little bounty from the garden

[Plymouthy Adams]

Small surplus of tomatoes from the garden so mums decided to make a bit of salsa.....about two tablespoons of mix left over for me to sample....she did good!

[Los_Control]

Lucky b@stard!    I have a hard time with tomatoes here. Just gets to hot in the summer and the blooms fall off never produce.

So I get a few tomatoes in the spring, then in the fall get a few more .... never enough for salsa though .... funny cherry tomatoes grow great .... I eat em like candy though while watering.

[Plymouthy Adams]

Sorry to hear that Los, it is about the same here this year, the heat is intense, the rains are nil and my watering is often a bit late....but am trying nonetheless to tend to everything about the house....major water project of renewing all primary water lines on hold for now, got the main line exposed, spliced and new maintenance valves and service box in place, the 35 foot trench to lay the new line I have not started due to dry and stressed grass, If no rain in a couple days...will have to start watering the ground a bit so to have moist sod plugs to put back in place.  Don't want the yard to look raw after the dig.  I am going to run the PEX through conduit so if future repairs needed, quick and easy line replacement.

 

Last year, I think I had to water the garden maybe three times...it was a nice wet summer for us....humidity was rough however.  

[Los_Control]

Yeah mine needs water every other day at the least .... right now it is screaming for water ..... Just been so busy with other projects that the garden is getting neglected this year.

 

The wife car has been a challenge for me but think I have it whipped now ..... that has kept me busy for 2 months .... my daily driver truck broke down on me and with used parts on the shelf I fixed it just needs a good tuneup ... past due on oil change and I have $200 worth of parts from RockAuto ..... lust trying to get the wife car finished and out of my work area.

 

Don't get me started on neglected household projects .....

Glad you getting those water lines out of the way .... here they are only 1 or 2 feet deep, my sewer line is 3' deep out in the alley, is only 2' deep through the yard then dives down.

Water lines are not buried deep either ..... still a job to do.

 

 

 

 

[Plymouthy Adams]

It looked like it would rain, two minutes of drizzle and it was gone...fart would last longer in a whirl wind, I think.   Watered the garden and the area I will trench for the water line so hopefully keep my grass plugs solid and useable for going back in place.  

 

Mums has also put away two batches of kosher garlic dill pickles and I sampled one jar today, man they are good, we adjusted the recipe for this years pickles...they crispy and excellent taste.  

 

I know fully well the everything seems to happen at once syndrome.  I would be more surprised if it did not happen this way....!

[Ulu]

My wife grew up out in the farm country but we live in the suburbs. She gardens all the time.

 

We have lots of room for tomatoes and cucumbers & other vegetables.

 

BUT, She refuses to grow anything but flowers (EDIT: farking cactus!) and shrubbery.

I don’t think she liked growing up out there between the corn fields.

Edited June 30 by Ulu

[Plymouthy Adams]

for sure she keeps your patio/garden decked out and dressed to the 9's  but I have to ask if you take a sandwich outside, do you have a table to eat at?  I keep my screened porch simple, few small plants, I do mean small in size and small in number, 4 total....lol  But I do have an open table for coffee and snacks and the occasional meal.

[Ulu]

There are three tables out there, yet the available lunch area still shrinks daily.

 

 

[Plymouthy Adams]

I will do a bit of an update here.  While I made a trip to the farmers market for a nice watermelon and cantaloupe, I also snagged a full box of tomatoes.  I have never before seen such nice and well boxed tomatoes at the market.  Price was also excellent so I told mums if she is willing, I will help her with processing these into salsa.  Bought the box, we did two cookoffs with these tomatoes, zero waste and with what she made earlier from our garden, we processed right at 3 3/4 gallons of salsa.  right place at the right time with the purchase of the fresh tomatoes....pic of them as they came out of the box to be washed.  

 

 

 

Edited July 20 by Plymouthy Adams

[metoodavid]

Hi,

It is really tasty you should done a good job.

[Dan Hiebert]

I'm a tad jealous, love me some good homemade salsa, but don't get enough ingredients here to make enough to put up.  Which is kind of a misstatement, because veggies grow very well up here.  Just can't get the fresh peppers.  BUT, the missus gardens just enough peppers to make a few fresh batches of salsa or pico de gallo every season.  Something to look forward to.  We've got six acres here, but it's just about all forest, not much room for other than some raised beds scattered about.  I wouldn't call us avid gardeners, the wife plants stuff, then barely pays attention to it.  I have to tend the gardens, and lean more towards flowers (I grew award winning roses when we lived in NM).  This year we signed onto a community supported agriculture program that the Amish are running.  Getting some really good and varied veggies every other week, just picked up a couple tomatoes that are almost as big as dodgeballs!

