Greetings Beausol Locavores:
This newsletter is late due to the holiday weekend... it feels like just another string of work days with additional, different demands... so my biological clock is off... again.
Summer continues to wind down. There are fewer lightning bugs out in the evening. The cicadas have pretty much finished the aerial portion of their lives. The crop pests don't seem to be letting up: the Japanese beetles and Colorado potato beetles are long gone, but the
grasshoppers are very much still active, the harlequin bugs are bothering the fall broccoli, the squash vine borers (not usually a big bother here) performed a brilliant blitzkrieg attack that took out the third and fourth summer squash plantings. The pickle worms have arrived. They are invading the last of the cucumbers as the vines succumb to the downy mildew after a most heroic summer.
The dogwoods are taking on a reddish cast. The elms have a decidedly a yellowish tone. The praying mantis females are looking to become widows.
I tilled under the buckwheat cover crop, depriving the honeybees of a rich foraging ground. Out at the farm I mentioned last week where I attended a Crop Mob work day I noticed lots of soldier beetles (a beneficial beetle - about a half-inch long with a dirty-yellow "shell"
with a large oblong black spot on each half) foraging for pollen on their buckwheat flowers. Oddly, I did not see a single honeybee there. I did not think to ask how their "fruit" crops did this summer without pollinators.
This newsletter is late due to the holiday weekend... it feels like just another string of work days with additional, different demands... so my biological clock is off... again.
Summer continues to wind down. There are fewer lightning bugs out in the evening. The cicadas have pretty much finished the aerial portion of their lives. The crop pests don't seem to be letting up: the Japanese beetles and Colorado potato beetles are long gone, but the
grasshoppers are very much still active, the harlequin bugs are bothering the fall broccoli, the squash vine borers (not usually a big bother here) performed a brilliant blitzkrieg attack that took out the third and fourth summer squash plantings. The pickle worms have arrived. They are invading the last of the cucumbers as the vines succumb to the downy mildew after a most heroic summer.
The dogwoods are taking on a reddish cast. The elms have a decidedly a yellowish tone. The praying mantis females are looking to become widows.
I tilled under the buckwheat cover crop, depriving the honeybees of a rich foraging ground. Out at the farm I mentioned last week where I attended a Crop Mob work day I noticed lots of soldier beetles (a beneficial beetle - about a half-inch long with a dirty-yellow "shell"
with a large oblong black spot on each half) foraging for pollen on their buckwheat flowers. Oddly, I did not see a single honeybee there. I did not think to ask how their "fruit" crops did this summer without pollinators.
I went into our hives to check on the bees this weekend and found no honey or pollen stored in one hive and no buckwheat honey in the other. They must have eaten all the buckwheat nectar as it was collected. I started feeding the one hive and will start feeding the other soon.
We had a group of homeschoolers, ages 8 and younger, to the farm last Friday. What fun! I do not see how teachers maintain their energy day after day. Whew!
The night temperatures in the sixties are definitely slowing the crops down. PIcking okra every other day seems to be sufficient. There are fewer eggplant needing harvesting each day. The second tomato crop is also starting to slow down. The wonderful peppers don't seem to notice the weather.
The winter crops are all doing splendidly. They are, very happily, all up with a great germination rate! It will soon be time to put the garlic back in the ground, plant next spring's strawberries, transplant the remaining seedlings and direct seed next years spring flowers.
That's about it for now.... time to get back out into the fields.
This week's shares will be full of peppers again. We'll add some eggplant, tomatoes, okra and herbs to the mix. The gladiolus are done and the tuberoses are a monumental disappointment this year. We usually depend on their intense fragrance at this time. The plants are healthy but they are not flowering. The flower bouquets will have zinnias, celosia, sunflowers, verbena, ageratum, gomphrena and solidago.
See you soon.
Harry
We had a group of homeschoolers, ages 8 and younger, to the farm last Friday. What fun! I do not see how teachers maintain their energy day after day. Whew!
The night temperatures in the sixties are definitely slowing the crops down. PIcking okra every other day seems to be sufficient. There are fewer eggplant needing harvesting each day. The second tomato crop is also starting to slow down. The wonderful peppers don't seem to notice the weather.
The winter crops are all doing splendidly. They are, very happily, all up with a great germination rate! It will soon be time to put the garlic back in the ground, plant next spring's strawberries, transplant the remaining seedlings and direct seed next years spring flowers.
That's about it for now.... time to get back out into the fields.
This week's shares will be full of peppers again. We'll add some eggplant, tomatoes, okra and herbs to the mix. The gladiolus are done and the tuberoses are a monumental disappointment this year. We usually depend on their intense fragrance at this time. The plants are healthy but they are not flowering. The flower bouquets will have zinnias, celosia, sunflowers, verbena, ageratum, gomphrena and solidago.
See you soon.
Harry
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