Blessings Darlings!
While we DID have a dry month early this summer, on the whole this summer has been coolish and dry. There have been less days over 90 degrees than usual, and rain levels have been more than usual since the early hot dry spell.
So now I have issues from those factors in my garden! I've only lost a couple of zucchinis to end rot from the rain, but on top of those losses some of the zukes haven't been well pollenated - they grow right the first few inches then sudden narrow and don't develop the rest of the way down the fruit. Others, while properly pollenated have seemed to started to hibernate instead of finishing growing. And my tomatoes are not just waiting for a few hot days to suddenly have hundreds of them suddenly ripen all at once - the indetermanent ones that ARE coming ripe one at a time all have big cracks at the stem end, the standard sign of too much water.
I'm concerned I won't get any of the sweet potatoes, as they need rather a lot of days over 90 degrees to move from forming vines to forming tubers.
By the way, the DE didn't do squat for any of the bugs on the beans. I don't think I'll be getting even enough beans for a dinner side dish, let alone freeze or can any. The leaves of the beans look like delicate lace. And the daily rain means that anything I use on the plants gets promptly washed off.
To paraphrase the folk saying: humanity proposes, nature disposes.
Frondly, Fern
Showing posts with label green beans. Show all posts
Showing posts with label green beans. Show all posts
Thursday, August 8, 2013
Thursday, July 25, 2013
Zuke Problems!
Blessings Darlings!
I've had several weeks of being buried in zukes. This has been a good thing for me. But ... now not only have some low-level problems with squash bugs started (and I think THEY are rather under control), but wilt has hit. I removed the plant with that, but ... I'm worried it will take out the other two in that hill. And that it will move to the gray squash in the next hill over.
I'm debating starting more grey squash in a new hill to get me to full summer squash power, but they'd have to go in the area I planned to put my fall greens/radishes/turnips in.
With the beans being so bad this year (I'll be applying BT to those this evening, if the wind is calm then), and the tomatoes being so late (my fault), the zukes have been our main veggie. Without them ... mostly I'll just be getting herbs and spices from the garden. Which will leave me sad and lower on money, since I'd have to pay for veggies.
On top of that, something has eaten leaves from some of my cucumber plants. So even THOSE aren't about to bury me.
I'm beginning to think I need a larger garden, as well as the energy and time to work it more.
Oh well.
Frondly, Fern
I've had several weeks of being buried in zukes. This has been a good thing for me. But ... now not only have some low-level problems with squash bugs started (and I think THEY are rather under control), but wilt has hit. I removed the plant with that, but ... I'm worried it will take out the other two in that hill. And that it will move to the gray squash in the next hill over.
I'm debating starting more grey squash in a new hill to get me to full summer squash power, but they'd have to go in the area I planned to put my fall greens/radishes/turnips in.
With the beans being so bad this year (I'll be applying BT to those this evening, if the wind is calm then), and the tomatoes being so late (my fault), the zukes have been our main veggie. Without them ... mostly I'll just be getting herbs and spices from the garden. Which will leave me sad and lower on money, since I'd have to pay for veggies.
On top of that, something has eaten leaves from some of my cucumber plants. So even THOSE aren't about to bury me.
I'm beginning to think I need a larger garden, as well as the energy and time to work it more.
Oh well.
Frondly, Fern
Wednesday, February 27, 2013
Great Depression Story
Blessings Darlings!
Times were tough back in the Depression. They were especially tough if your father was an alcoholic who had been fired from his job as an insurance salesman and your mother was abusive, and you were still in high school.
This was the situation my Mother In Law was in.
As a result, they somehow ended up on some rural farmland during the Depression. I don't know if they owned the land, how much land there was, or where in Illinois the land was. It was not located 'in town', or walking distance from the high school.
They made it thru', obviously, or she'd not have married and had a son that I ended up marrying.
They grew stuff and had a farm stand. I suppose they grew all sorts of things - but what she says got them by were two main crops: Sorghum, which was pressed for sweetener; and Kentucky Wonder pole beans. Perhaps these were their 'cash crops', while most other things they grew they consumed and sold only extras.
But while what they raised 'got them by', they didn't provide enough for her to go to high school. She left home (moved out permanently? during the school year? During the school week only?) to live with the widow who ran the general store in town, working for her after school, to get thru' high school. That way she could get to school by walking and earned enough cash to pay for books/supplies and clothes and such.
This year, the first growing season after my Mother In Law has passed on, I'm going to grow my first Kentucky Wonder beans, in her honor.
Frondly, Fern
Times were tough back in the Depression. They were especially tough if your father was an alcoholic who had been fired from his job as an insurance salesman and your mother was abusive, and you were still in high school.
This was the situation my Mother In Law was in.
As a result, they somehow ended up on some rural farmland during the Depression. I don't know if they owned the land, how much land there was, or where in Illinois the land was. It was not located 'in town', or walking distance from the high school.
They made it thru', obviously, or she'd not have married and had a son that I ended up marrying.
They grew stuff and had a farm stand. I suppose they grew all sorts of things - but what she says got them by were two main crops: Sorghum, which was pressed for sweetener; and Kentucky Wonder pole beans. Perhaps these were their 'cash crops', while most other things they grew they consumed and sold only extras.
But while what they raised 'got them by', they didn't provide enough for her to go to high school. She left home (moved out permanently? during the school year? During the school week only?) to live with the widow who ran the general store in town, working for her after school, to get thru' high school. That way she could get to school by walking and earned enough cash to pay for books/supplies and clothes and such.
