The onions have been pulled out, carrot seedlings have been transplanted and a head of cabbage is ready to rob a bank. All perfectly normal activities for a vegetable garden in August.
Table of Contents
Onions
I grew a fantastic bed of onions this year, better than I ever have before, but the day before harvest Mother Nature sliced open her waterbed right over my town.
Highways, homes and my onion patch were flooded almost instantly. When onions get wet at this stage they'll rot. It wasn't just a charming summer shower. It was this ...
I got them off the ground and home to cure. After a few weeks of curing and triage, I can estimate that half of my onions have rotted.
But half didn't, so there's that.
Vegetable gardeners are relentlessly Pollyanna.
Carrots
First of all, contrary to popular belief you absolutely can transplant root vegetables like beets and carrots.
I planted 32 feet of carrot seeds earlier this year. One section the length of a pencil grew. The rest are either made of invisible ink or they're asshats. Whichever you prefer. Either way they're not going to grow.
Therefore, knowing I need carrots for Szechuan Carrot soup this winter, I started more carrot seeds at home as soon as I realized my original planting didn't go well. I just filled an old galvanized tub with soil and heavily scattering the seeds in it. Then I left it outside of my backdoor where I could keep an eye on it.
Germination was excellent.
When your garden is a 10 minute drive away germination and sprouting are things you hope are happening. The same way you hope to win the lottery or lose 5 pounds.
Once the seedlings in the tub were transplanting size it was August 5th, so that's when I brought them up to the garden to plant. These carrots generally need 75 days to get to harvestable size. Planting later in the year when less sun is around the corner means it will take them longer to get to harvestable size.
What I'm getting at is it's a crap shoot as to whether I'll actually get a carrot harvest or not. I gave them some beet buddies on the other side of the bed which I also started at home, the same way I started the carrots.
And I have the same expectations of them.
Dry Beans
I grew 16 turtle bean plants. Those are what you grocery store people will know as black beans. I stepped on one plant so now I'm down to 15. They're the large green mound in the centre of the above photo.
Would you like to save this stuff?
We'll email you this post, so you can refer to it later.
They are absolutely covered in bean pods. To harvest them I'll wait for the plants to dry (but if rain is predicted I'll pull them EARLY) and then pull off all of the bean pods.
Those drying bean pods get thrown into a brown paper bag. In January or whenever I have time I shake the hell out of the bag so the black beans come out of the shells and separate them.
Those get turned into canned black beans for Brazilian Black bean soup and refried beans for wintertime broccoli burritos from Bad Manners.
Weeds
I give up.
I weed at least an hour every time I go to the garden. Within a week it looks like the first scene in every depression era movie ever made. All that's missing is the long abandoned long underwear on the clothesline.
An hour with a weed whacker and some hand pulling got it into relatively good shape. At least the right half. I use a 40v Ryobi battery operated weed whacker which even with a low charge still cleared over half of the garden.
I love my weed whacker. A lot.
Saving Flower Seeds
It's time to tie ribbons on specific flower blooms that I'd like to save seed from. Once the seed is ready to harvest in the fall, the blooms are all just shrivelled scribbles of beige and you can't tell varieties apart.
I really need to remember to save the seeds from this Alpen Glow zinnia showing peach petals with lavender edges and veining. But like a violet lavender. A vlavender.
HEY YOU! Remember, if you like a bloom label it soon.
I apologize for getting pushy but I don't want you to forget or put off doing it. Now is when I tell you I've been reminding myself for 3 weeks to start labelling and bagging my blooms.
My chronically tap dancing brain has added "label the flowers!" to its reminder repertoire. And yet here we are. Me without labelled plants and you taking advice from a fraud.
Cabbage Attack Update
I grew my cabbages under row cover, except for a few that I didn't have room for. So I just stuck them in the soil without any protection and hoped for the best. That turned out to be about as effective as the rhythm method.
I sprayed the cabbages with BTK
To help what was left of my unprotected cabbages I threw a pair of knee high pantyhose on them. Now they're protected from cabbage moth laying eggs on them. Technically they still can because the nylon is touching right against the cabbage, but it greatly reduces the chances.
When I harvest the cabbage I'll have to remove most of the outer leaves that will be harbouring dead cabbage moth caterpillars and poops.
But because CABBAGES GROW FROM THE INSIDE OUT, all the tender, inner leaves will be perfect. PERFECT I TELL YOU.
