In the heat of summer

I haven't been able to do much blogging lately, so here's an update. The only thing that's growing in our time of 100+ temps and drought is Basil and Okra. I can't wait for a rainy season! Abbey got some Okra seeds from a plant-exchange deal and I planted them in the right side of the garden about three weeks after the other Okra, that's why they are a little smaller. It will be time to plant fall tomatoes soon, but I think I am going to save the space for leafy-greens. I am also definitely going to plant Broccoli again, and I think I want to try soybeans... see y'all in a bit.

today's harvest: Okra

This afternoon I picked the first harvest of the fall garden. I sliced them up and sautéed them in vegetable oil and minced garlic. Delicious.

Okra is actually one of the easiest vegetables in the world to grow. It's drought and heat tolerant, it grows in sandy or clay soil, and it is self-pollinating despite the beautiful flowers. It continuously produces, so you will want at least five plants, and as long as you keep picking the young pods, it keeps on making more. It's originally from Ethiopia, so it laughs in the face of what we consider to be "hot" weather here in south Texas.

I am going to plant more of it with the spring garden in April, and it will likely be the only plant I can harvest before, during, and after the July-August heat.

For now I am enjoying the flowers and looking forward to seeing how many pods they will make before it gets too cold. Gumbo anyone?

Buggered Corn

The corn has literally been buggered to death

Okra flower

For the past three weeks, my corn has been steadily consumed by tiny caterpillars, and I have been too busy with school to do anything about it. The little buggers were deep down in the stalk eating the new leaves before they even unravelled! There were certain measures I was prepared to go to in order to protect the delicate stalks. I suppose I could have sprayed them with any combination of my organic pesticides, but most of the corn just wasn't doing well enough to warrant such extremes. This afternoon I pulled it all up and buried it in the compost. The corn roast party has officially been delayed until the spring harvest. Bugger!

I am also worried about the okra. It's doing great for the moment, blooming and making pods, but it will probably be the first to go when the really cool weather comes. It will be interesting to see how much longer I have until I have to pull that up too. I think I will wait until it either completely stops growing or I find something better suited to cold temperatures.

I am not all that disappointed since the garden space where the corn was has now been filled with a more suiting (and more healthy) fall-weather crop. Broccoli and cauliflower have joined the lineup, and in a couple weeks so will mesclun lettuce.

Newly transplanted Broccoli and Cauliflower

Photolog 9/12/2008

Wow look at all the growth! Let's hope we get a nice soaking from Ike!

New this week:

+Black eyed peas have flowered and are making pods

+All the snap peas have sprouted

+First okra fruit has set!

Snap Pea sprouts

Black-eyed pea pods

Okra pod

"BRING IT ON"

It's been my motto for this week. 

I started my last semester of nursing school on Monday, and even though I know this is going to be a difficult semester, I'm ready for it. Word around campus has it that a majority of the senior class always fails their first exam (which for me is on Sep 8th). I plan to be ready for it, as well as the other five exams I will be taking over the next eight weeks during my critical care course. So if you don't see or hear from me for the next two months, just know that I am tucked away somewhere reading everything there is to know about how to fix really sick people. 

This motto of mine is also has something to do with the recent rain we have been getting, especially since I now have a way to capture it and put it to use whenever it's convenient. I put some gutters up last Saturday with some much appreciated help from Archie, and on Tuesday went out and bought a rain harvesting barrel. That 2" of rain we got in the medical center yesterday filled it up till it was overflowing (past 55 gallons!)

The cooler cloudy days and rain has also given the garden a nice chance to really grow, and everything has nearly doubled in size since the last pics I posted. The corn has sprouted, the tomatoes are looking greener and have been sending out new shoots, the okra is growing like crazy and is starting to put out tiny buds, and the peas are starting to take over my little side garden. The cucumbers I planted never sprouted, so I am guessing it's due to old seed. I think I will plant some snap peas there in the next couple of weeks. I am also going to try spinach and some of Pa Pa's elephant garlic.

I took these pics with my phone so sorry if they came out a little hazy...

