Garden Notes: August 2023

 Rainfall 

• 2nd: 0.02" 
• 3rd: 2.72"
• 7th: 0.35"
• 9th: 0.2"
• 10th: 1.07"
• 11th: 0.04"
• 12th: 0.44"
• 24th: 0.28"
• 27th: 0.23"
• 28th: 0.43"
• 29th: 0.45:
• 30th: 0.14"
• Total: 6.37 inches

Temperature

• range of nighttime lows: 62 to 75°F (17 to 24°C)
• range of daytime highs: 76 to 95°F (25 to 35°C)

Weather Notes

The weather service keeps trying to forecast us into scorching temperatures, but Mother Nature simply isn't cooperating. Of course, we live amongst trees and vegetation, so our temps will be considerably lower than in towns and cities, where concrete, asphalt, and blacktop absorb and retain heat. Even so, we still have humidity to deal with, so it feels hot as usual! What is unusual, is our continued overnight lows in the 60s. I don't ever recall nights like these; our summer lows are usually in the mid-70s. Getting down into the 60s really helps cool the house down and keep it more comfortable during the day.

Planted

• kale
• turnips
• carrots
• parsnips
• collard greens
• lettuce

Picking and Preserving

August is my busiest month. I spend the morning picking and the afternoon preserving.

Harvest bucket in early August

Harvest bucket in late August

It's the month for figs and pears, so these keep me busy.

We seem to have had an extra long run for the figs, which usually only last a week or two. They kept producing for more than three weeks this year. 

Fresh figs with kefir and granola

When the harvest is in full flush, I can pints of figs. When it trickles down to smaller numbers, I quarter and dehydrate them. Sadly, another of our fig trees is dying. That's the third one in as many years.

Amazingly, we have very little bird damage to our figs this year. I suspect it's because they're feasting on elderberries instead.

While I'm not getting a lot of elderberries, I did get enough to make another half-gallon of elderberry infused vinegar. 

We eat pears fresh and the rest go to make pear sauce. 

Dan's not keen on canned pear pieces, but we both like pear sauce, which I think is easier to do than chunks anyway. Most of the sauce is canned, but I'm going to dehydrate some too.

Fresh pear pie

I guess because of the rain and cooler temperatures, my cucumbers continue to look good.

These are my landrace cucumbers, second year. As it gets hotter they slow down a bit, but I've replenished our dill pickle supply and we continue to eat them in salads almost daily. 

Peppers are doing well.

As is the okra.

I had volunteer cherry tomatoes come up in the okra bed. They sort of lean on the okra plants, making them easier to pick. Both seem to be getting enough sun and are producing well.

Okra and tomato plants growing together.

I try not to plant too much okra, because one year I had so much I still had okra in the freezer when the new harvest came in. Frozen okra oven-fries nicely and makes a tasty vegetable, but we'd eaten so much of it over winter that the first fresh harvest wasn't as appealing as it usually is. I love the anticipation of those first seasonal tastes. 

Even so, I'm freezing some of the extra.

Ready for the freezer. I'll add more as I have extra.

The nice thing about okra, is that it can be frozen without blanching. I may try to can some with cherry tomatoes as an experiment too.

Speaking of cherry tomatoes, we have those in abundance. I only have half-a-dozen slicing tomato plants, but the cherry toms absolutely thrive. I've already shown you some of the pizza sauce I made, and I've been popping extras in the freezer for next year's batch. Also, I've started a couple of jars cherry tomatoes preserved in olive oil. I found the recipe in Preserving Food Without Freezing or Canning and I tried a couple of pints last year, and we really liked it. 

This year I'm going to preserve a couple of quarts. The recipe calls for cherry tomatoes, small onions, and fresh herbs (I used rosemary, thyme, and oregano). Everything is sprinkled with salt and a couple tablespoons of vinegar or lemon juice, then covered with extra virgin olive oil. I vacuum seal the jar as well. 

These make a wonderful condiment or salad topper, complete with tomato and herb flavored oil and vinegar salad dressing right out of the jar!

My watermelons have been incredibly slow to do anything.

