Mary, Mary, quite contrary, how does your garden grow?

Well I don't know about Mary, Mary, but MY garden is growing great! The rain last week really got things going. It's amazing how much better a garden does with rainwater, mostly since we've hardly seen rainwater in 2 years! Both cauliflower and broccoli almost doubled in size, and carrots, spinach and lettuce sprouted! The only downfall being the pesky rodent that inhabits my neighbor's shed. That rat is eating all of my beautiful spinach! So this weekend I plan to erect some sort of cage around that bed. It may not stop him completely, but hopefully it will be a deterrent. I also plan to sprinkle the bed liberally with cayenne as soon as the wind stops! Maybe if Willard gets a big snoutful of pepper, he won't be so inclined to come and steal from my garden. But knowing my luck, he'll be a fan of pepper and he'll come back for twice as much! Rat nibbling aside, the garden looks great, the cauliflower and broccoli are starting to make florettes (if that's what you call them) and they are so cute! Ian is looking forward to the day he can start pulling up carrots! I am looking forward to the day we eat our first head of cauliflower! I heart my garden!

This may look like a lot of mud to you, but it looks like teeny carrots, teeny lettuce, some rat-gnawed spinach and some onions to me! I have high hopes for this bed!


Itty bitty lettuce, Aaaawwww!


Look at that broccoli... can I get a YEE-HAW!


And that cauliflower! I've never seen anything so cool!


Green, growing and gorgeous!

Winter Garden

I was pretty sure that I had procrastinated WAY too long and my dreams of a winter garden were dashed. I tried to suck it up and realize that I have just been so busy with daily life, Monkey Man's school, the chores, the obligations outside of the home. I was trying to psych myself out with the old "sour grapes" attitude. Hell, I didn't really want a damn garden right now anyway!

That was about as far from the truth as you could get. It was killing me that I had wasted time and screwed up and I wouldn't be able to attempt a winter garden. All that wasted space, sitting there empty, except for maybe some weeds! I was pissed at myself big time! And then Tim, sweet Tim, owner of the Green 'n Growin' Nursery in Pflugerville (which if you're local, I HIGHLY recommend) set me straight. I went to find some plants to use for a science co-op experiment and ended up leaving with a big smile on my face! Tim brought down his handy dandy little "Planting Guide for Central Texas" and lo and behold, after Jan. 15th, you can plant all sorts of things! My mind was wild with possibilities!

I went back that weekend, stocked up on compost and plants and seeds and proceeded to go home and work the shit out of those beds! Who needs a workout DVD when you've got a shovel, a hoe and a rake and two good sized beds to work! I dug and turned and patted and added compost and dug and turned and patted until I damn near collapsed! But it felt SO good to be out in the mild weather, enjoying the sunshine and working toward a goal, a goal of fresh, wonderful food!

Once the beds were prepped, I sent for the Monkey Man and he and I transplanted broccoli, cauliflower, and spinach plants, we tucked many onion bulbs in and planted carrots, spinach and lettuce seed. He was happy digging in the dirt, I was happy digging in the dirt, the Piggy was happy watching us dig in the dirt while she jumped on the trampoline, it was a beautiful thing! So now, I feel at peace again. I know I bitch about gardening, I know it drives me crazy, but in my defense, it was pretty stinkin' ironic that I decided to plant my first vegetable garden smack dab in the middle of the biggest drought since 1916! But you can't say I'm a quitter, cause here I am, making a go at a winter garden, still in a drought! But all that matters is we're trying. And we have high hopes of being able to harvest luscious, pesticide-free veggies from our own backyard! Can I get a hallelujah!

Bed One: Spinach, onions, lettuce and carrots


Bed Two: Broccoli, cauliflower and onions (spaced more closely so I can harvest them as green onions)

RATS! Literally.

