Re: California - What are you doing this month?

**sanderson** 6/16/2014, 2:03 pm

Audrey, How wonderful, wonderful for you! You will have to post a photo of the grandsons in your garden!! Very Happy

**sanderson** 6/17/2014, 1:31 am

I couldn't find a past post on Arkansas Traveler tomatoes so I thought I would just post here. No photos cuz they got et tonight! 2 dark pink (?) tomatoes on one of the Round #2 tomato plants. Sooo good. Old fashion flavor. 2 more blushing. I just hope the plant doesn't succumb to curly leaf.

**sanderson** 6/24/2014, 3:48 pm

I'm back home! Branson, MO. was a great place for my husband's family reunion. family friendly, showers and sun, clean lake, etc. But, my garden is here.

We didn't get home and unpacked until3 AM or so. Then grabbed the flashlight. Everything survived the heat and Jerry-rigged drips on the pots. Spaghetti squash turned yellow. Have a ripe lemon cuc from some pollinator. 2 yellow squash, 2 orangish butternuts, 2 ripe lemon squash plus young ones, 3 sprouted Bantam corn seeds, 1 eggplant, 3 okras still doing good. Volunteer tomatoes still good.

Waiting for a couple grand kid photos from Audrey. How are the rest of you No. Californians doing?

mazzy 6/24/2014, 11:57 pm

Good to have you back. My garden is flourishing and prospering. Like a forest. The winter squash are starting to grow fruit. I'll probably end up having 30 plus squash when all are ripe. I know they store real well. Any idea how to put them up? Possibly a ton of frozen butternut soup.

Mazzy

Marc Iverson 6/25/2014, 12:26 am

sanderson -- welcome back, and what are the lemon squash like? Not familiar with them. Sounds like you're doing very well with squash.

Mazzy -- when I have too much butternut squash, I bake them and freeze the baked squash rather than turning it into soup right away. That way it takes up less freezer room.

**sanderson** 6/25/2014, 3:53 am

Marc, The lemon squash was mellow whereas the green cucumbers from the grocery are stronger. Hard to describe, but we definitely like and prefer them. I wish the apple cucumber would produce so I could compare.

Mazzy, So glad the MM is working so good for your first year. Poster girl for SFG!

mazzy 6/25/2014, 9:07 am

Thanks Marc. Good idea about baking and freezing.

Mazzy

Marc Iverson 6/25/2014, 5:37 pm

[quote="sanderson"]Marc, The lemon squash was mellow whereas the green cucumbers from the grocery are stronger. Hard to describe, but we definitely like and prefer them. I wish the apple cucumber would produce so I could compare.
/quote]

I grew some lemon cucumbers last year, but most got eaten by bugs. The ones that survived produced brilliantly yellow cukes with lots of brown fuzz on the outside that was easily rubbed off by hand. The thing is, by the time they got good and yellow, most had a whole lot of seed inside them. I loved the look, but they weren't popular. They were also too round and small to peel, so I left the peel on, something I normally never do.

I'm wondering how people tend to like them most -- picked younger and smaller and less yellow, peeled or unpeeled, etc. What do you do?

**sanderson** 6/26/2014, 12:09 am

Yes, a lot of small seeds. I will try to pick them younger (if I ever get another one!) and see if the seeds are less conspicuous. For peeling, is used a small paring knife.

audrey.jeanne.roberts 6/26/2014, 3:19 pm

I had lemon cukes last year, well into the winter as they were growing in my greenhouse. We had them both ways, picked small and full size. We didn't find the seeds an issue. From my recall, they weren't bitter even if there were large seeds where a standard cuke will tend to go bitter when overripe.

Marc Iverson 6/26/2014, 8:23 pm

Mine weren't bitter either, but on the ones I let get large and deep yellow, the seeds were a real mouthful. I don't even mind or notice seeds usually -- I even eat apple and watermelon and other seeds -- but when the seeds take over 2/3 of the cuke, it's just too much. You start to have to grind your way through them. I hope this year I'll be successful enough to have cukes to spare, so I can experiment and find the best time to pick the lemon cukes.

**sanderson** 6/27/2014, 1:29 am

Audrey, You're back!! Hope you had a wonderful time with your family.

I think the seeds could become a mouthful if I ate them everyday. I was thinking I would peel, cut in half and then scoop out part of the seeds, like a cantaloupe. At least they aren't bitter. I really like them so I'm hoping for an encore.

It looks like I will be getting a 2 x 8 table top within a week. bounce

Two 3 x 3 TTs will come later. The area of dead grass is 8.5' x 9.5' and I want to put down artificial Fescue turf in the whole area so we won't have to worry about mowing the grass around them. That will leave a small grass lawn for me to care for.

audrey.jeanne.roberts 6/27/2014, 1:46 pm

We did have a lovely time - excepting one thing... the baby was sick and baby germs are deadly!!! They left on Monday and we've been sick already for over a week. YUCK!

Ellington (6 1/2) loved my garden and spent every moment he could in it. He picked my Japanese Eggplant clean affraid

But that's okay they're already producing more. He got very good at picking the Zucchini that was large enough. He doesn't like tomatoes (going to have to work on that one!) He ate every Strawberry that got close to being ripe.

It was a great visit!
aj

**sanderson** 6/27/2014, 2:05 pm

Baby germs! Yes, they can really take you down. Hopefully a photo will be forth coming.