Baby watermelon

I hope we get some before first frost!

And here's a treat.

Asparagus!

I always thought asparagus was a spring thing, but I've been regularly cutting small handfuls this month. They make a great snack, addition to salad, or scrambled eggs. 

Speaking of salads, I usually show you one.

This is my version of taco salad, with chips instead of a taco bowl. Avocado makes it special, as does the sauce, which is ricotta cheese mixed with salsa. We've been eating these once a week.

Varmint

Earlier this month I had a problem with something eating the leaves off my sweet potato plants. Dan put out his live animal trap and trail camera one night, and caught this!

Raccoon in live animal trap.

That's pretty much it for my August garden. How about yours?

Garden Notes: August 2023 © Aug 2023

by Leigh at http://www.5acresandadream.com

Dried Pear Sauce

Fruit and vegetable powders are very popular amongst folks who dry a lot of food. That intrigued me, so dehydrated pear sauce was the first thing I made using my new blender. I started with a quart of pear sauce that I didn't can.

I don't have fruit leather trays for my dehydrator, so I used waxed paper and spread it with a spoon. I tried to keep the thickness under a quarter inch.

After about a day in my dehydrator, the texture was similar to fruit leather.

It was pliable, and this is how people make fruit roll-ups. To powder it, however, I needed it drier. It was sticking to the wax paper, so I peeled it off and returned it for another day in the dehydrator.

It never got truly crisp, but it got dry enough to break into smaller pieces.

It only took a few seconds in the blender, using the tamper to push the pieces on top toward the blades.

One quart of pear sauce yielded about a pint dried. It isn't like a true powder, it's moister than that and a little sticky. More like brown sugar but not.

Lastly, I vacuum sealed the jar with my little hand pump to protect it from pantry moths and humidity. (I don't trust ants either!)

I'm thinking this would be a fantastic thing for hikers and campers. It could be sealed in small-serving mylar bags to carry. For myself, I will probably rehydrate some just to see what it's like, but since I have plenty of pear sauce canned for serving right out of the jar, I'll mostly use the powder for baking. It can be added directly to baked-good batters without reconstituting. I foresee myself using it in cakes, muffins, cookies, pancakes, etc. I like pieces of dried fruit for our granola and oatmeal, or for baking like my Better Than Fig Newton Bars and Fruit Cake Cookies.

Dehydrating versus canning. Which is better?

I think where we fall in this debate depends on our preserving, cooking, and eating habits. Canning lends itself well to large quantities of an item and is usually the first way I preserve the harvest. Drying (and freezing) work well for small quantities that aren't enough to can. Both dehydrating and canning take time and a power source, although I'm pretty sure that my dehydrator uses less electricity than my stove, even though it takes longer. When necessary, I've canned on a wood cookstove and over a campfire. My dehydrator requires electricity, and while solar dehydrators do exist, I read they don't work well in humid climates like mine.

Dried foods definitely use fewer jars for the same fresh quantities and need less storage space, which are both pluses. Also, they can be stored in mylar bags, making them easier to transport than heavy, bulky jars. On the other hand, dried foods require some planning ahead to prepare, while canned goods are basically ready to use. Dried foods need to be protected from potential pest and moisture damage. Canned goods have the potential for a broken seal and spoilage. When properly stored, both have a good shelf life (see Grandpappy's "Five Different Shelf Life Studies" for some surprising information). 

No matter our habits and preferences, I think having both canned and dried on hand increases food security and versatility. Now, I have two forms of dried fruits and veggies - pieces and powder. And that means even more options.

Okay, you home food preservers out there, your turn. Favorite methods? What are they and why? Any ideas or tips to share with the rest of us? Anything new you've discovered? We want to know!