The Monkey Man and I were out in the garden yesterday, harvesting tomatoes. I have been noticing recently that alot of my Golden Boys have had big, chewed-out sections. At first I thought it was another tomato worm, but there was no telltale poop and all of the tomatoes that were chewed were close to being ripe and close to the ground. Tomato worms usually attack green fruit closer to the top. Anyway, a minute or two into harvesting we heard this big rustling and I caught a glimpse of something racing out of my bed and through the hole in the fence! Eeeeek! I did not actually witness what it was but Monkey Man said it was some sort of rodent. He said it was pretty big, but then he's never really seen a rat and a mouse together to compare size. He is convinced it's a Harvest Mouse, since logically, it has been harvesting our tomatoes, but from the size description, I'm thinkin' it's a rat. When I looked through the fence, I didn't see it, but did notice that my neighbor has a shed that doesn't sit flush on the ground and there is a whole bunch of wood rot and straw under the shed (what a nice, warm little home for a family of ratties). We also had several folks at our BBQ awhile back state that they saw a portly rat cruising along the top of the fence. So there you have it. But what do I do about it, they seem to be living in my neighbors yard and they are renters that could give a hairy rat's ass (no pun intended) about maintenance and upkeep of the property. And I certainly don't want to lay any traps in my yard, for a couple of reasons. I don't want the dog to get caught up in it, don't want the kids to get snapped and as stupid as it may sound, I've had rats as pets and I just couldn't kill one to save my life! But at least now I know what gets the dog all worked up after dark! Time to patch the holes in the fence. I know that won't take care of the problem 100%, but maybe it would make it more difficult for said rat to raid my garden!

SUCCESS!!!

Those of you that have been following along know that this summer was my first bonafide attempt at a vegetable garden in Central Texas. It has been several months of hard work, great joy, and extreme frustration! I have learned that bell peppers don't do so well, yet jalapenos thrive. I have watched beautiful little seedling squash emerge only to see the whole crop wiped out by squash borers (evil little beasties!). I have had days where I got 3 tiny tomatoes and other days where I picked upward of 30. It has been a crazy ride! My main goal with this garden was to get a few tomatoes, some squash, some peppers, a few cantaloupes and now I am hoping for at least 2 pumpkins. I wanted to show my children how plants grow and where food comes from. I wanted them to see the different types of bugs, pests and beneficials. I wanted my son to feel a sense of accomplishment everytime he ate a fresh tomato. So, we may not have had the best harvest ever, after all, it's been 3 months since we've seen a drop of rain, so ANYTHING we got was a success, but this garden has been a wonderful learning experience for all of us. If hadn't been for this garden, we would never have found Ernie the Tomato Hornworm and we would have never had that amazing experience of raising a gorgeous moth!

The main downside of the garden was the damn squash! EVERY single time I planted squash, it got hit and destroyed by borers. But for some reason, one of the last bunch I planted has managed to keep it going. I'm pretty sure it has some borer infestation, but it keeps growing, the same thing has happened with the pumpkin vine. Anyway, long story short, I noticed last week that the zucchini was starting to put on and I was thrilled! So this morning when I went out, I was able to harvest my first squash!! I am so excited, it is a beautiful golden zucchini and I am sure it will be lovely in calabacitas for dinner tonight! So... as long as I end up with at least 2 pumpkins, I will call this garden a semi-success and hope for better harvests in my winter garden!

My pumpkin and squash vines, oh my!


Crazy, out of control tomato vine!


Baby pumpkin!


The first squash...

Harvested! Can't wait to eat it!

OK, seriously???

I went outside earlier to retrieve my recycling bins as storms are rolling through and the wind is bad. For some reason I noticed that there was a bunch of fluffy white stuff all over my Cypress Vine out front. So I pulled down one of the runners to investigate and the white fuzzy stuff was bugs! Little tiny bugs, all over the vine, covered in this strange white stuff. I figured it must be some type of early stage caterpillar, so I looked and looked at photos and descriptions on whatsthatbug.com but I found nothing. So just for shits and giggles, I typed "small, fuzzy white bugs" into the search engine and sure enough... MEALYWORMS! A sort of cousin to the aphid, and we all know how fond I am of aphids. But seriously, I have had the summer from hell in respect to garden pests in the veggie garden, but my front flower bed seemed all hunky dory, now this??? I mean seriously, what more am I going to have to endure this summer with my gardens? Are swarms of locusts and Africanized honey bees heading my direction?!?! Shit! It is just so aggravating to me, I have worked so hard to have something more than dying grass and burford hollies and I seem to be running into issues left and right here. I didn't have near this aggravation last year. Is it the drought? I always thought aphids didn't like severely hot weather. Either way, I am beginning to lose my patience and I'm seriously gonna start killing things soon!

How I plan to deal with my tomato worm problem...

