Fork & Knife

Cook your beets

I have had a member's friend have a serious reaction to the beets eaten raw. Beets contain oxalic acid and some people have a reaction of burning in the mouth and feeling like their throats are closing up. Please cook your beets. I am not sure if it was the drought, her particular sudden body's reaction, or some other factor. For more beet info go here:

http://www.whfoods.com/genpage.php?tname=foodspice&dbid=49
http://allallergy.net/fapaidfind.cfm?cdeoc=1485

There are beet recipes in the recipes section of this blog. Do not use the raw beet recipe with these beets.

What's all this weird stuff falling out of the sky?

Beautiful, beating sunny days in the upper 90's leads to pop-up clouds. All this useless beauty (to steal from Elvis Costello) as these clouds carry water over and further east. Lightning in the sky at night. One begins to want to curse the sky, the one thing that can bless and relieve your suffering in the midst of a drought. 

Well, it seems the back of the drought might finally have been broken. Friday morning it rained for about 28.5 seconds and I thought, "Oh goddess, not again." Around 5:00 we were headed into town and it was raining on the cherry tree as we got in the car. We came home about an hour later and it was not raining. The gauge showed .125 inches of rain and I said, "Oh goddess, not again!" Then around 10 p.m. I was picking peppers with my headlamp on, as usual, and it started to rain. I kept picking expecting it to stop and needing to have something to sell at market. It rained harder and I finally started slogging toward the house carrying buckets of Gypsy, Jalepeno and Habanero peppers along with Sungold, Whippersnapper and Yellow Plum tomatoes. It poured for awhile and then rained steadily overnight. Before I went to market the gauge showed 2.1 inches of rain. OH MY GOD! It rained some while I was at market, but not much at all here at the farm.

I went out in the late afternoon to cut some weeds from about a half acre of ground poorly plowed this year (I had a hell of a time finding anyone to plow for me this spring). I want to plant a cover crop of clover or buckwheat, or both, or buckwheat then clover. As I mowed the clouds started piling up and swirling and I began to watch the sky carefully; it had that tornadic cast to it. I finally had seen enough and began to hightail it back toward the house. The clouds were going in about four directions at once and as I got close to the house, the wind suddenly blew so fiercely that it nearly blew me off the mower and all the dead leaves from the drought and live leaves and even limbs began blowing out of the trees around the house. I got the mower under cover and sprinted toward the house as the skies opened up and the sky went electric. It rained about an inch. Still no puddling or runoff.

Sunday it was cool and misty and we probably got between .2-.5 inches of rain.

We are only two weeks from September. We may be mostly done with the big heat, but early September can be hot too. Next time it dries out I start planting tons of cool season crops and in the mean time, I will be planting stuff in flats.

Drought

Well I have not written about the drought yet, so here goes. The sky just won't give it up this year. So far in August we have had 1/2" of rain. July gave us a grand total of 1/2" of rain. June came in at 3" of rain. May only provided one and a half inches of rain. April was dry also; I have a little less than an inch on the calendar, but I'm not sure the gauge was out for the whole month. So that is five and a half inches of rain; normally, we would have much more than that in just one of those months.  The crazy thing is that October through March was insanely wet, standing water everywhere. Missouri is such a study in contrast; extreme changes season to season, day to day, and even hour to hour. Some days it's minute to minute or even second to second.

This has been the worst drought since the 1980's. It has started much earlier than the usual July-August dry spell we get every couple of years. To add insult to injury, after six weeks with no rain, temperatures have been in the high 90's and we had six or so consecutive days over 100 degrees.

I feel lucky to be providing food for my thirty subscribers, but incredibly guilty that I have not been able to provide more quantity and variety. So far, I have been providing about ten items a week, but they have not been changing out as much as I would like. The quantities have been lower than they should too.

The water company actually called us because they thought we had a leak in our line. Our water bill went up 400% in July. This year has made me get serious about the need for a simple and highly efficient watering system going forward. I have been using soaker hose and, gasp, sprinklers. I have planned to use Queen Gil drip irrigation hose since before it was available in the U.S.; now I will make the call and choose. I am currently leaning toward soaker hose, but will be doing a lot of research and investing over the winter.

I also am considering building a pond or two on the farm. I will have to price it out and decide if I can afford to spend the money or if I can afford to not spend the money.

Fall is looking better. I have a lot of stuff planted and up after applying copious amounts of water. As ground comes clear from summer crops I am either replanting summer crops or planting fall crops. Eventually it will start raining again.

Week Fourteen

August 1-3 Delivery:

Kinbi, Atomic Red, Cosmic Purple and Nelson Carrots

Cajun Delight Okra (Maybe only Monday and Tuesday this week)

German Extra Hardy Garlic

Sungold, Whippersnapper and Yellow Plum Tomatoes

All Blue and Carola Potatoes

Raven, Goldrush, Eight Ball Zucchini or Sunburst, Butter Scallop, Benning's Green Tint Patty Pan

Diva and General Lee Cucumbers with a few others tossed in for good measure

Daikon

Various Bell Peppers plus Banana and Gypsy

Hungarian Wax and Jalapeno Peppers

Pink-Eye Purple Hull Peas (Monday and Tuesday only)

Oregano, Basil, Sage and Mint (Tuesday only)

Chioggia Beets (Tuesday only)

Wasps

Lately I have been noticing wasps in the garden.

A few weeks ago, Jordan and I watched as a wasp pulled a cabbage worm through a hole the worm had eaten in a savoy cabbage leaf. It then preceded to eat the things' head off. Very gruesomely cool.

Monday, while picking Pink-Eye Purple Hull Peas, I watched as wasps patrolled the plants looking for aphids. What was most interesting to me was how different their styles were. Some would walk around and around the peas like they were chasing the aphids, or might just find one if they kept walking. Others would sit still and jump at the aphids as they came close. And still others would flit from plant to plant in a drive-by motif. They would hardly even light on a plant before they were off to the next. The ants were annoyed by all of these methods as the wasps were making off with their precious food source. Ants actually farm aphids for the honeydew they excrete. So essentially the wasps were rustling the ants cattle.

Just now, I went out to move the water and thought I might make a quick pass through the tomatoes with my headlamp on a reconnoiter for the pesky tomato hornworms. They come out at night because it's cooler and there aren't a bunch of bluebirds waiting around to eat them. Not to mention most farmers/gardeners aren't wandering around at 1 a.m. with a headlamp on. I succeeded in removing several python-like worms and dispatched them underfoot. After this little meditation I decided to walk around a bit because it was cool and I have had precious little time to just enjoy the garden this year with more subscribers, a new baby, a seven week drought, 100 degree heat etc. I also have been seeing a lot of shooting stars and I just love that. Anyway, I noticed what looked like a wet spot on the edge of one of the pumpkin beds and walked over to have a look. What I found was moistish soil from our 1/2" rain last week that was being carried/pushed out of the ground by an enormous looking wasp. I stood fascinated for several minutes and then noticed several others as I walked through the pumpkin patch. A little googling leads me to believe that they were Cicada Killer Wasps . No real danger, but something to watch, literally and figuratively.