Dried Pear Sauce © September 2022

by Leigh at http://www.5acresandadream.com

Garden Notes: August 2022

 Rainfall

• 1st: 0.35"
• 3rd: 0.125"
• 4th: 1"
• 7th: 0.8"
• 11th: 0.9"
• 17th: 0.1"
• 19th: 0.5"
• 21st: 0.7"
• 26th: 0.1"
• Total: 4.575"

Temperature

• nighttime range: 68-75°F (20-24°C)
• daytime range: 78-94°F (25.5-34.5°C)

No complaints about August weather. We had good rainfall and generally cooler daily temperatures than July. We only saw 90s during the first and last weeks of the month. On the other hand, the higher humidity meant that it felt just as bad as the 90s! What really helps is when it gets down to below 70°F (21°C) at night because we can cool the house down, making it more tolerable during the day.

State of the garden

All I can say is, beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Everything is overgrown and runaway so that it looks a mess. But almost everything in it is useful!

Here we have cherry tomatoes, watermelon, mangels, horseradish,
celery, lambs quarter, sweet potatoes, raspberries, cowpeas, landrace 
brassicas, morning glory, a couple of carrots, and a potato plant or two.

Hoophouse: The living shade you see is hopniss, cherry tomatoes, and morning glories.

Also a volunteer winter squash, cultivated grape, and Chinese yams.

My largest sweet potato squash so far.

Inside the hoophouse are winter squash, Malabar spinach, violets,
strawberries (back right bed) and cultivated burdock (back left bed.)

Hugelkultur: winter squash, turtle beans, cherry tomatoes,
chicory, clover, morning glories, lambs quarter, & sunchokes.

Hugelkultur closeup featuring squash and chicory.

African keyhole garden: sweet potatoes and a survivor kale.
The porch trellis is growing green beans and cherry tomatoes.

I planted kale in the keyhole bed about a year ago. This is one of
two plants that survived both our cold winter and hot summer.

Picking and Preserving

Bucket full of cherry tomatoes, a few okra, and one lone pepper.

The cherry tomatoes are still going gangbusters. I got bored with making and canning pizza sauce, so I'm switching to tomato juice and ketchup.

The cucumbers are done, so our salads, now, are cherry tomatoes and kale.

Tomato, kale, and black olive salad
with homemade ricotta ranch dressing.

The okra hasn't been very productive. 

Okra is a member of the hibiscus family.

I don't plant a lot, just enough to have oven-fried okra a couple times a week during growing season, with a little extra to freeze for a side dish during winter. It hasn't produced that much, although it's making a better effort now that our daily highs aren't so scorching and we're getting a little more rain.

August is fig month, and these are the largest figs we've ever seen on our trees.

They aren't all this size, but it's amazing to find them. Can't take any credit, though, because the fig trees are pretty much on their own! They are next to the goat barn, so perhaps they're getting some rich rain runoff.

Breakfast: fresh figs on peanut butter granola with
kefir. Sometimes we swap the figs for diced pears.

There were lots to can.

And dessert!

Fresh fig cake with vanilla goat milk ice cream.

Pear harvest started in late July. The heaviest harvest was a couple weeks ago.

Bucket of pears.

One year, I spent days in the kitchen canning chunked pears, but Dan wasn't very enthusiastic about them. So now, I just make pear sauce. It's easier and faster to do, and we both like it.

Cinnamon pear sauce.

As pear picking slows and the pearsauce jars fill, I switch to drying them. Ditto for figs.

 

The cores and peels are being made into vinegar.

Elderberry harvest starts in late August.

First of the elderberries.

I used the first of them to flavor my canned figs and pearsauce. I also freeze them for jelly making this winter, and will make a couple batches of elderberry wine. This year I want to try an elderberry pear wine. I've experimented with adding other fruits for subtle flavor (of which some are more likable than others).

And a few parting shots.

Buckwheat planted as a cover crop in my newest swale bed.
Only a few plants came up, so this will be my seed crop.

Marigolds and a winter squash blossom.

Our first Orange Glo watermelon of the summer.

I picked the watermelon just the other day. They were planted late, and only after my cantaloupe plants all died. I'm not sure what happened to them. They were doing well until our hot dry spell. I watered them faithfully, but they weren't happy and that was that. The watermelons have done much better and we're just starting to enjoy them.

