to be getting naked while it's still quite warm out. I feel bad for the birds up north that get naked when it's so cool at night, and even in the SNOW! BRRRRr..... Yesterday, on Monday? Only one egg. So it looks like egg production is down, feather production is up and my birdies will be looking rather disheveled for a while. I'm hoping it won't take too long. I'm also hoping it will set little Miss red on her rear! She's been pecking on Dusty when she's in the nest box and has managed to pick all of her neck feathers out. It would be good if this helped to change her temperament a little bit. *crossing fingers* If not I'll be buying two chicks in the spring to replace her and while my soup pot will be fat the hen house will get skinny. LOL. Just don't tell the kids. I don't mind them knowing where our food comes from, but these hens are their pets. After all they watch us quarter the hogs and deer. Meat and butchering is not a surprise to them.

 

Ah, so that was my Labor Day weekend. We enjoyed ourselves, puttered around the garden. Replanted the corn that didn't come up...(Oh, yes that is another post)  This week I'll tear out the squash that just up and died on me. *pout* and the circle of garden life continues on.

 

See you soon!

 

Barbie~

 

 

Harvest Monday 8.29.11

Welcome back to Harvest Monday! I'm joining in at Daphne's once again to see what everyone is harvesting and how people are using their harvest all over the world. Be sure to stop by and check it out!

This weeks harvest again focuses on dry beans:

As well as a few hot peppers and lima beans.

I also managed to get a single Brazilian cherry. It was sweet, and juicy and.... all alone. The other 3 fell off the tree while still green. I wish my tree was bigger but for now it is a tiny little bush, and I'm almost positive the fallen fruit had something to do with a soccer ball and 2 rambunctious little boys. LOL. I didn't stop to take a picture as I popped that sucker into my mouth, but I did think to split it into thirds for each of the kids to taste. EVERYONE loved it. So now it is up to me to save this tree over the winter and protect it with blankets and Christmas lights. :-)

This week I also processed the last Lakota squash:

10 cups of beautiful sweet puree ready for pies, muffins and assorted fall baking goodies, and a cup and a half of seeds cleaned and ready to go! The seed cavity was relatively small, and this puree was without a doubt the least watery, while not the sweetest it was the least stringy of all the winter pumpkins I have ever grown. This squash will have a place in my garden from now on! Those seeds are big and meaty, too. Now I have more than enough to save, trade and eat! :-D

We are still getting rain daily so yesterday I ventured out to plant some Kurdora carrots. Between the heat and rain the only kind I thought might hold up. Thanks Dianne for the seeds! My broccoli is beginning to head up just as anticipated but it looks like tiny heads for me. I guess pushing boundaries heat wise will leave me wanting something. In this case perhaps size. But the fact that the plants are producing at all makes me happy. I'll keep you posted on flavor in the coming weeks.

The excessive rains killed back my cucumbers once again. I may have to start growing them indoors. As for 'Diva' I am completely unimpressed. 3 cucumbers on 2 vines does not a happy gardener make. So much for 'large fruit set' I'd rather take a paint brush to my picklers and get a better harvest. HUMPH! On to another trial for me. If only I had a sun room.

'Till next time!

Barbie~

A comparison. Finally!

Well, I should have yet another picture to show you to add to these comparison shots, but it decided to actually storm last night so I was unable to get the picture for you. I suppose that is all fine and dandy as the look won't change much from now until harvest as the coloration is pretty well set now.

These are the Lakota squash from 3 weeks ago. I had 6 set on the vine...

 

 

I take that back. Apparently I had five! My guess is that the sixth squash either showed signs of not taking or had already begun to wither and abort when I took the first set of pictures.


These initial pictures were taken somewhere around May 13th - 18th.

The second set of pictures were taken June 3rd. So just shy of 3 weeks later....


Unfortunately most of the fruit has aborted, but the 2 remaining fruit are both already larger than 'maturity size' that is listed at 5lbs max size on the label for this variety. Of course i've done research since they have set and found that most people say they reach larger proportions that use good gardening techniques. The smaller size is generally a 3 sisters planting in an undressed field. Poor little squashes. Nobody loves them.

Anywho.... here are the 2 remaining squash as of last week....

Now the trick will be to outsmart the pickleworm (and other assorted blasted creepy crawlies) until I can bring these beauties in!

Any helpful hints, anyone? My goal is for these to be for my fall decorations. They are the perfect size - just like bowling balls and the orange has really come through now with the yellow fading back. I'm so excited - it's like... like.... the GREAT PUMPKIN CHARLIE BROWN!

Seriously. I've grown pumpkins before. Grew them last year. We made pies and cakes and breads from them, but these... these are cool. They are different and even though they may not be as good of eating as my Jarrahdales of past. The kids are really getting a kick out of them and I love that they are unique for my fall display. I believe they are a medium hardshell squash like a butternut or acorn so I have hope that they will store well into fall. After all I should be posting next week about using my last fall pumpkin from last year. :-D Just in time to make room for these in a few more weeks.