Fried Green Tomato Worms

3 tablespoons olive oil
16 tomato hornworms
4 medium green tomatoes, sliced into 1/4-inch rounds
Salt and pepper to taste
White cornmeal
In a large skillet or wok, heat the oil. Then lightly fry the hornworms, about 4 minutes, taking care not to rupture the cuticles of each insect under high heat. Remove with a slotted spoon and set aside.

Season tomato rounds with salt and pepper, then coat with cornmeal on both sides.

In a large skillet, fry tomatoes until lightly browned on both sides

Top each round with 2 fried tomato hornworms.

Garnish the paired hornworms with a single basil leaf.

Agriculture sucks!

As I'm sure you were all aware, I planted a bunch of squash as the vine borers are supposedly NOT laying eggs at this time. What a crock! They took out 6 out of 9 plants! I still have one zucchini, one lemon squash and one pumpkin, we'll see if they manage to survive or not. My garden has been overrun with aphids. Who would have thought such little bugs could make such a HUGE mess of things! Little BASTARDS! Then the other morning I went out to find one of my golden boy tomatoes half-eaten. It looked liked someone took a big bite out of it. I was thinking maybe a raccoon or birds or maybe even a bat, I didn't know. I left it alone and the next morning, went out to find the tomato right next to it looking the same way, like someone had come and taken a huge bite of it! UGH, what was up?!?! Then I got to really looking at the plant and the bed and there it was, the telltale sign... LOADS of caterpillar poop! OH NOOOOO! I searched that vine from top to bottom and could find nothing. So I came inside and looked up tomato worms on the internet. Not that I don't know what one looks like, I remember my mom picking them out of the garden and squishing them with sticks as a kid, I know... gross! But I just needed to refresh my mind and maybe see how they hide, if it was UNDER leaves or next to stalks or what. After that I went outside and found the little culprit within a matter of minutes, hanging out, fat as could be! Of course my first instinct was to throw him on the ground and squish him, but if you know me, you know I have a problem killing things (OK, squash borers, aphids and cockroaches aside), so what does any card-carrying homeschooler mom do??? She grabs the butterfly habitat, cuts off some of the tomato vine and transfers giganto Tomato Horntail Caterpillar into the enclosure. We will have one of two outcomes, he will either eat lots of leaves and tomatoes I'm willing to share and turn into a chrysalid that is bound to become a 5-spotted Hawkmoth or he will keel over and die if he has been parasitized by a wasp. Either way, great biology! If he becomes a hawkmoth, he will be observed for a day, then humanely released FAR away from MY garden! And of course, you can't keep something and not name it. He has been dubbed "Ernie" by the Monkey Man. Ernie the Tomato Horntail, with such an evil name for a caterpillar, I was thinking more along the lines of "Severus" or "Beelzebub" mostly since that thing was hell on my tomatoes! But Ernie it is.

I hate seeing the crumpled leaves, telltale sign of aphids!


Stinkin' aphids!


Victimized Golden Boys!


The culprit...

High hopes!

I don't remember if I posted or not, but on July 4th we completed our second raised bed in the back yard. I planted seeds on Tuesday. Some golden zucchini, dark green zucchini, lemon squash, lemon cucumbers and yes, I planted a pumpkin vine for my kids! These are the first seeds I've planted, the rest of the plants in my garden were transplants, so needless to say, I was quite excited to go out to water this morning and see that one of the cucumbers, 2 golden zucchini, one green zucchini and 2 lemon squash seedlings are peeking out of the soil! The Monkey Man was pretty excited as well! The rest of the garden is doing well. The cantaloupe vine is covered with small melons, two of my 3 tomato plants are producing small harvests, and the jalapenos are producing well. Wish I could say the same for the bells, HOWEVER, I did notice that the green bell has a teeeeeeny little start of a pepper, so it may be rallying for a comeback! But I have high hopes for the second bed. The borers are close to the end of their breeding cycle, the temps are still hot but not miserable and we are actually getting some decent lows at night to cool things down. I just may end up with LOTS of squash! Which is great, more to eat, more to freeze for the winter and more to share with friends!

SUCCESS!

Although many told me it was too hot and I would NEVER get any cantaloupe out of my vine, I am happy to report... THEY WERE ALL WRONG! I have been noticing the past week or so that my cantaloupe vine is a major hang-out for the local bees. This gave me great pleasure due to the fact that bee populations have been on the decline. I just knew in my heart with all that good pollination going on, my vine just HAD to produce at least one melon. Well, I went digging around in the vine, as it is huge and taking over my yard, and what do you know. baby melons! There are 2 that are about 2-3" in diameter, one that is 1" in diameter and two brand new ones just starting. So FIVE folks, FIVE melons growing on my vine, yee-haw!