So there are the pictures to go along with my Summer Mantra blog post. I liked hearing about what you all have been up to in your gardens, so keep the comments coming. 😀

Garden Notes: August 2022 © August 2022

by Leigh at http://www.5acresandadream.com

Garden Notes: June 2022

Oh my. The month has flown by. I need to get my June garden post up before July gets here!

 

June rainfall

•  3rd: 0.25"
•  9th: 0.5"
• 16th: 1.125"
• 27th: 0.25"
• 29th: 0.125"
• Total: 2.25"

Temperature

• nighttime range: 58-80°F (14.4-26.6°C)
• daytime range: 80-100°F (26.6-37.7°C)

Tasks

Things I'm trying to get done before picking and preserving take all my time. 

Tying up tomato plants.

We must have 50+ cherry tomato volunteer plants. 

Mulching. I have a pretty good routine for this.

Afternoons are mulch gathering time because I can do it n the shade.

Early the following morning. I work on mulching my garden beds.

Ideally, I think mulching should be done right after a rain, to prevent the moisture from quickly evaporating out of the ground. With no rain, I water the bed thoroughly before putting down mulch.

After I finish with the beds, I need to re-do the wood chip mulch in the aisles, if I have time.

Harvesting, Preserving, and Eating

Strawberries, red raspberries, and mulberries

Mulberry pancakes

Multiplier onions

Garlic

Potatoes

Volunteer lamb's quarter

Lamb's quarter

Lamb's quarter

The lettuce started to bolt earlier this month, but I
find that Jericho doesn't get terribly bitter, even then.

Landrace cucumbers and Matt's Wild Cherry tomatoes.

What are landrace cucumbers? They are my experiment to develop a locally adapted yet genetically diverse variety of cucumber for my garden.

• This blog post explains what landrace gardening is.
• This blog post tells how to do it.
• Details about my cucumber experiment are at the bottom of this post.

So far, the cucumbers are growing very well and producing tasty cucumbers.

Lots of flowers hopefully means lots of cukes. That's
good, because I need to can pickles & relish this year.

100% homegrown salad, even the salad dressing! (Recipe here.)

Seed saving

So far, I've collected seed from:

• Collards
• Kale
• Edible pod peas
• Garlic (bulbils)

One thing I don't want to cross-pollinate, is my lettuce. I have three types of lettuce growing: Jericho Romaine,  a ruffly loose leaf type, and wild lettuce. 

The loose leaf lettuce bolted in early June.
Jericho didn't start until a few weeks later.

As mentioned above, the variety I grow is Jericho, which is the most heat tolerant variety I've tried. I don't want it cross-pollinating because I don't want to lose that. According to Joseph Lofthouse in his Landrace Gardening: Food Security through Biodiversity and Promiscuous Pollination, lettuce doesn't easily cross-pollinate. It still can, however, so to keep my strain pure, I took measures to prevent it.

Jericho lettuce. Flower heads covered to prevent cross-pollination.

I covered the flowering heads with the mesh bags I got to keep the birds from eating all my elderberries. Time will tell if this works!

Growing

Georgia Jet sweet potato vines and flower

Slicing tomatoes. Dan got four plants from a flea market.

Chicory

Moonglow pears. 

Sweet potato winter squash in the foreground (speckled leaves).

Late planting (replanting/transplanting). 

Ordinarily, I try to have all my planting done by now. Summer for us is a season where the days are hot and rain can be elusive. The sooner I can get my plants established and mulched, the less watering I have to do. We did have to replant some things that made a poor showing: melons, corn, and sunflowers. I made a second planting of summer squash and cucumbers as well.

Also, I was late on getting my homegrown sweet potato slips in the ground. I finally finished that the other day. These were planted in the African keyhole garden.

I had two types to plant. My trusty Vardamans and some from
a purple sweet potato that I originally got from Misfits Market.

The kale is a lone survivor of our cold winter.

I wanted to protect the newly planted slips from wilting, so
I watered and covered with shade cloth. That helped a lot!

Okay, that was long. But I had a lot I wanted to make note of. How about you? How does your garden grow?

Garden Notes: June 2022 © June 2022

by Leigh at http://www.5acresandadream.com