This year, the first growing season after my Mother In Law has passed on, I'm going to grow my first Kentucky Wonder beans, in her honor.
Frondly, Fern
Wednesday, September 5, 2012
Today's Haul
Blessings Darlings!
Just in from the garden and tabulating today's frugal harvest:
2 cucs, 9 oz total
1 zuc, 12 oz
green beans, 12 oz
Tomatoes are still totally green. Vines from the purple sweet potatoes still trying to take over the garden, but I have no clue if the sweet potatoes are growing under the earth. No sprouts yet from the lettuce and spinach.
We ARE falling behind in eating the beans and cucs, so Suz is going to get some as gifts. If we can work out our schedules!
Frondly, Fern
Just in from the garden and tabulating today's frugal harvest:
2 cucs, 9 oz total
1 zuc, 12 oz
green beans, 12 oz
Tomatoes are still totally green. Vines from the purple sweet potatoes still trying to take over the garden, but I have no clue if the sweet potatoes are growing under the earth. No sprouts yet from the lettuce and spinach.
We ARE falling behind in eating the beans and cucs, so Suz is going to get some as gifts. If we can work out our schedules!
Frondly, Fern
Tuesday, September 4, 2012
Freezer Eatin'
Blessings Darlings!
The funniest part of Eating While Broke - and there really are LOTS of funny things to it - is the 'creating meals out of the stuff buried in the freezer' part. We're spending almost no money at the store any more - only milk, cat food, and a few odds and ends this week (small yogurt, can of water chestnuts, egg roll wrappers, etc) - but the Chubby Hubby thinks this week's menus are totally outstanding.
Sunday - Home made pizza, salad, fruit.
Monday - Stir Fry using Reduced price Mystery Raw Meat, home grown cabbage, home sprouted bean sprouts, and rice.
Tuesday - Shish Ka Bob, using reduced priced beef, home grown zucchini, and onions, tomatoes, mushrooms, served in home-made pita. May need yogurt for sauce.
Wednesday - Korean Seafood Pancakes and ... probably seasoned bean sprouts.
Thursday - Kalbi (Korean BBQ Ribs) using reduced price thin flanken, rice, green beans, salad
Friday - Fried Chicken - from reduced price chicken, potatoes, broccoli, salad
Saturday - Pulled Pork - last of those 50 cent a pound pork shoulders, cole slaw, rolls, fried leftover potatoes
Sunday - Egg Rolls from scratch, using the pulled pork and some salad shrimp. Will probably buy rather than make wrappers.
Monday - Rumaki - we now have a bag full of frozen livers from whole chickens we've bought. Will need to buy a can of sliced water chestnuts, spicy green beans, rice, salad
And when I type reduced price I mean the meat was already on sale but hadn't moved, so the store knocked the price down lower. Cabbage, bean sprouts, and green beans from the garden are the main vegetables used this week. Zucchini will start taking over next week. Garden cucumbers and more cabbage are in salads.
The fried chicken and the rumaki are the only things that use 'intact' pieces of meat ... and in the rumaki's case the pieces are accumulated livers from whole birds made extraordinary. The rest all use meat cut small and mixed with other stuff.
I've got sweet corn, but no idea where to fit it in. I may freeze it. Also have 6 granny smith apples, which I'll probably bake for desserts. As a result of that ... we may need to buy some whipped cream.
Frondly, Fern
The funniest part of Eating While Broke - and there really are LOTS of funny things to it - is the 'creating meals out of the stuff buried in the freezer' part. We're spending almost no money at the store any more - only milk, cat food, and a few odds and ends this week (small yogurt, can of water chestnuts, egg roll wrappers, etc) - but the Chubby Hubby thinks this week's menus are totally outstanding.
Sunday - Home made pizza, salad, fruit.
Monday - Stir Fry using Reduced price Mystery Raw Meat, home grown cabbage, home sprouted bean sprouts, and rice.
Tuesday - Shish Ka Bob, using reduced priced beef, home grown zucchini, and onions, tomatoes, mushrooms, served in home-made pita. May need yogurt for sauce.
Wednesday - Korean Seafood Pancakes and ... probably seasoned bean sprouts.
Thursday - Kalbi (Korean BBQ Ribs) using reduced price thin flanken, rice, green beans, salad
Friday - Fried Chicken - from reduced price chicken, potatoes, broccoli, salad
Saturday - Pulled Pork - last of those 50 cent a pound pork shoulders, cole slaw, rolls, fried leftover potatoes
Sunday - Egg Rolls from scratch, using the pulled pork and some salad shrimp. Will probably buy rather than make wrappers.
Monday - Rumaki - we now have a bag full of frozen livers from whole chickens we've bought. Will need to buy a can of sliced water chestnuts, spicy green beans, rice, salad
And when I type reduced price I mean the meat was already on sale but hadn't moved, so the store knocked the price down lower. Cabbage, bean sprouts, and green beans from the garden are the main vegetables used this week. Zucchini will start taking over next week. Garden cucumbers and more cabbage are in salads.
The fried chicken and the rumaki are the only things that use 'intact' pieces of meat ... and in the rumaki's case the pieces are accumulated livers from whole birds made extraordinary. The rest all use meat cut small and mixed with other stuff.
I've got sweet corn, but no idea where to fit it in. I may freeze it. Also have 6 granny smith apples, which I'll probably bake for desserts. As a result of that ... we may need to buy some whipped cream.
Frondly, Fern
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