My jalapeno plant is producing fairly well, the bell peppers are starting to rally in the cooler (by this I mean less than 100*F) weather, and the tomato plants are starting to produce! The "sweet 100" has little teeny tomatoes all over it, in fact, we harvested 3 bright red ones yesterday! I had to laugh, as I had no clue what "sweet 100's" were, as it turns out they are very small, very round little tomatoes. Very cute, but hardly a mouthful! So it's good that the vine is covered because it will take 30 to make one salad! The cherry tomato vine has a little tomato on it, so there is hope there and the "Golden Boy" is actually flowering like crazy, so maybe tomatoes to follow!

I also got the great news yesterday that I can replant zucchini and squash in mid-July here. The temps start decreasing, the borers are out of season and from what I understand, Texas has 2 summer growing seasons, the late spring through mid-June season, take end of June and early July off, then replant for the second round in late July. Then I get to plant a winter garden. I hope by next year I'll have this all under control. I do know that I need to get that second bed done though in the next couple of weeks as the cantaloupe vine has taken over my one bed, so I have no room for zucchini and squash! No prob though, I can knock a bed out in a weekend! I even still have dirt leftover from the first bed. I am loving this gardening stuff! And just as a note, those little tomatoes may have been completely puny, but nothing ever tasted SOOOO sweet! Ah yes, the taste of fresh, home-grown tomatoes and with a pinch of success thrown in!

Seeing red...

Anyone with a delicate nature or who is easily offended by use of excessive profanity need not read any further.

Whoever thought it was a grand idea to plant invasive grape-like vines all along the perimeter of my backyard fence was a SICK, SADISTIC, COMPLETELY PIECE OF SHIT HUMAN BEING! I have lived in this house for exactly 3 years and I have cut back these fucking vines at least twice a year. The problem being that they are so big and so invasive and the trunks and root structure are buried beneath a very rickety fence. Now if I had the cashflow to rip the fence down altogether, I could probably eradicate these damn vines, but at this time, that amount of money isn't floating around my bank account. So I cut these damn things down as far as I can go without damaging the fence. Then they grow back, bigger and faster than before! It's like they are some sort of crazy mutant vine that intends to take over the planet! And from what I've seen, if left unchecked, it would do just that! Block out our sun and destroy life on the planet as we know it (so you all should be thankful and praise my name that I am saving you AND the planet from certain death and destruction)! And maybe it wouldn't be so bad if this damn thing actually produced SOMETHING. I don't know, a fruit, a melon, hell, I'd even be happy with a flower, but NOOOOO!! It is a big, stupid, ugly, worthless bit of organic matter and a waste of carbon dioxide and I want it to fucking die! I mean seriously, you have to know this thing is a bitch if I, Queen of the Tree-Huggers, want to rip, maim and otherwise mangle this horrid thing! Not only did I just spend hours in the hot Texas sun ripping that thing off the fence, I had to tackle the Hackberry tree that was felled by the storm a couple of weeks ago. So a double whammy! Now that I have most of it cut down, I'm now trying to figure out how the hell to get rid of it. I swear, I'm going to hunt down the evil succubus that used to live here and dump all this shit right on her front lawn and let her deal with it! Then I'm gonna punch her in the neck and let my dog shit in her yard!

We might have some success!!!

As the old saying goes, "A watched pot never boils", it must be true for gardens too! I have been so obsessed over my veggie garden. I have mulched and fertilized and watered and worried and fussed, Big Daddy thinks I'm nuts! He says we should have another kid, it would be less stressful for me. Haha! Anyway, I have tried to let go a little, realize that if it's gonna live and yield it will, if not, I'll try again in the fall and winter. So yes, I've watered on occasion, but I have tried to not go out and fuss with it. Much to my surprise, we were out Sunday evening letting the kids play in their little shark pool and I decided to just go see how the garden was doing and lo and behold, my jalapeno plant has several peppers, almost ready to harvest and my Sweet 100 tomato plant has around 8 little tiny tomatoes! My cantaloupe plant is growing rapidly, no buds or fruit yet, but the plant looks healthy, my bell peppers are starting to bloom and put on new foliage and the other tomato plants aren't putting on fruit yet, but they are rapidly growing foliage as well. I may end up with a half-way successful garden after all. Yee-haw! I'll be especially glad for the tomatoes since we are having a HUGE tomato recall in Texas. Salmonella contamination! Henceforth why I'll be happy to eventually master my garden space, you can't trust store bought food anymore! Tomatoes, spinach, lettuce, everything is contaminated with Salmonella or E. Coli. Sucks! Anyway, here are a couple of pics of my soon to be fruitful garden!