Rain harvest barrel in place (still needs to be painted to match the house)

Peas are busy growing after the recent rains

Sweet corn is sprouting all over the place!

Tomatoes are looking greener than ever

Okra is on it's way

fall garden is underway

Fall tomatoes! Now which is which?

Side garden

This pic is an update on the poor guy in the last post... looking better!

The 4X12 raised beds

Corn hasn't sprouted yet

The okra is loving the heat

Gideon helped with the Saturday morning honey-do's

I decided to give the blog a face-lift to celebrate my newly planted fall garden. I am growing three different kinds of Tomatoes: Better Boy, Cherry, and a grape-tomato variety called Juliet. I planted two of each, and then forgot which was which so we won't know until they start to set fruit (how fun!). I have a variety of Okra called Cajun Delight which is busily sending out new leaves every couple of days. It looks like they have been planted too close (okra gets really tall and wide) but Abbey's grandpa (from henceforth known as Pa Pa) showed me a way to do this by cutting off a stem every time you harvest an okra (you know when to stop when you can't reach the tops of the plants anymore). I also devoted half of the other raised bed to a super-sweet corn variety called Gotta Have It, and after tasting some of what Pa Pa grew I must agree. I think I will have around 50 or so ears of corn in about seventy days, so we will have to have a corn-roast party at our house and celebrate before the raccoons do. Party details will be closer to harvest-time. In my side-garden I have a black-eyed pea variety called Early Contender which has done well despite the abuse I have put them though last week (see the previous post). Also in the side garden I have planted some Cucumbers called Sweetest Yet, and they should be hanging all over my energy meters and time warner cable boxes soon. 

In a month or so I have been thinking about planting Snow Peas and Spinach in the second half of the raised bed with the corn. I have also been thinking to interplant some elephant garlic cloves that Pa Pa gave me. Garlic is a pest and disease-free plant, and it can help keep bugs out of the garden if you juice it up and spray it (I hear it also keeps away vampires). Garlic is different from most veggies in that it grows during the winter. You plant it in the fall, and harvest in the spring.

I also must recommend a blog that I ran across by accident. Skippy's Vegetable Garden can be found in the continuously updating column on the right. She puts up new posts almost daily and takes really great pictures. I tried copying her picture-posting style for this post, we will see if it works.

Stay tuned!

FAQ's

Let's get Back to the Garden for this post!

There are two questions people usually ask me when they find out I have a garden:

The first question is always: "What do you grow?"

I am always pleased to answer this as it is nearly never the same answer. Currently I still have those tomatoes I planted. They are not setting any new fruit because day-time and night-time temps are too high, so i am keeping them until the last green tomatoes turn red. I also planted Okra last week, which sprung up immediately. Okra is pretty hardy so I decided he would be best to endure the two hardest gardening months here in San Antonio. The other day the wind blew a layer of mulch to cover over two of the Okra seedlings and the doodle bugs had a feast, so I have re-planted them with some success. I also have some strung-out looking bell peppers that stop growing when they get to the size of large strawberries, I guess I must be doing something wrong. Oh, and let's not forget the Basil (i always forget to mention him). The Basil growing in my garden is delicious, I recommend eating it by wrapping a leaf of basil around a cherry tomato - Yum!

All these yellow flowers should be cherry tomatoes soon, but it's just too hot! :(

Strung-out Bell Peppers

Okra Sprout

Basil

The second question is usually something like: "Where (or how) do you build a garden?" 

Either way the second question usually hint's at the questioner's own inner desire to garden. Each of us have gardening in our genes (we were gardeners from the beginning), and we all have the desire to put something in the dirt and watch it sprout up and become food. The answer to this question is tricky, and it depends on a lot of things. I am not an expert, but I can tell you what has worked for me. 

I will be building a second garden in my backyard this week and I will post a how-to explanation with pictures. I will be using methods I learned about from my father-in-law Bo Cappadonna, and from diagrams that can be found in The Vegetable Gardener's Bible (there is a link to this book on the right column of this page).

Get your shovels ready!