Bogieblog

Near the Last Harvest

Last weekend I stripped the garden (again) of tomatoes. I even pulled down the tomato cages. We are out of the tomato business for the rest of the year.

We are also out of the corn business. The stalks were stripped on Friday because of impending frost. I made 7 or 8 pints of creamed corn for the freezer. The corn was picked late enough that the sugar had converted to starch so I added a bit of sweetened condensed milk to each jar. Of course we had creamed corn for dinner one night of the weekend - the sweetened condensed milk did its job admirably.

I did leave a few very small peppers. They have managed to survive the cold nights and grow some more. The gourd and pumpkin plants are still growing (although some vines have died back and I did pick decorative gourds last night).

That only leaves the green beans. they were flowering again last weekend, so I may get another small crop before the season is officially done with.

After I clean up the vegetable garden, it will become the holding bed for the roses that I received this year. They are all young plants, and own root, so small enough to be in quart and gallon pots. Since I did not have time to plant them this year, I will plant the pots in the vegie garden and let the soil protect the roots from the winter. Next spring they can be dug back up, without having to disturb any roots, and planted where I want them.

Last weekend I also dug up volunteer flower garden plants. I have loads of volunteers in pathways that I had told a friend at work I would dig up and give to her. After all was said and done, the haul (literally) for my friend was; Black Eyed Susan's, Perennial Bachelor's Buttons, pink Tickseed, Husker Red Penstemon, white Gay Feather, pink and purple tall Phlox, and about 20 Creeping Phlox plants of various colors.

Everything except the Creeping Phlox was large enough that I potted them into quart containers. If I was smart, I would dig up volunteers, pot them up, overwinter them and sell them in the spring. The quart pots would sell for $7-8 each and the smaller pots of Creeping Phlox would sell for $3-4 at garden centers. However, I'm not that smart, so I give the plants away. I toy with the idea of a road-side stand, but I'm just not that interested in it yet.

Guess what this is:

I Feel Smarter Already

Last night, while picking peas in the garden, I told WS, "I wish I knew what these weeds are." Said weeds having pretty puplish-pink flowers, of one stem and alternative leaves.

Susan, over at Sustainable Gardening, had the answer for me this morning, Smart Weed.

Ask, and ye shall receive!

Shocking

Everybody sit down before you read what I am about to write. It will blow your mind and make you question if the world is still spinning the correct way on its axis. Also, have your heart medication handy, because this just might give you a jolt big enough to cause arrhythmia.

Fall Endeavors

The gardens held up well thru the storms on Saturday and Sunday. It didn't hurt at all that there was little wind involved.

The first frost warning came out for Thursday morning, so once again I went out and stripped tomatoes and cut buds from roses (what few there were - Japanese Beetles are still feasting). Last night I made 2 quarts of tomato sauce and used half of it for chii. Tonight there will be spaghetti made from the other half. MMM-mmm-mmm, nothing quite like home made sauce as a base!

Today I will make some Italian bread to go with the sketti, and while the machine (what, you thought I actually made bread by hand?) is doing it's thing, WS and I will head out to stack wood. We had started earlier in the year, then got sidetracked by other projects so we only have enough in the lean-to for a couple of months. Now we are getting down to the wire and it has to get done. First, about half of the pre-stacked wood has to be restacked. This is because of the assumption that we made that we would get back to stacking wood shortly after our first efforts (silly us). So, I started 2 banks of wood instead of filling up just one bank. The second bank of wood will have to be restacked to the front of the first bank, since it will be much drier than what is in the pile out behind the dog pen.

WS will load the split wood into the cart and bring it down with the 4-wheeler. I get the dubious honor of stacking the stuff after helping to unload it; it goes faster to get it out of the cart so WS can go re-load while I'm stacking.

We won't get all the wood stacked, but we should be able to finish up this year's supply and get a good start on next year's. We are hoping to get 3 year's supply in the lean-to so next year we can loaf around.

Not Forgotten

Tomato Disease Indentification

I think I have found the problem with my tomatoes that had some sort of strang spotting disease; Alternaria Canker or Alternaria Stem Canker. If I cared enough I would go out and look at the vines of the plants that produce such tomatoes - but I don't. Suffice it to say that I will be looking for resistant varieties in the futrue as crop rotation is not much of an option.

The Tomato Problem Site made it very easy to identify what I had and I will be keeping the address to it for future reference! Iowa State also has a very nice PDF that is helpful, as does VegetableMDOnline.

Between the three resources, all the information that you will ever need (and more) is just a click away.

After the Storms

Total score for yesterday:

In the vegetable cooking category:

• 18 pints of salsa (14 hot and 4 x-hot)
• 7 quarts of Italian tomato sause
• Green bean and pea mixture for dinner vegetables (yum)

In the rain category:

• 3/8" rain in the morning
• just under an inch of rain from another system that came in from the West in the afternoon
• 3.5" of rain from Hannah last night

It is still dark so I don't know how everything held up last night under the downpour. WS did some work on the driveway (filling in low spots that might encourage erosion) yesterday afternoon, so hopefully it came out okay.

Daylight will tell the story.

Hannah Comes Visiting

It was madness around the Bogie estates last night. WS and I were preparing for the deluge of rain to hit; first a band of thunderstorms carrying lots of moisture first thing this morning - later the remnants of Hannah dumping more rain.

I was madly picking any tomato that even showed a bit of a blush. I was planning on making salsa again this weekend, but I took way more tomatoes than I would have done for cooking. I also stripped the peas and green beans - not too much there because we had harvested last Sunday. Peppers were harvested as normal; lots of small peppers left on the bush. I took in a couple of squash/gourds and two pumpkins that were ready to go.

  The basked is holding about 15 pounds of tomatoes and the red 5 gallon bucket is about 1/4 full of tomatoes.

We left the corn and unripe pumpkins / squash - figured they would be okay with the heavy rain and any wind we may get. While I was picking tomatoes, I felt somewhat like a farmer from generations past madly trying to get in the harvest before all is lost (but, the forebearers would not have had the warning so they would have probably been harvesting in the heavy rain).

While I was dealing with the vegetable garden, WS was dealing with the new shrubs that have been planted in the last couple of weeks. I managed to get 5 more shrubs planted this week but have not mulched any of my endeavors so far. WS was mulching so heavy rains would not wash away the exposed soil.

No Labor Zone

Happy Labor Day!

Hope you are with good friends/family, have a good time, have some good food and drink and stay responsible and safe!

Last Cookout for Friends

Last night we had a cookout as a last get together for some friends that are moving to Indiana. I managed to make an awesome marinade for steak tips, bought some really good potato salad and WS grew some nicely sweet corn. Added to the mix was a fresh tomato and basil salad (provided by Heather) and some died-and-gone-to-heaven chocolate chip cookies (from Karen). Jimmy and his girl friend provided heathy appetites (as they were ordered to do).

Harry and Heather will be moving out of state by the end of this month - it should be a good change for them so we are both happy for them and sad they are leaving. WS and Jimmy will most likely help drive the two U-hauls and dump truck out for them. The plan is to trailer their bikes behind one of the vehicles so they can have a nice ride back. Although not quite like the two week trip to Sturgis, it will give them a short and enjoyable break.

Me - I'll hold down the fort and enjoy the break myself!