Feathered Friends

This is our little rooster, Shivers, and his BFF, our last (geriatric) bantam hen.  They are a pair and hang out together for much of each day.  Neither one of them are "spring chickens" but both still look pretty good.

Pictured are four of our six geese.  Geese tend to stay together in a gaggle and ours are no exception.  Where you see one, you can be sure the others are very close by.  (You can see how low our pond is because of lack of rainfall this summer.  Ugh.)

When I pulled out my green and yellow bush beans a few days ago, they were still lush and had lots of tasty beans on them so I threw all the vines into the poultry yard.  Ducks, geese and chickens were all interested in them.

Today I noticed the geese looking over what was left of the vines.  Do you know those silly birds ate all of the leaves . . . but left the beans?  You never know what's going to appeal to them, I guess.  (Next time I'll have to remember to cook the beans and add a little butter and salt before offering them to the birds.  Ha.)

I've Had Help Putting The Garden To Bed Early This Year

The "someone" helping me is Mother Nature herself.

We had stiff winds blowing all day Monday and for much of that night.  This followed a good amount of rainfall which made the soil fairly soft.

Going out into the garden yesterday morning, I found these two things had combined to do a bit of damage.

Granted, the seemingly sturdy stems of cosmos plants are actually quite fragile . . . 

. . . and these didn't hold up to the wind at all.

If you look closely, you can see that this trellis of my decorative gourds has developed a definite tilt toward the south.  (Yes, grass cutting and weed whipping is on the schedule for today.  'Bout time.)

The onion tops had started to topple over, but they all got laid flat in the wind.

This Brussels sprout plant broke off completely right at ground level.  I'm mighty thankful the rest of them didn't go the same way.

My Ring of Fire sunflowers didn't escape damage.  The ones in the middle of the row would have gone completely over if they hadn't had their fall broken by the row of big sunflowers behind.

But it's all okay.  If it had happened earlier in the season, I would be upset.  As it is, I'm choosing to take this all as a supportive sign in my decision to wrap up this gardening season a bit early.  Thanks, Ma Nature!

My First Summer Job

My first try at gainful employment (other than babysitting like most of my peers) was when I was fifteen and detasseled corn.  We lived in a town in Illinois, but you didn't have to go very far to be in serious farm country.

I think detasseling corn was the hardest work I've ever done.  (Well, as a kid anyway.)

There were about fifty of us teenage girls who gathered in a city park by six o'clock every morning.  (Where were those child labor laws?!)  We were loaded into a semi-truck trailer that was outfitted with bench seats on either side and another double set of seats running down the middle.

We were then trucked to a specific farm for the day where we started working down the rows of corn that were invariably dripping with dew at that time of morning.  About the time we were soaked from head to toe, the temperature would begin to climb into the nearly unbearable range.  We had to wear long pants and long-sleeved shirts or our skin would get cut up by the leaves on the corn stalks.

I have a not-so-fond memory of some of those corn rows going on for an eternity!

A lunch break was taken around noon time.  Most days we spread out under trees on the lawn of the farmer's house and, if we were lucky, were offered all the cold, clear water we could drink from a well with a hand pump on it.

We all brought our lunch and the food had to be something that wouldn't spoil in the heat as our lunch bags sat in the trailer of the truck from morning until lunch time.  Some of the girls had insulated bags they carried their food in, but those were the "older" (17 and 18 year olds), more experienced ones who came back to detassel corn year after year.

After a short lunch and rest period, we dragged ourselves back out into the field and worked for another three or four hours.

When finished for the day, we climbed back into the semi-truck to be returned to the park.  About half of the girls were African-American and many days on the truck ride home, they would start singing.  And, boy howdy, did some of them have amazing voices.

I lived about seven blocks from the park, but if I remember correctly, some of the girls walked the two blocks down into town and caught a bus home because they lived at a much farther distance.

My walk home each night almost made me sweatier, if that was possible, so the first thing I did upon reaching home was to strip off my dirty clothes (and they did get dirty each day) and take a cool shower.

Hard to believe, I know, but we were paid 35 cents an hour.  If we worked the whole detasseling season without missing a single day, we got retroactive pay of an extra 15 cents an hour.  Wow, what an incentive!  I didn't make it.

I detasseled corn only that one summer because the next year I was sixteen and old enough to get a "real" job which was as a clerk in a small two-story department store in our town.

