September 5, 2011

The two day heat wave is long gone.  The high today never reached 70.  The wind was a steady hard blow all day long.  It would have been a ripping’ good time on a sailboat, and I probably would have been in the water a few times.  Instead I cleaned up the beds, removed dead foliage and suckered the tomatoes which were about eight feet high.  I dug in a wheelbarrow of compost into the greens bed a few days ago, and today I got out the little 2-stroke Earthquake cultivator and tilled the top few inches of soil and raked it smooth.  

     

I planted half the bed with lettuce (Pinetree winter mix) and Space spinach, then spread a little half finished compost over the seeded area.  Would I rather have been on the water fighting spraying whitecaps trying to keep a dinghy upright?  Let’s not go there.  I think there are basically two weather conditions for sailing:  Drink beer sailing and can’t drink beer sailing.  If the wind is light you can hold a can of beer in one hand and sail the boat.  If the wind is hard forget about having a beer, you won’t have time and it will be on its side in the bottom of the boat anyway.  One has to reconcile the need for a beer with the desire to sail.  Life is full of hard choices.

I’ve been picking butternut squash when the vine supporting it dies.  The plant set out some more squash after the first set and it looks like most will ripen in time, unless the plant dies first.  The leaves just yellow and die.  The vines on the trellis are holding up the best, but it’s apparent that a fungus or bacteria is slowly doing it in.  I’ve tried to give it plenty of water and even a few doses of fish emulsion as it’s a heavy feeder, but the plant is determined to die.  No matter, it’s September. 

The parsnip also has a disease but it looks like it puts out enough new foliage to stay ahead of it.  Actually everything looks bad this year.  The tulip poplars and sassafras trees have a lot of foliage that looks diseased.  Two drought years in a row have probably stressed them quite a bit. 

Peppers have done great this year, a real bright spot.  It looks like they will produce a new batch of peppers for pickling or maybe salsa.  With the help of a few stakes the pepper stems kind of support each other at this point.  It seems like Fall weather really intensifies the flavor of sweet peppers like Cubanelles.  And beans, lots of beans, Romas right now.  I think I like Roma beans the best. 

Totals for the week:  Okra 5 oz;  Snap beans 18 oz;  Tomatoes 5 lb 7 oz;  Sweet pepper 11 oz; 

Hot pepper 2 oz;  Eggplant 15 oz;  Butternut squash 2 lb 4oz.

Catfish 11 oz;   Weekly total  10.9 pounds.  Year to date 169 lb