We are having an unseasonably warm November. 75 degrees today (November 5) and the same is forecasted for tomorrow. The trees have almost lost all their leaves yet here we are enjoying the sun in our tank tops. I am behind with clearing my plot and I have not planted my garlic yet. Today, I cleaned almost half of my plot and will do more work tomorrow. Trying to get the garlic in tomorrow as well.
Bad news. The rodents got ALL the King Philip corn. Even the ears that were not quite ripe. I was too late. They also started feasting on the glass gem corn, so I harvested four bigger ears this morning, even though it is still a couple of weeks early. Lots of things still growing in the garden. I still have plenty of green beans. The carrots are coming in nicely, I thinned them a few days ago. Fall greens are looking good. The winter squash less so; there are only a few fruit on the vines and those are not very big.
So much for King Philip corn being more rodent resistant :(. I still have a few ears growing. The mice/rats only ate ears with partially exposed kernels. I hope they will leave the other ones alone. The glass gem corn is (still) untouched. Fingers crossed.
My corn is not yet ready for harvest but I am very excited about the King Philip corn I planted this year. It is a historic Wampanoag flint corn native to New England (named after the Wampanoag chief Metacom who adopted the name King Philip) and has copper-colored, reddish kernels. Flint corn has a hard outer layer around each kernel (protecting it from rodents) and is mostly used for coarse corn meal. It can also be dried and used for popcorn. In addition to King Philip corn, I grew glass gem corn again this year. While mostly used for decoration, glass gem corn can also be ground into meal or popped for snacking.
I did some weeding this beautiful Saturday morning and also thinned the carrots. Many tomato and cucumber plants seem to have recovered from the heat waves, the corn is tall, the beans are flowering, the winter squash are (finally) growing. Some tomato plants are looking very sad though: Black Strawberry and Ananas Noire have dried, brown leaves; Ananas Noire even has fruit rotting on the stem. There is still lots to come from my plot this late summer and fall: green beans, Swiss chard, kale, corn, squash, salad greens, beets, carrots, leeks.
I cleaned up the area where the garlic had been and sowed beets (Chiogga and Burpee Golden), two rows of fall greens and carrots (Coreless Amsterdam, Dragon Purple and Mokum). Coreless Amsterdam and Mokum are early carrots with 55 days to maturity, Dragon Purple is 70 days. I also sowed basil (among the tomatoes), a row of cilantro (between the leeks and the flowers) and Black Seeded Simpson leaf lettuce (between the eggplant and the timber border). I top-dressed the tomatoes, squash and eggplant with cow manure and gave everything a good watering.
We are starting our next heat wave here in Boston, but I still went to the garden this morning to weed for two and a half hours. Long overdue. I had bought field hay to mulch two years ago, and the hay had seed heads. Now I have grass everywhere.
The summer garden has been somewhat disappointing this year so far. Other than tomatoes, not much is thriving. Zucchini died. Eggplants are a now-show. Cucumbers are a total fail; I got three “globes” and one decent-size one from six plants. I do think the heat is to blame, at least for the cucumbers. The kale and chard are very short for some reason. The winter squash is looking okay, I see many flowers but no fruit yet. But then again, I started the garden very late this year.
Yesterday, we had our first real rain in weeks. There was a big and beautiful thunderstorm moving through the area and everyone was celebrating. It is really scary how dry it has been.
My first Black Strawberry tomatoes are ripening. They are so beautiful. And very tasty.
I harvested some more tomatoes and some forgotten beets and baby carrots. I need to replant the spot in the garden where I pulled the garlic a couple of weeks ago. I will direct-sow lettuces, carrots and beets and some basil. I also need to stake the beans and do a thorough weeding. There is so much grass in my plot. I think it came from the field hay that I used to mulch last year or the year before.
The cucumbers do not look great. The plants are not thriving, and the fruit is small and round. I know they suffered from the heat. Cucumbers do not like temperatures above 90, and we just had a 8 day-heat wave with temperatures in the mid- to upper 90s. The zucchini is dying. Not sure what is happening. It is just shriveling up, including the one single fruit, which stopped growing and is deformed and starting to yellow. The eggplant plants are tiny. The three winter squash plants have very few flowers. I am hoping things will improve.
Tomatoes are looking great. Tons of fruit, but the plants themselves are not very tall this year. I need to amend the soil this fall. Beans, corn and flowers are looking great.
I went to the garden tonight to harvest parsley and mint for a fattoush for dinner and noticed the first tomatoes of the season, yay! From left to right Stupice, (somewhat underripe) Black Strawberry and Baker’s Family Heirloom.