[Eneto-55]

We have been dealing with a huge population growth of groundhogs here in our small town neighborhood. Next door neighbors say they have caught 6, I have gotten 4. They have decimated some areas of our garden. The other neighbors don't like them around, but don't have gardens.  There's an Air B&B in the house behind us, and the beasts are undermining the foundation there. But the owner lives out of state, and the care-taker has a full-time job, a family, and is also on the local volunteer fire squad. So he cannot dedicate too much time to it. 

Edited July 25 by Eneto-55

[Plymouthy Adams]

a good Remmington 700 BDL in .223 will take care of the problem....but at least be a bit fair about it and back up to about 250-300 yards before firing....make it seem somewhat sporting....I like the little guys in the wild, but they are destructive.  I have squirrel issues, feel your pain.  

[Eneto-55]

3 hours ago, Plymouthy Adams said:

a good Remmington 700 BDL in .223 will take care of the problem....but at least be a bit fair about it and back up to about 250-300 yards before firing....make it seem somewhat sporting....I like the little guys in the wild, but they are destructive.  I have squirrel issues, feel your pain.  

I've been using a live trap.  Not very sporting, I don't suppose.  Tried to get them to move along at first, when I thought there were only three, the mother and two little ones.

I have VERY old 22 Winchester repeater - my only gun. (1911 is last patent date.) 

Reluctant to fire a gun here in town.  Tried a bit with my sons pump pellet gun, but my aim is pretty bad. I am left-handed, but right eye dominant. At one time I could shoot more accurately on the left from the hip than trying to aim right handed. Now I'm just bad.

[Plymouthy Adams]

for sure the Remmington 700 BDL is a varmint gun but not at all sporting.  I will avoid disturbing let alone killing any wild wife or poisonous snakes IF NOT IN MY YARD....dodge them on the highway, aim for them in the yard.  I care not for them trespassing.  The squirrels have picked clean my peach tree in the back yard and laying waste to the two trees in the west section.  The have cut all the pears from the tree and it was loaded...they destroyed the apples and will be working the pecan as soon as the milk starts to form in the shells.  For reasons unknown they stay out of the veggie garden.  The all METAL roofing and fascia has put them at bay along with removing any tree not on the 10/12 roofing side of the house so they no longer traverse the roof, they cannot get traction on the steep angle.  But they so cute all the neighbors think....I am reluctant to set traps for fear of killing or injuring any of my birds about the place.  Targeted kills the best method but new neighbors are ammo-phobic.   Just sighted in my East German pellet gun, it is pretty powerful but still has a resounding pop when fired....next up, silencer....lol  

[Eneto-55]

We have lots of squirrels and chipmunks - they don't bother our fruit trees as far as I have seen. Lots of rabbits, too, and they have pretty much no fear.  I can walk almost right up to them before they take off.  Wasn't that way back in Oklahoma.  We used to have a next door neighbor who would shoot them out of an upstairs window.  Now there's a neighbor across the street who feeds them, and leaves a strip of tall grass as a "bunny refuge".  So I haven't taken any active (read destructive) action against them.  My wife just sprinkles some sort of deterrent all around the garden area. 

 

The birds are a real threat to our cherry tree, raspberries, and blueberries.  If we do not cover them in nets, we don't get much of the fruit.  The sweet cherry tree we had died, and now we have a sour cherry tree.  We did still have to compete with them to some degree, but not like with the sweet cherry tree.  (My wife had hung aluminum pie plates and a wind chime in the tree this year, but after awhile they were no longer deterred by those things.)  When we had lots of raspberry bushes, I planted some down along the corner of our property, where there are a bunch of trees, thinking I'd let the birds have those, and maybe they'd leave the garden patch alone. Didn't really work.  We also have lots of (mostly Concord) grape vines along one side of our lot, and I don't think anything has bothered those, except for the Japanese beetles.

[Los_Control]

30 minutes ago, Eneto-55 said:

there's a neighbor across the street who feeds them, and leaves a strip of tall grass as a "bunny refuge".

Thats it! I have been trying to figure out my backyard ..... Thanks @Eneto-55

 

My backyard identifies as a bunny refuge

[Plymouthy Adams]

I have just gathered some peaches and have a cobbler in the oven as I type.  I will get a little for my efforts I suppose.  Good you have a lot of different nuts, fruits and berries.....as for the dang Japanese beetles, these little bugs bite me....I squash them all on site.  One of the guys on the other forum I am active has a beautiful 6.5 acre vineyard...got to smell them in blossom this season, hard to see the bloom.....its a lot of work he states.  He is in middle of Kentucy, good area for grapes.  

