Things are swingin' at Westmore! As you may have seen on our Facebook page, we've been harvesting a pea here and a pea there, along with the occasional strawberry. The peas have been of good size and quite delicious - one challenge they have presented, however, is differentiating between the shelling peas and the sugar snap peas. We had marked each variety, but when the cats got under the netting (repeatedly), they not only disturbed the pea seeds and - I suspect - greatly reduced the number that germinated, but they also took away the markers. Therefore, I have no idea which plant is a member of which variety, and I have to play a "wait and see" game with the pods. The ones that don't get fat quickly are the ones that I assume belong to the sugar snap variety, and the ones that do puff out are probably the shelling peas. So far, we've just stood in the garden and sampled them. Not that I'm complaining about that!
The strawberries have been sort of tricky - we've discovered that they're difficult to see even when they're nice and ripe, unless you're bending down next to the plants and specifically looking for them. I was a little slow on the uptake for the ones that have ripened so far, and we've either missed them entirely or gotten to them when they're past their prime. The good news is that the one or two perfect ones that we managed to sample have been absolutely delicious - sweet and bursting with strawberryness! Their amazing flavor is also impelling us to keep a closer watch on the strawberry patch for ripening berries - right now, we have about ten on their way.
The beans I planted the day after the hail storm are coming up nicely. The Empress and Golden Wax bush beans are coming up the most reliably - the Kentucky Wonder pole beans have had kind of spotty germination, for some reason. Hopefully, they'll all come up soon.
The first round of beets and carrots are getting big! They are really quite leafy, and I believe we'll be harvesting some soon. The second round are coming up and sending out some true leaves. I'll be planting a third round soon!
I replanted some cucurbits a few days ago, this time using two seeds per desired plant. I'm tired of them refusing to germinate! I replanted one cucumber, two yellow squash, three butternut squash, three cantaloupe, and one Tigger melon, and they should come up within another three or four days. If not, I give up! I also still need to call Nick at CSU to see if he has any leftover pumpkin starts that I could buy - Frank says I waited too long to plant our Howdens; they are too long-season to yield much before the season is over if I plant them this late.
About a week ago, I picked up the next three tires for the potatoes, again from Alpine Tire Center, painted them using free recycled paint from the Larimer County Landfill's Home Hazardous Wastes Department, and stuck them on top of the first layer of tires. I also drove in the rebar stakes I'd gotten - two per tire stack, to hold the upper tires in place against wind, shifting soil, etc. I only put on a base coat of light yellow; Ben and I will be adding some colorful designs pretty soon, to make them a little bit less of an eyesore. After I stacked the second tires on, I filled in their centers with soil from around the first tires, covering most of the potatoes' leaves. Then I stuffed some dead leaves around the inside of the tires (where the tubes would go), as per Louis' suggestion. Actually, Louis had suggested straw, but straw is a lot harder to find than dead leaves, and I think the same principles will apply to the leaves. They will probably break down a lot faster than straw would, but I think they'll be fine for this growing season. The potato plants only took a couple of days to pop right back up through the soil again, and now they're going strong once more.
We have a very healthy population of flea beetles at WOG. I first noticed them on the tomatoes, and now they are also on the potatoes and a few peppers. The eggplants alone of the solanaceae have been left unscathed. Flea beetles aren't a big deal at all in small numbers, because all they do is chew little holes in the leaves. Of course, this is not ideal, because it makes the plant take energy away from growth and fruit production and put it toward repairs, as well as reducing the number of photosynthetic cells, which is where the energy comes from in the first place. I have been smushing the beetles I've been able to catch (not many), but I'll have to purchase some Pyrethrum to get rid of them if their population explodes. However, Pyrethrum is a broad-target insecticide, so it would also kill any populations of beneficial insects we've built up, and that's the last thing we want to do. Here's hoping the population stays small, and that the beneficials we have will help to control it.
We also have some aphids. So far, I've only noticed them on the kale - Ben and I were sampling a kale leaf the other day, and I turned it over and discovered those darn little green bugs. Not a whole heck of a lot, but they were on the other leaves as well. I smushed them all, and so far they haven't made a comeback. There aren't any on the cabbage or the other kale plant, as far as I can tell, or anywhere else. Yet. Come on, ladybird beetles!
I finished the entire roll of netting yesterday. The roll was enough to cover the beets, carrots, cucumbers, beans, tomatoes, zucchini, pumpkins, yellow and butternut squash, eggplants, and peppers. Ben was a great help stretching the ungainly netting over tricky hoops - it was a lot easier to do with two people! The only things left uncovered that I'd like to cover are the melons. Gotta get more netting!
That's all the updates we have for today! Thanks for reading.
WOG out.
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