Blighted

The tomato blight that has been plaguing the Northeast hit my parents' garden on the 17th of August - just when the tomatoes were beginning to ripen.  I went to check it out the morning of the 18th, and I fully expected an army of zombies to rise up from the choked and tangled remains of the tomato patch at any moment.  Ah, but where there is life, there is hope.

My parents were able to salvage about 75 pounds of undead tomatoes from their 80 mostly dead plants.  Hardly what they had hoped to put up for the winter, but still better than nothing.  And they're looking on the bright side - my mom will have to spend a lot less time in the kitchen this fall! 

Now let's get down to business, shall we?  The random number generator chose comment #8 to be the winner of my giveaway.  Congratulations, Roberta!  In honor of the blighted zombie tomatoes, the prize is a copy of Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, by Jane Austin and Seth Grahame-Smith.  Just use the contact form (the link is at the top of the page) to email me your address, and I'll get that mailed out to you as soon as humanly possible.

Thank you all for playing!  I appreciated all your kind (and amusing) comments.  Except for yours, Tressa.  You're a punk.

The (unfair) Distribution of Labor

Gender inequality is alive and well here on the farm.  If you are a man, you work. If you are a girl, you stay out of the way.  (A boy becomes a man at age 13 on the farm, but once a girl, always a girl.) Poor old JellyMan is the low man on the totem pole, so he gets all the jobs everyone else is too busy to do, like tilling the garden.

While JellyMan is tilling, Anemone (being a girl) is off in a field chasing butterflies.

The next item on JellyMan's list is to prop up the asparagus ferns.  They're so tall that they are falling over - I had no idea they would grow so much!

While JellyMan is propping up the asparagus, Anemone (being a girl) is off in a field chasing butterflies.

Next on JellyMan's hit parade is the bean planting.  Planting beans is a pain.  First you mark off five rows with stakes and twine.  Then you get a stick and make a little furrow down the whole row.  Then you drop in your beans, and then you go back along the row covering the seeds.

While JellyMan is planting the beans, Anemone (being a girl) is off in a field chasing butterflies.

JellyMan is finally finished in the garden, so he hightails it over to the barn to clean up the hay feeders.  The pasture is so hilly that if you drop a round bale of hay, the cows end up rolling it down the hill, and it gets trampled and ruined, so you drop the hay in a feeder instead.  (But sometimes Dad drops a bale in the pasture so the cows can play with it.  They have a great time.)  There are several feeders, and two of them were scheduled to be scraped and painted. 

While JellyMan is scraping the feeders, Anemone (being a girl) is off in a field chasing butterflies.

JellyMan is finally finished with his chores.  He's tired and hungry, but he's a good boy man and he shares his carrots with Puppy and the girls.

Oh, would you look at that!  Wonders never cease.  While JellyMan is off visiting the cows, Anemone (being a girl) is planting the corn, which is an even bigger pain than planting the beans.

The times, they are a-changin'!

Gardening in the Military

My grandmother has the prettiest flowers. Her peonies and oriental poppies are just to die for. She has banks of lilies, huge lilac bushes, climbing roses, hydrangeas, drifts of any sort of bulb you can name, flowering trees, clematis vines, and lots of things I don't even know the names of. I love her flowers. (And the flowers in these pictures are all hers.)

I love the frequent moves the military puts us through, but one thing that saddens me is that I'll never have an established garden like Grandma's. She's been living in one place for the last 50 years. By the time I get my flower beds and vegetable patch the way I like them, we get orders and I have to start all over again. It can get depressing, but I've learned a few things that help make it easier on me.

First of all, I keep a gardening notebook. I take notes on all the plants we try - which does well in what sort of soil, which ones can't handle direct sunlight, which are easily transplanted, etc. I take pictures of the garden, including detailed photos of areas that turned out especially well. This makes it easier to set up my new garden when we get to our new home.

Starting a garden every few years can be a drain on the budget. BecauseI never know what style or color of house I'll end up with, I keep garden ornaments to a minimum, and the ones I do have are neutral and go well with any color scheme. I use terra cotta colored plastic flower pots to keep our weight under the maximum limit, and we use handtools instead of tillers and other machinery. We also keep our leftover seeds from year to year. Most of them sprout!

Every time we move into new quarters, I plant some bulbs and other perennials. I figure someone down the line will appreciate it - I know I'm always tickled to see "surprise" tulips during our first spring on a new base. I make an effort to plant only non-poisonous perennials, because most people living in military quarters are young couples with small children, and I hate the thought of someone's child dying twenty years from now after munching on my lily-of-the-valley plants. I also give plants to friends and neighbors when we PCS. It's nice to see a friend's face light up when you present her with your potted lemon tree.