[Plymouthy Adams]

1 minute ago, Los_Control said:

Thats it! I have been trying to figure out my backyard ..... Thanks @Eneto-55

 

My backyard identifies as a bunny refuge

sounds like some of my early pottery projects...in the end, cut two grooves in it and call it an ashtray.   I usually have one pair of bunny hoppers raise a brood in the backyard....I have to keep the dang feral cats at bay so the bunnies are not molested.  We have cat problems here also...

[Los_Control]

No bunny problem here .... just tall grass  

 

I have thought about having some critters like chickens in the back yard, just too frigging hot in the summer to try and take care of them.

Be difficult and border on cruelty to animals in my opinion. ..... While I have seen a couple neighbors try it a few times, never for long.

[Plymouthy Adams]

my neighbor started a chicken farm......

 

 

 

as for the squirrels......they don't get them all this time.....fresh out of the oven, no sugar added cobbler.......

 

 

Edited July 25 by Plymouthy Adams

[Dan Hiebert]

The critters seem to stay away from the cultivated stuff in our yard.  But we do have wild raspberries and strawberries all over the place that the birds and other wee forest creatures scarf up.  When those get ripe, it takes me an extra hour or so to mow.  I'll be mowing all biff-and-happy and come across a strawberry patch - "ooh, strawberries!"  Turn off the mower, sit in the grass, and eat strawberries.  Itty bitty things, but they're the strawberriest tasting strawberries I ever recall eating.  The raspberries stick around longer, but we have to watch for bears in the raspberry patches, especially later in the summer.

 

   

[Plymouthy Adams]

I attended a tech school while in the reserves in Illinois.  The base was rural and sat across from some of the last of the natural prairie.   I did enjoy that section for as you stated, were the best strawberries ever, raspberries and even goose berries growing wild and rabbits, you dang near had to step over them.   I am glad I carried my 10 speed bike with me when I drove up.   As a kid in WV it was only natural to pick wild raspberries, blackberries, gather hickory, walnut and hazelnuts.  Very few butternuts were left.  Few mulberries also.  Back in them good-ole-days.  

[Veemoney]

I haven't put in a garden patch in 10 or more years but bit the bullet this year. The weeds were so thick they had matted roots under the soils and I had to use the skidloader to get under them a little bit at a time and then hand lifted the sections out before tilling. I used the old garden patch for burning brush and spread and tilled all the ash in. Wasn't sure it would produce but it is doing well.

 

I started some tomato, bell pepper, squash, cucumber and misc from seed and probably a bit to early as my tomato plants had fruits and were almost 4ft in the window before I could get them outside. I tried to harden them off but they looked sickly for a bit then kicked in. Something grabbed 5 beefsteak tomatoes a week or so after they were out. I suspect deer and put a camera out to see. So far the vegetarians caught on camera are deer but now they are eating apples that have fallen, racoons, rabbits, skunk and a cat on the prowl  all in the evening hours. The squirrels by me have raided the apple and pear trees and between the deer, geese, the remnants aren't a problem but something ate the tops off my beets which stunted them some and I just picked, cleaned and bagged 2 gallons off leaf lettuce before I seen all the updates here.

 

I've got a good share of the cherry tomatoes, yellow squash and green zucchini so far and acorn squash should be ready next week. My black raspberries were small this year and are done for the season. I opened up a new patch to move some and will add the red variety. I have 8-10 rhubarb plants that have supported my pie habit well and expect I will be eating another this weekend. 

 

PA mentioned cats and my neighbor has one that comes by my place all the time stalking a kill. He does well with the mice and an occasion bird or chipmunk but left an adult rabbit next to the garden last week. I wondered what happened to it till I rolled it over and saw the bloody neck wound, came back later with a shovel and part of the hind quarter and leg were gone. Buried it and something dug it up and well it's gone. Guess that's one way to keep the rabbits out of the garden

 

 

[ggdad1951]

On 7/25/2024 at 10:57 AM, Eneto-55 said:

I've been using a live trap.  Not very sporting, I don't suppose.  Tried to get them to move along at first, when I thought there were only three, the mother and two little ones.

I have VERY old 22 Winchester repeater - my only gun. (1911 is last patent date.) 

Reluctant to fire a gun here in town.  Tried a bit with my sons pump pellet gun, but my aim is pretty bad. I am left-handed, but right eye dominant. At one time I could shoot more accurately on the left from the hip than trying to aim right handed. Now I'm just bad.

 

a groundhog hide is too thick for a pellet gun to do much 'cept give them a sting....22l semi-auto worked wonders for me.