It was decidedly easier, cooler and cleaner than detasseling corn.  Still, for some inexplicable reason, I'm very glad I worked in those corn fields the summer I was fifteen. 

I'd love to hear about your first job experiences.  Please do tell all!

Nobody Ever Said I Was Patient

We hadn't had any potatoes since early spring until a week or so ago when I caved and bought a five pound bag of Yukon Golds at our organic co-op.  Boy howdy, did they ever disappear lickety-split.

Yesterday I gathered my produce bucket and garden trowel, set a determined look on my face and headed out into the garden.  I wanted potatoes.

This is what I stole from under two plants.  Not bad, eh?  Not honking big ones, but not golf ball sized either.

Along with my usual bell peppers this spring, I started two plants of an Italian sweet pepper that turns orange or yellow or red.  I've been eyeing the attractive green peppers on these two plants for a while now and today snapped off three of them.

Shouldn't have.

Apparently, they really do need to be orange or yellow or red before they're ready for the table.

I sliced one of them lengthwise this evening and put a half on Papa Pea's plate and a half on mine.  After taking one bite, I uttered/muttered something like, "Yuck.  Gluck.  Ick."  

I'll be waiting now until they turn color.

As we were clearing the table, Papa Pea inquired, "Aren't you going to finish your pepper?"

"Nope, I'm not."

"Well," he said.  "I'm not going to let good garden produce go to waste."  And into his mouth it went.  The man will eat anything.

Just Another Garden Tour

It seems it's been a while since I've documented some of what's going on in the garden.  Most of the time spent out there has been to harvest the bounty, bring it in and get it processed.  The last accomplished has been another batch of pickles and a dehydrator full of mint.

This is the last of the lettuce (sob) in the garden.  But, alas and alack, the hot weather has turned it bitter.  

I've decided not to do any fall planting this year, but rather to put my energy and time toward getting the garden cleaned up and ready for winter earlier than usual.  Then maybe I won't be out there in cold weather trying to do same after a couple of hard frosts.  (I'm oh-so-ready for some quilt room time!)

Finally, finally, some cherry tomatoes are turning red!

The tops of the onions have gone all flopsy-mopsy and have mostly keeled over now.  Looks as though we may have a good onion crop again.

This sweet little clump of Johnny Jump-Ups has popped up in the middle of an empty bed that grew broccoli this year.

Here is one row of potato vines which is starting to turn brown and flopping down.  Sure hope there are lots of potatoes underneath.

This year the blossoms on the pickling cucumber vines are so dense they're growing in clumps.  Wonder if they will all turn into cucumbers or if there won't be room for them all.  I have one more batch of pickles to make before I have my quota to last two years.  I like to plant pickling cukes only once every other year.

My "Ring of Fire" sunflowers have given us many cheerful bouquets for weeks now.  You can spot the row of large sunflowers (to the left) where the heads are bowed and are starting to dry.  I've never had the season last long enough to actually get mature seeds from them, but there's always hope.

I planted this 8' long trellis of mixed gourds to use for decoration this fall.  You may recall I planted the same mix two years ago and every one of the gourds turned out to be a little white pumpkin.  Every single one.  Last year, same mix and I actually got a nice mix of colored gourds.

This year, every single gourd forming is this pear-shaped yellow one with a green bottom.  Methinks it's high time I go to another company for a seed packet of "mixed colored gourds!"

The sweet peppers are looking great.

Each plant is loaded with growing peppers or blossoms.  I'll have plenty for my supply of Stuffed Green Peppers for the freezer.

That's all for this trip through the garden.  How is your garden looking this time of year?

In A Pickle (A Good One)

Our temperature has dropped a few notches in the last two days along with a bit less humidity so canning pickles yesterday wasn't too bad.

The only part of making pickles I don't care for is scrubbing off all those little black nubbity-nubs on the pickling cucumbers.

But listening to an audio book while doing so makes the task go quickly.  Sort of.

I got exactly six quarts (down to the very last pickling cuke I had harvested) for this first batch of dill pickles.

We go through about eight quarts a year of the dills, and I like to plan it so I have to plant and grow the pickling cukes only every other year.  That means I have a couple more batches to go for my two year supply.  Actually, the vines are just starting to move into full production so I shouldn't have any trouble getting as many as I need.

Humidity is back up there already this morning so it's gonna feel not-so-pleasant again regardless of what the thermometer climbs to.  Guess it's still summer time in the north woods!

Anybody else dreaming of those cool, crisp autumn days on the horizon?