Gardening is kind of boring. You walk out, you check things, nothing has happened, you come back in. Next day, wash, rinse, repeat.
BUT THEN...some day, you peak out the window, wondering why you should bother and you find your squash plants are HUGE! You rush out to see lots of large yellow flowers, and then you notice the cucumbers have blossoms too. And there are tiny green beans and tiny bell peppers. The tomatoes...well, they're growing. They smell like tomatoes, so you take that as a good sign.
Then there's a holding pattern again, and suddenly it's August 5. Which brings us to today.
Janet had pulled a few onions already, and cleaned them and put them in the fridge. She said we could use the leaves as seasoning too. She is not sure about the potatoes, as she only saw one or two blossoms on one plant. I don't know what that means, or if it even matters, so I just agree.
Well, backing up a bit, I had gone out to see if ANY of the blossoms on the squash were turning into actual squash and that's when I saw it. The dreaded cucumber beetle! It flew away before I could do anything, but it confirmed what exactly was eating my squash blossoms. To the Googlesphere I went, and there found all sorts of helpful information on cucumber beetles, including that not only did they like squash, but also cucumbers (hence the name) and beans. All of which I have in the same raised bed. It's like I made a buffet specifically for them.
In searching for what to do about them, there was the usual round of toxic chemical advice. However, since I want to actually eat the stuff I'm growing, that is out. The organic options are not much help. "Find beetles and squish them." Okay, they fly away. "Plant baby blue Hubbard squash to distract them, since they like it better." Yeah, I don't have room for that. There's rumors of traps as well. But the basic solution for everyone is to find them and squish them.
Thus, I have been looking. And looking. And looking. And not since I saw the one have I seen any others. I did go to a garden store in search of the aforementioned traps, but no one there knew anything. I did get some insecticidal soap. This will do pretty much nothing to the beetles, what with their hard shells, but it will make me feel better. I think I will apply it in the morning.
Tonight when I got home I raked up some of the grass and tossed it into the compost bin, which is not really composting as much as it is just holding leaves and garbage. I need to get a pitchfork to help stir that up. Then I picked about 5 or 6 more tiny strawberries (a grand total of 10!), and then turned to the onions. I picked about 12-15 of them (I didn't count) and watered everything. At that point the leaves were probably too wet for the soap, or maybe they weren't, hell if I know. I'm just winging most of this. I was thinking of pulling the potatoes too, but I'll ask Janet what she thinks.
That raises the question of what to do with the empty bed. I think I might take the lettuce and spinach seeds and toss them in there just to see what happens. Trying to sprout them from seed indoors hasn't worked, so what could it hurt.
Our harvest thus far is kind of disappointing, and it's largely because much of it went in late. The canning and preserving I was hoping to do is going to be either way delayed or there won't be enough to preserve. Already I'll have to supplement the raspberries, and maybe the apples, for jellies. I don't know that we'll get enough cucumbers for pickles or tomatoes for salsa. I'm a little disappointed, but again, it's a learning process. Janet is going to go with us to a farmer's market so we can get some cukes and I'll see if they have raspberries, and hopefully we can get started.