~ Polly
Hettie
I love your gardening posts, Karen. (As I have said before your garden is why I started a veggie garden and, such is my love for the thing, I am forever in your debt.) I thought I'd share with you that I've discovered how to deter voles. At least I hope I have and it's not just a fluke that they are not eating my beets and carrots this year: Castor oil! I sprayed my plants a couple of times with a mixture of castor oil and water and they remain undisturbed. I also planted sage amongst the carrots to deter carrot flies, which appears to have worked too. Each year, the veggie garden gets better and better. That said, I've yet to have any luck with brassicas, which is a pity because I love them. When I netted mine I ended up with a revolting infestation of flies - the big uglies that get stuck in windows - under the netting. Do they live in the soil? I removed the netting and the caterpillar party began. Japanese beetles are the real problem. They LOVE my beans and they're all over, and I mean ALL OVER my plums and cherries and roses. I am spraying them with Neem and picking them off by hand in the morning and evening and recently I applied nematodes in hopes of knocking out their grubs. I hope you never have to contend with them; they skeletalize everything and steal joy along with produce.
Karen
Thanks Hettie! I have had Japanese Beetles but never a real infestation. Which is good because I'm usually busy dealing with other pest emergencies. ~ karen!
Jo-Ann Pieber
Hey Polly(anna?) like your cabbage growing method for the big bad world. We discard the outer leaves Anyway - don't we? clever strategy.
I cannot imagine going to such trouble for black beans. Literally one of the cheapest beans one can buy, dry or canned. And really - is there Really a difference? after you've Dried them? Ug. I just can't Do all that for such a small return. Herbs yes. Tomatoes (or fill in your fave veg here) yes. And even Potatoes! I recently had some garden grown ones and Man! or Woman! they were Good. Better than anything I've had recently from the superstore. So - I get it. But unless one Has an allotment, or large-ish backyard - it's not going to go well.
If I Can grow Anything in my wee deck/container garden - it's going to be the Most flavorful ones, and the most Expensive ones. Plus, Fruit! You really haven't got all that much into fruit - why? In your neighborhood it should be - ok? Where are the grapes/pears/cherries/kiwis/quince?/hey- figs even? Where is the fruit?
Karen
There's no room for fruit that just gets eaten by the animals. It's hard enough to hold onto any of my apples. Regarding the black beans there is no comparison to store bought - they are *that* much better. I'd stop growing carrots before I stopped growing black beans. ~ karen!
Babs
Too bad I donated all those pantyhose I quick wearing. My daughter and son-in-law could have used those for their cabbage heads. Only one head survived the onslaught.
Karen
They really do seem to work remarkably well. I checked on the cabbage tonight and it's still good and it's still growing. ~ karen!
Christine Hilton
Worst year ever! Did you know it was possible for cabbage to stay the same size for two months and then overnight turn into lace?
The good news is l am down to killing 2 slugs after a rain.l started at 100.
After gardening for almost 50 years l am leaning to artificial if l can find some place that sells good ones like Hobbý Lobby but not them because, well you know.
Karen
I have the same lacy variety of swiss chard!😆 ~ karen
Jane
I'm happy to hear that someone as active and hardworking as you still gets weeds. Every August I almost give up with gardening.
But doesn't a week whacker just propagate more weeds?
Karen
This year there is seriously NO keeping up with it. People who have gardens that are normally immaculate have weeds. It's exhausting. ~ karen!
Karen
There's a point when you just have to get rid of the weeds regardless of method. This was that time. Most of the weeds just had flower heads, as opposed to seeds, so it was a pretty safe way to go. ~ karen!
Nona Schulz
YOU are a joy. I garden like you do. Weeds are my nemesis but I persist. I have dreams of this art book looking garden which I will never achieve. One can dream. However the the joy derived from fresh produce and even the labor to produce it knows no bounds.
I love this blog. I've learned things and even applied a few of them. So keep sending and for cryin' please do not ever stop with the humor.
Bev Hawkinson
Ah Polly. Thank you for the reminders. I have package after package of labels and I, like you, fully intend to label my plants and assorted seeds I've randomly harvested. Keep those reminders coming please. I can't remember where I put all those labels and will need the nudge to look for them, and once found, use some of them before they disappear again.
You truly do inspire!
Bev Hawkinson
My reason for gardening. While my children haven't abandoned their fur daughter to poor recreational life choices, I did notice she didn't move out when they did... something about leases and cats...
So Ophelia Daffodeelia and I (her grandma) garden to cover her Romaine lettuce addiction.
Karen
Hahahaha! Your rabbits look weird. ~ karen!
Kat - the other 1
I was going to say, that chipmunk is pretty big! 😮😆
Karen
YOU are a joy. I think. I really don't know you in an up close and personal .. well on any level at all I suppose, but I'm certain. YOU are a joy. ~ karen!
Jane
This is the year when you blink and the backyard turns into a jungle. So far, it's stalemate between the weeds and me, except for one back corner where the grapevine is out of control and tangles up with the forsythia and mock orange and nightshades are crawling all along the bottom of the back wall. See if I can do something about that when fall comes. Unfortunately, that's also the corner where flocks of birds like to winter, so I can only prune back so much. Sigh!
Karen
There have been a lot of sighs going around this summer. In fact, I just breathed one when I realized I published this post 12 hours earlier than I meant to, lol. It was supposed to go up tonight at midnight. See? Even my brain is weedy. ~ karen!