I Got Globally Warmed

And I am not alone.

Victims (not quite casualties but close): hostas and carrots and maybe the cukes too but the latter did produce. They just slowed down during and after the wicked heatwave we had.

So I made it to The Big Easy. But my troubles are not all at an end, my friend. I don’t like what I’m hearing. I met a gardener from Oklahoma who said they’ve been without rain for about two months. Said she went away for two days and came back to find her petunias and other flowers all wilted or dead. Another friend outside Chicago put as her Facebook status that someone had murdered her cilantro (I think that same killer was on the loose in my herb garden). When I was talking to a fellow reveler in Carmel, IN a couple weeks ago, she had to stop mid-sentence because it started to rain, something they hadn’t seen in many weeks (may also have been a couple months). She and her father commented that a lot of people would be stating out their windows at that moment. All other folks, too, across the country have been telling me their global warming woes. Hope about you?

QUESTION: what’s your take on this wacky weather? Are we getting globally warmed? What does your garden have to say about it? Are you changing your approach in response? Will this change what you do next year? How so?

Go ahead … Gimme the dirt!

1 Comment

I Had Trouble in Getting to Big Easy

The day started out rotten.  Up at 4 a.m. (okay, well 4:30), only to miss my flight to New Orleans, despite my best efforts.  Made it all the way to JFK, raced inside like a lunatic, wheeled luggage flying behind me, only to find out I’d have to pay an additional $80 for the next flight this afternoon, couldn’t check my bags until at least after 1:00, and would have to trek it back home in the meantime to wait (which meant another $100 in cab fare to get home and back again later).  Sooooooo, while still in a spectacularly foul mood, I headed out back to check on the garden.

I had major renovations done on my house in the last six months.  I find that when I’m in a good mood I look at the changes and am pleased as punch I laid out the money for it.  When I’m grumpy, I see the tiniest nicks and chips in the new paint or corner spots where the moulding isn’t perfectly straight, or that infuriating little dribble of paint that hardened under the counter ledge in the opening between the dining room and kitchen, and think about the dollars wasted.  This morning I found the same phenomenon occurs in the garden.  I went out there and all I saw were the problems.  Although the first heirloom tomato ripened, this morning all I could see was the split at the top.  While the peach tree is producing lots of fruit despite some early season troubles, all I saw this morning were problems that I don’t remember being there a few days ago.  (In May, I sprayed it with copper fungicide but not in the amount Shannon’s recommended — I try to go easy with that stuff even thought it’s organic.  It’s still copper being sprayed on a tree that produces fruit I fully intend to eat.)

So, although I didn’t skip through the garden this morning, peppering self-congratulations, I did identify some problems that need fixing.  Of course, my mood is a little improved after getting up close and personal with the plants; that never fails.  Eternal happiness and sprightliness, however, can be a dangerous thing.  I don’t know that I would have spotted those issues if I weren’t such a grumpy gardener this morning.

I do feel like the guy in Dr. Seuss’ I Had Trouble In Getting to Solla Sollew.  He left all the pesky troubles he was having at home to get to the beautiful city of Solla Sollew (on the banks oft he beautiful River Wah-hoo, where they never have troubles, at least very few), but found that the journey wasn’t quite as easy as he had expected.  After an exhausting bout of difficulties getting to SS, he arrives to find that the city is suffering from a key-slapping slippard who moved into the door, and now no one can get in and no one can get out.  The town’s gone to pot and even the ever loyal doorman has decided to leave, off to the City of Boola Boo Ball, where they never have troubles, no troubles at all.  So, while I’d really like to kick off this vacation with a bloody mary, fixins courtesy of the garden, and chill till my flight at 3, I’ve decided to follow dude’s suggestions.

Declining the doorman’s invitation to follow him off to paradise, he tells us what he has decided to do:

…I started back home, to the Valey of Vung.  I know I’ll have troubles.  I’ll, maybe, get stung.  I’ll always have troubles.  I’ll, maybe, get bit by that green-headed Quail on the place where I sit.  But I’ve bought a big bat.  I’m all ready, you see.  Now my troubles are going to have troubles with me!

