Flowers for Fall?

Jay likes to grow a wide variety of produce, and this fall he even grew a few flowers. Of course, the girls thought this was an awesome, fabulous, great, stupendous idea... as long as they were pink. And so, they compromised:

Mobile high tunnel 2, filled with zinnias and sunflowers

Sunflowers, just before "harvest"

Maggie got special Daddy-time and the honor of picking the zinnias

Displayed at market, aka Maggie saying "Daddy, it's too hard to smile at 7 a.m. on a Saturday."

The flowers didn't sell very well, but most new products don't sell the first week we've offered them. Besides, think how lovely my house looks!

Flowers for Fall?

Busy bees, busy bugs

We are so very busy right now. The garden and market business is Jay's summer job, but for school teachers, summer is over. I'm also in school full-time now, and we don't have any paid hired help. So, gardening is done in the evenings and weekends.

Thankfully for us, the garden slows considerably in late August. Because the high tunnels put us ahead of season in the spring, it also makes our end of season one come sooner. Season two, however, is in it's infancy. The fall crops are all planted and the weather has been favorable. The bugs, however, will be our problem this fall. It seems they have "found" our garden spot and are feasting away. The sunflower plants looked ideal on Sunday night; on Monday night, the leaves looked like Swiss cheese. And, let me tell you, the very hungry caterpillar is  cute in a book, when he eats all those lovely picnic foods, but in real life, he is one ugly contender. Even the pretty white butterflies are looked at with disdain in our household. If only us busy bees can stay ahead of the busy bugs, we should have produce for months to come!

Busy bees, busy bugs

What is going on at the farm?

What is going on at the farm? Well that is a wonderful question. Everything! We have been so busy doing everything that we haven't had time to post any new information. With school starting, it has been hard to make everything happen, however with the rain and cooler weather, it makes working outside much more bearable.

What is happening......

In the high tunnels, the tomatoes, cherry tomatoes and bell peppers are still producing. However, they are slowing down. They are loaded with blooms and if the weather holds, we will be expecting larger harvests towards the end of September. This week will be the first time for cut flowers. We have sunflowers and Zinnias. The girls are very excited about them. The fall root crops are planted in the moveable tunnel spaces. We planted 16-32 foot rows of Haikuri Turnips, 16-32 foot rows of Carrots, 8-32 foot rows of Beets. We also planted Radishes and some more turnips outside. We have 3- 40 foot beds ready to plant in one of our big hoop houses, also. We will be planting green onions, napa cabbage, kale, lettuce, spinach, bok choy and kohlarbi in this space. We are also going to be planting some lettuce inside to transplant in October in the tomato tunnel.

Outside is really slowing down or done. The outside peppers were a real disappointment along with the watermelon. We have a few cucumbers coming and a few potatoes left to dig. The leeks are ok, it just go to hot for them. We have 375 plus broccoli and cauliflower plants out. We will be putting them in side low tunnels as the weather gets cooler.

On the Jelly front- We have been very busy. We have made over 100 jars in the last 2 weeks. Expect to see some new jellies and we are bring back a few more.

What is going on at the farm?

Color wheel

Who says watermelon must be red to be delicious?

Color wheel

Turning Yello'

I am a pretty brave gal. Snakes, bugs, spiders, wild animals... they don't usually scare me. But, what I almost grabbed in the tomato building is still sending shivers up my spine:

Apparently, this is a beneficial garden spider, called the Black and Yellow Garden Spider. (Gee, real creative naming there.) According to this site, here's the basic info on this thing:

The Black and Yellow Argiope is a common orb web spider. Orb web means it spins a web like a circle.

Female spiders are much larger than males, growing almost an inch and a half long. Males grow about 3/4 inch long. Both spiders have a cephalothorax (small front body section) with silver hairs on it. The abdomen (large back section) is egg-shaped with black and yellow coloring.

Legs of these spiders are black with red or yellow bands. Each leg has three claws on the end.

Black and Yellow Argiopes live in fields and gardens. They can be found on shrubs, tall plants, and flowers.

The web of this spider spirals out from the center and can be two feet across. The female builds the large web, and a male will build a smaller web on the outer part of her web. The male's web is a thick zig-zag of white silk.

Black and Yellow Argiopes eat flying insects that get trapped in the sticky web. The most common ones are aphids, flies, grasshoppers, bees, and wasps.

The spider hangs with her head down in the center of her web, waiting for prey to be caught. Sometimes she hides off to the side with a thin silk thread attched to her web. When an insect hits the web, the spider feels the vibrations and comes running.

These spiders prefer sunny places with little or no wind to build their webs. Each night, they eat their web and build a new one.

Now, the one in our garden was at least 8 inches across. Okay, so maybe only 2-3 inches, but it was huge! But, I did the right thing. I backed away and left it there to kill the many grasshoppers attacking our tomatoes. However, I did NOT pick that side of the building for the rest of the day, and won't  go back any time soon, now that Jay informed me we have four "Charlottes" in that part of the cherry tomato building.

Just let Charlotte and her friends stay out of my house, and we'll get along just fine!

Turning Yello'