Jalapenos!

Sweet little mater!

Front flower bed, almost done!

I've been working hard the past week or so trying to get all the planting and mulching done. I still have a bit more mulch to lay down, but I'm happy with how well the plants are acclimating. Wish I could say the same for my vegetables! Anyway, here are some pictures of all my hard work!



Little Blue Daze
Blackfoot Daisies
Sweet Lollipop Plant

Death of a Squash

My first zucchini plant bit the dust today. I fear the other two squash plants are soon to follow. I'm so sad! I knew I couldn't expect my first gardening experience to be perfect, but I from what I always knew, there was just no way to kill a squash plant! Well, looks like I can! All three plants starting getting yellow, although they did produce blossoms and this was the first to blossom and had several blossoms so I was optimistic, but it is a curled and sad little stump today. Are they getting too much sun? Everyone tells me that squash flourish in full sun, hence the reason I bought them. Wonder if I would have had better luck if I would have had stuff ready to plant early and planted with seeds? I was SO looking forward to fresh zucchini this summer! Sigh.

At least the tomatoes seem to be holding their own, as well as the bell peppers, although they are looking a little weak. I don't think anyone in town has anymore zucchini or crookneck plants, so I don't know what to do with the rest of the garden. Maybe I should plant nasturiums, pretty flowers and edible too. Anyone with gardening experience in TX, please let me know if there is anything that might help save my squashies. I dosed them with liquid seaweed per the nursery I deal with, thought that would give them a little boost. That was two days ago, but alas, it seems to have not worked at all. Oh well, I'm bound to have disappointments in a vegetable garden, I suppose we all do. Guess I should chalk it up to a learning curve and move on. It's true what they say about the $20 tomato, except in this case it's the $20 zucchini!

Raised bed update...

Today I had 32 cubic feet of topsoil dumped in my driveway. $65 for some guy to have the soil company dump soil into the back of his truck, drive 4 miles to my house, and flip a switch that causes the truck bed to dump the dirt on my driveway. So basically I paid someone $65 to do a whole lotta nothin'! Who do you think actually had to shovel the dirt into a wheelbarrow and haul it to the backyard? Yep, me and the Big Daddy. And I can tell you, my arms are so weak feeling right now I can hardly type! Although it is after 10 pm, I am seriously thinking of sliding into a hot tub for half an hour to hopefully nip that soreness in the bud! I may not be able to move tomorrow and I still have probably 14 cubic feet left to move! Holy crap!

Slowly but surely...

I am sure I have regaled you all with tales of my hideous and horrendous backyard. The fire-ant infested, barren, dog shitter! Well I have come to a point in my life where I just can't stand it anymore! If I don't get this backyard to a somewhat habitable space I'm gonna freak the hell out! We have been spending more time out back since we got the trampoline. We have dusted off the patio furniture and have been doing a good job at keeping on top of the lawn mowing. But FINALLY last weekend I made a couple of big advancements in my quest for backyard serenity! Big Daddy and I tackled an 8' X 4' raised garden that is hopefully going to be filled with soil this weekend and planted during the next week. I'm not going too crazy, just some tomatoes, bell peppers, squash and simple stuff like that. I want to make sure I can actually cultivate something so I don't get discouraged! I also got busy and planted two little boxes of herbs, and yes, I am sure I over planted the boxes as many of these herbs will get big, but I figured I had to start somewhere and I will pinch stuff off or transplant as needed, but I just NEEDED to start the process. I will handle growth as it happens. I will also need to get a good little book on cooking with fresh herbs. I occasionally buy fresh herbs at the store, but have never grown them and used them. I am looking forward to not only the adventures in gardening this summer, but the culinary adventures that are sure to follow! And I am so happy to at least see SOMETHING productive happening in my shitbox of a backyard!

Raised bed... no dirt yet.