Watch out ants.  I’m going to Shannon’s to buy my big bat.

2 Comments

Who Did This?

20110805-091155.jpg

Here is the third and fourth (and hopefully the last) of my peach tree troubles. The gash on the peach is the only one like it that I’ve seen (but obviously I don’t want to see anymore). The stream of peach juice (I’m assuming that’s what it is) which has oozed and hardened, however, can be spotted on a good number of the peaches. Does anyone recognize this or know how to treat it (assuming it’s not too late) organically?

2 Comments

More Peach Tree Trouble

20110805-085945.jpg

Could it be ants who have done this damage to the leaves? Close examination of the branches identifies a few small reddish brown ants but no other sign of predators.

Leave a comment

Peach Tree Problems

20110805-085813.jpg

Can anyone identify this issue? Brown spots appearing on several of the fruit. But, wait, there’s more…

Leave a comment

1st Ripened Heirloom

20110805-085304.jpg

Of the season, this one is an Oregon Spring. It did suffer a minor split (could be from irregular watering), but no sign of splittage on the others , yet (keeping a close watch on them now).

Leave a comment

Hey Hey Whaddaya Say

Here’s to another day at the CSA!

20110803-115442.jpg

1 Comment

Before

20110723-114752.jpg

This is the “before” shot of one of my tomato plants before I decided to trim it.  Just to the right, you can see an “after” of the brandywine, which I did chop down quite a bit, in honesty, more than I intended.  (It has a very bent stem due to late staking — horrifying, I know.  But plants are hearty beasts and it’s still giving me hearty fruit .)  So I did this pruning one day before sitting next to an experienced gardener who lives down the street.  Her sons come to visit two weeks every summer, and the whole nabe ends up there for a beer or two at some point in those two weeks.  Her front yard is gorgeously adorned in always bountiful flowers and I’ve heard of the abundant veggies and other fruits and foliage she grows out back.   In her heavy Italian accent, she told me, “nooooo, you don’t do dat” when I showed her the before and after pictures of the tomatoes I had cut back the day before.  My pruning adventure also occurred one day prior to talking to my friend whose family works 20 acres for local markets in Indiana.  In addition to other interesting tidbits about tomatoes (including that the sweetest part is the bottom because the sugar sinks and settles there), she also admonished me (in the friendliest way — she is a Hoosier after all and therefore born into midwestern nice) for my pruning efforts.  It was one day before listening to a couple podcasts on tomatoes, where none covered pruning with enough attention for me to think anyone else was doing this.  So I thought I was sunk.  My before and after should have stayed at “before.”  But, then, ta da!  The tomato plants seemed to love it.  They grew back some branches but wasn’t overrun with them.  And my eyes may have been deceiving me but suddenly tomato fruit were springing up where none had been before.

Now, having had some additional time to read a little further on the question whether to prune tomato plants, and realizing that the answers are more elegant (is it just me or is that word creeping up everywhere lately – throwing it in to be a member of the bandwagon) than I expected.

Having had time to consider all this – the instinct to prune, the tsking of my fellow gardeners, and the happy tomatoes as an end result, I affirmed what I have been discovering all along: it’s good to take in the advice you can get, but your own instinct and experience is your best guide.

1 Comment

Let’s Face It – Part II

A few days ago, I posted the following: More people are gardening because they think the world (as we know it) is going to end soon.

QUESTION: What do you think?  Go ahead … gimme the dirt.

And here’s some of the dirt…

Weighing in on FB:

Dwain Cromwell Not ending, but the world is changing. For the first time in my life, tomato plants are not producing in NW Arkansas because the temps don’t drop low enough at night for the buds to set. There are tomatoes at Farmers Market, but the vendors must have controlled set-ups. Back yard tomatoes just aren’t happening, no matter how much watering and care. It’s just so damned hot.

and

Crescent Dragonwagon ‎at Dwain Cromwell, this is SO sad. They say if climate change is not reversed, there will not be maply syruping in Vermont in 25 years.

8 Comments