Most of the installations we've lived on have regulations forbidding vegetable gardens in base housing, but I've found that we are able to get away with it by scattering vegetable plants among theflowers and herbs, and keeping the garden area very, very tidy. Absolutely no weeds allowed! We don't plant things like corn or watermelon, which scream, "I'm disregarding regs! Notify the commander immediately!" and I make sure my tomato plants are neatly staked and harvested in a timely manner - no fruit is ever left rotting on the vine. Some installations have community garden plots available for rent. We've used them in the past and have good experiences with them, though it is a pain to have to drive to your garden plot.

Gardening in the military can be frustrating, but I think it's worth the trouble whether you live in military housing or out in the local community. Having a pretty garden can be a real pick-me-up on those "I wish I lived anywhere but here" days, and it can really improve the feel of a neighborhood. Think of your garden as a gift to your neighbors! Gardening is also good for our children. You'd be amazed at the fun you can have and the things you can learn while gardening with your little ones, so get out there and plant some seeds together.

Blossom End Rot

This is most irritating.

Blossom end rot can be caused by a calcium deficiency or irregular watering.  I suspect the latter.  If I don't water first thing in the morning, the plants wilt by 11:00.  The problem is that we have lots of afternoon thunderstorms, so the plants end up drowning later on in the day.  I can't win.  I have read that the first flush of fruit is the hardest hit, so I suppose I should resist the temptation to cut down the vines.  It's just so frustrating! I'm not getting many tomatoes, and the ones I do get don't even taste good enough to justify the effort I put into growing them.  The plants aren't even pretty; they're all weedy and mangy looking, plus they've been chewed to bits by every sort of bug I can name.  Urhghth.

This is Not the Ugliest Tomato in the World

But I bet it's pretty darn close.  It's a brandywine.

I have to say that I do not see why people make such a big fuss over these tomatoes.  After reading all the hype, I was expecting this divine tomato experience that would change my life forever.  Didn't happen.  They taste like the tomatoes I buy at the grocery store - no better, no worse.  I deem them "not worth the effort." 

Hornworm Heartache

I can't get rid of these things. I found this one on my pepper plant. Yesterday it was in perfect health, and today it was ripped to shreds by a three inch long monster. Where are those parasitic wasps I keep reading about? With all the wasps that fly around and make pests of themselves, you'd think at least one of them would earn its keep and take out a hornworm or two, but no.

I'm starting to get a little ticked off about this. It's my own fault. I knew they liked pepper plants, but I still didn't think to check it. Luckily it didn't eat any of the peppers, but it won't be easy for the plant to bounce back after what this little booger did to it. I was happy to squish it with my popsicle stick.

Mealy Bugs on Tomatoes

I believe this is a mealy bug.  I squished two on my tomato plants this morning, and I have a feeling I will be squishing them for many mornings to come.  I am still not rid of the hornworms, though I continue to hunt and squish them every morning.  They're getting bigger and bigger.  So big, in fact, that I can't bring myself to touch them anymore and now I just sever the leaf they are resting on and squish them with a popsicle stick.  Their guts shoot out in a big green stream, and the ants come running to tidy up the carnage.  Someday soon I will take pictures for your viewing pleasure, but for now, you'll just have to take my word for it.  I know you are disappointed, but try to be patient.

Tomato Hornworms

I inspect my plants every day so that any problems are identified in the early stages. Yesterday I found that my tomato plants are playing host to the dastardly tomato hornworm. I found and crushed twelve of them, but not before taking pictures. We do operate a homeschool, you know. I did not know that these caterpillars left such large amounts of poop (the scholarly term is "frass," but just guess what sort of limerick that leads to - I think we'll stick with "poop") behind them. I found the most poop on the largest, oldest leaves at the bottom of the plant. It seems they are not good eating, but they must be great to poop on. I soon learned that the easiest way to find them was to first find the poop:

Then look directly above it. You will see a chewed leaf, and when you turn the leaf over you will find the caterpillar:

As far as I can tell, these caterpillars are in the 2nd instar. They reach full size after a month or so, and that is when they cause the worst damage. The kids want to let them grow, and I told them that was a great idea - we could make this Recipe. It looks delicious!

Here is a picture of a hornworm's head under a low power microscope:

 and here is a hornworm horn:

Some Garden Pictures

 

I'm Still Here

But I don't want to be. I want to be somewhere else.

But since I am here, I might as well show you a picture of the deck The Man built. I thought about showing you carefully staged pictures in which everything looks perfect, but in the end decided to show you what it looks like for real.

This is our s'more platform. The Man refuses to make a proper fire in the fire pit unless it is a special occasion, so we make s'mores on the grill most of the time. My children are very mindful of wasting energy, so they will not stand around the grill. They haul the patio chairs up there instead. I am even more mindful of wasting energy, so I have The Man make my s'more. He brings it to my chair on a plate. Notice how NorMan really, REALLY wants a marshmallow, but is not quite willing to step onto the strange platform to get one. He still hasn't forgiven us for messing up his yard.

More pictures later.