OKAY- so I am completely willing to go NON organic to keep these pumpkin/squash beautiful and wormie/hole/pest free. Give it to me. What is the best defense? All around I mean? Protect the plant and the fruit as well. I mean, we won't be eating the skin so I don't feel too bad using a pesticide - plus it will be four months and at least 3 of those months will be spent sitting inside pestiside free. :-D After being washed outside with a bleach solution of course.

Stay tuned for a bloom post. Coming soon!

'Till next time!

Barbie~

The newest update.

In pictures of course. Because I'm hot or cold with them. Either all or nothing, and today you get 'em all! Well, gardening ones anyway.

I came home the other day with this lovely basket. All for the sake of sharing a little knowledge, and a lot of wind (talk, not toots!)  with a friend of mine. I sent him home to his wife with a grab bag full of seeds all labeled with when to plant and what would tolerate the frosts and what wouldn't, etc. I certainly didn't expect this, and now turn abouts fair play - if anyone is looking for the best AFLAC agent in Florida just let me know and I'll be glad to send you his info. :-) His wife C. made this basket by hand. Talk about talent. OK she didn't hand weave the thing, but she put it all together and made such a wonderful presentation. I can't wait to find the perfect place to put a few of these things, and the Burt's Bees already managed to find a place, my purse! :-D

Now, for the garden side. It's the end of April now so the cooler season crops have all dwindled down. I expect that the very last peas will be brought in on Saturday. All what, three, five? of them that are left. In their place I'll need to decide quickly if I will plant the limas or the black beans, or the cow peas, or.... *sigh* such cramped spaces is bad this time of year. In the winter it's good because I don't do a lot of cole crops but in the spring and through fall it is pure torture.

Believe it or not my corn is tasseling! It's a mere 3.5 - 4 foot tall! I am certainly not complaining. Early corn is all good by me. I'm just concerned because something inevitably happens to my corn. I typically harvest only 1/5 of what is planted. Oh, and I have a few silks peeking out, too so at least the plants aren't insane, they are doing what they are supposed to do, just early it seems.

The tomatillos - well they are insane still - both bushes but as of yet none of the fallen flowers have filled in well enough to tell for sure that we have set fruit. It seems we have, but no guarantees yet. I'm wondering how the 'papers' will do in our humidity, but so far the plants are certainly thriving on absolutely no attention whatsoever. I've decided next year to plant them behind the pool pump and let them grow wild, like weeds. We had a lantern grow there last year for only 2 months and it was willing to dominate the entire pumpyard. I'm thinking these plants look identical and act identical and would do very well there, completely ignored.

There are monsters in my garden lurking! This behemoth weighed in at over 2 and a half pounds! And it DID NOT BULB! Hello!? Can you imagine if it had? Yikes!
It has siblings i left in the ground, but curiosity got the best of me and after playing tug of war for a few minutes, I finally got this one out to give it the once over. Hopefully the others will see the massacre and get scared into bulbing. Hey, cound happen. Never know! Meanwhile it is perfectly usable, just not for storage. Soup, here it comes!

 

Every tomato plant I have it setting fruit now. Not as much fruit as I have seen in years past, thanks to a very hot start to our spring, but a faster start then previous years so it is a trade off. Even the smallest plants at only 4" are setting fruits! The one in the screen enclosure is as well and it is small, too. It's a everglades currant if anyone in Florida wants to know. I'll be planting more of those. Tom says they will set through the summer. I'm yet to see a tomato that truly sets in Florida summers, but he lives not far from me, so we shall see. I'm certainly excited to try, and Tom is someone I definitely trust, so I'm very excited indeed! (even if it is a tee tiny tomato something is better than nothing!)

The beans are still producing well, spilling into the lawn.
The first to produce (harvester) are finished with their duty and ready to be pulled and replaced with a summer staple. Hard to do that when the plant itself is so darn healthy. But it would be another 4 weeks before it would bloom again and then it would be too hot to set. Of course the decision of which plant will replace it is yet to come.

 

Sunflower, Winter squash Lakota and Pomegranates ready for pollination.

 
Pesky cuke finally took after weeks of getting after it with a paint brush. Just look! It's already over grown the 4' lattice. sheesh! I'm so happy to see this little fella hanging on!

The blackberries are uh- brambling. The grapes are setting....

 The peaches are ripening and as of yesterday fully half of them were stolen and our back gate was open. Grrr...

I've decided I'm going to fertilize this guy, grown him big and get him a collar. Then I will sick him on anyone who walks back there unannounced! Bad news is we had just showed off our garden to a neighbor. We don't think she did it, but we think she may have talked it up with her neighbors and word spreads. I just hope it was someones kids who did it and not an adult. I will seriously hurt someone if I find them stealing my food. (adult) Ask, and I will gladly share, but do NOT steal! Grrr...

I think that is it. The rest of the pictures are for Harvest Monday so come on back y'all. I have them uploaded already so at least you'll have the first half of the week waiting for ya! This week the garden harvesting is going gangbusters -relatively speaking for a 100 square foot garden- as the cool season stuff is on it's way out and needs harvested before it bolts. Get this- I FINALLY (successfully) grew carrots! Sweet success. Only problem is that the kids are eating them straight out of the garden (after rinsing them with the garden hose) and not many are making it inside! I guess that is a good sign that they at least taste good. GO ME! *snicker*

'Till next time!

Barbie~