**sanderson** 7/3/2014, 3:11 am

Fourth day of triple digits with a prediction of 10 more days. I have some sheers over the potted veggies since their soil heats up despite the mulch. The heat doesn't seem to affect the summer squashes. They are just flowering away. The beans are starting to flower again since I started hosing them for the spider mites. The new 2 x 8 TT is in place. I got some of the 1" PVC tubes secured in the corners and will finish the rest tomorrow. Then it's time to make some MM with the March-April compost. The second one for this year has heated up to 165*F and will need to be turned tomorrow of Friday. Why am I always making compost in the heat wave?? silly me

How are the rest of you and your gardens holding up in this heat?

Marc Iverson 7/4/2014, 1:03 am

Wow that many triple digit days? And here I was moaning and groaning about one or two and a bunch of high 90's coming up. Hope your plants make it through okay!

And grats on getting those new TT's put up. I love two-foot-wide boxes; so easy to work with.

**sanderson** 7/4/2014, 2:36 am

Marc, I only have one up so far. I bought coarse vermiculite and peat moss today and got half of the MM finished. It's 11:30 pm and the nights and pre-dawn are the best time to work during the heat waves. With the heat wave comes the Unhealthy ratings for air quality. I need to finish the MM tomorrow because the fireworks make the air absolutely horrible. To add insult to injury, we only got 3" of rain this year.

I'm watching the weather channel and the hurricane is around Hatreras, NC The reporter is leaning into the winds and rain! Opps, he lost his signal! Can't imagine why! I also can't imagine what it would take to protect a garden during one of those!

Marc Iverson 7/4/2014, 2:44 am

Garden? Heck, some people lose a whole house!

Poor air quality and perpetual drought are two things about California that I really don't miss a bit. Nice that you can work in the evenings without worrying about mosquitoes. That's one thing I DO miss about California. Skeeters are better this year, but usually they make early evenings, and sometimes later ones, around here a time to be inside, not work.

Nice that you found some coarse vermiculite! That's rare in so many places. Even the medium is so often fine.

**sanderson** 7/4/2014, 3:01 am

6 cu. ft. for $65

audrey.jeanne.roberts 7/4/2014, 6:42 pm

105 degrees on a north facing porch at 3 PM - UUUUUGGGGGHHHHHHH! It's miserable and my garden is not any more happy about it than I am. The ground is literally cooking.

My wood chips have broken down to under 2 inches and it's too hot to do the heavy work to replenish them, so it's a vicious circle. How are you guys in the valley doing?

**sanderson** 7/5/2014, 1:20 am

Just hot, too hot to work outside at all until sunset. At least I got the new Berkeley pile turned tonight. Hope to finish making another 2" of MM tomorrow for the new TT.

**sanderson** 7/8/2014, 4:42 am

We had a nice break in the heat today (Monday) with a cloudy overcast. I think it only got to 99*F but 107*F is expected tomorrow. I got the 160*F compost turned for the second time tonight. So Audrey, did you get 4 loads of chips moved today?? After all, it was cooool. Very Happy

Marc, Brace yourself for your heat wave.

audrey.jeanne.roberts 7/8/2014, 1:30 pm

sanderson wrote:We had a nice break in the heat today (Monday) with a cloudy overcast. I think it only got to 99*F but 107*F is expected tomorrow. I got the 160*F compost turned for the second time tonight. So Audrey, did you get 4 loads of chips moved today?? After all, it was cooool.

Marc, Brace yourself for your heat wave.

Sooooo funny you asked, I did! I thought "Make hay while the sun DOESN'T shine!" I have 3 loads more to go in the worst of the gardens.

That garden also has a cottonwood tree about 10 feet to the outer edge of it and I keep noticing that the side closest to the tree is always dry. I think the tree is taking all the water. I've heard they are bad that way :-(

**sanderson** 7/9/2014, 2:28 am

audrey.jeanne.roberts wrote:
sanderson wrote: So Audrey, did you get 4 loads of chips moved today?? After all, it was cooool.

.
Sooooo funny you asked, I did! I thought "Make hay while the sun DOESN'T shine!" I have 3 loads more to go in the worst of the gardens.
:-(

That's funny!

I Binged cottonwood tree and it looks like they are rather aggressive.

The spider mites really devastated the trellised beans. I've been hosing them to increase the humidity and occasionally spraying with Neem and it looks like they are recovering. But, now they have cabbage worms! I tried to 'zap' them with the new electric fly racket but I'm a poor aim. I picked them tonight with a flashlight. That does it. I'm going to get the head lamp if I can find the Topic. I wish I had bookmarked the page. silly me

audrey.jeanne.roberts 7/9/2014, 7:52 pm

Bummer on the Spider Mites... they a pain to get rid of if they get away from you.

I have two helpers in my greenhouse - a lizard we caught in our house and I let loose in my biggest bed in the greenhouse. He's as happy as a clam in there and eating away at the bug population. And I have spiders making webs in the tomatoes. They appear to be normal garden variety spiders so I'm letting them run free. Can't get too much help keeping the bugs down so I'll cheer them on!!! cheers

I made a giant batch of salsa today with all my tomatoes, onions and hot peppers and a teensy, tiny bit of cilantro that I could harvest. I'm lacking enough cilantro due the the heat wave so I'm going to have to have my daughter buy us a bunch and mix it in.

Keep cool,
audrey

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