Weather & Conditions
Cloudy this morning — looked like it could have rained — but it cleared up to partly sunny. It’s a good thing I covered the tomato mounds I prepared yesterday because we ended up getting almost a 1/4 inch of rain. That was enough that I couldn’t till the Back 40 tomato holes.
Low 72, High 86.
Rain again expected after 4 pm.
At least the mounds are still covered, and I can plant my first six Big Beef regular tomorrow as scheduled.
Cucumbers & Okra
I decided to trim off all the spotted cucumber leaves since they were sprayed on Friday. It either will help with airflow and growth, or I’ve killed them. They look better, and now I can see the planting area so I could give them some 8‑24‑24 — which I did. This is the first time I’ve fertilized them, so they were long overdue.
I picked a few more cucumbers and will try to make dill pickles tomorrow. I picked the okra and that was it for harvesting.
Dickinson Pumpkins
I went to check on my Dickinson pumpkins, since Susie gave me a few seeds she saved. This variety, she says, is what they use to can the famous Libby pie filling. I use the Libby recipe for my Thanksgiving pumpkin pies, so growing this variety will be an experience — and I’ll need to learn how to process the pumpkin when the time comes.
The first time I planted them, nothing came up. The seeds probably rotted because I didn’t hill them up. The next time, I decided to increase my chances and planted four every foot. This time all came up.
I didn’t want them too close together since they need airflow and growing room. I dug them up and wrapped them with my old landscape fabric to easily haul — to you guessed it — the Learning Plot. I planted them on each end of the sunflower row, which I think is about eight feet or more. A good distance apart. So far I notice one sunflower up. I think they’ll play nice.
The Garden Thief Strikes Again
The gardener I’ve been letting use some of my seeds came by to drop them off, and she said yesterday she had two flowers on her squash — and now they’re gone. I asked if they had simply fallen off, but they weren’t on the ground, they weren’t wilted, and they weren’t anywhere to be seen. Gone completely.
I remembered the heavy footprints I saw in her garden and asked if the prints went to her squash. She said yes. I told her someone clipped those blossoms, because that’s exactly what my garden neighbor does in his garden. He grows half his plot in squash just to collect the blooms for stuffing.
It is sad, as this is her first year gardening — first she was flooded out, and now she’s had things stolen from her plots. I know a fence helps, because before the Back 40 was fenced I had watermelon and pumpkins stolen.
She hasn’t put up her fence or her sign yet. She needs to do that to help prevent the people who drive by looking for easy pickings. One year I saw a couple pushing a baby carriage — but there was no baby, only produce. That happened five years ago.
I’ll need to let the office know about the thieves so they can get the police to patrol.
B40 and RRR Work
I went back to my gardens to start pulling the weeds out of the tomato holes. I cleaned them out several weeks ago, and that’s how fast the weeds moved in and grew.
With the six I did yesterday and the eleven I did today, I have five more to go. I’ll still need to use the little tiller before planting the Back 40 and RRR.
I still didn’t do the baking soda spray on the basil since they’re calling for rain today.
Wolf Spider Encounter
While weeding the Back 40 tomato holes, I noticed a spider climb onto the cardboard. I took a picture and, right after that, I opened Chrome and used its image search to identify it. Chrome’s Google Lens said it was a harmless wolf spider.
A few minutes later, I saw the same type of spider again — this time carrying a white ball, which I think was its egg sac. Maybe it was the mama wolf spider looking for a new home since I probably destroyed hers while weeding. The other spider was still sitting on the cardboard. You never know what you’ll encounter out here. I have to be careful with the composters too — last year I had black widows hiding in the handle, and now I always use my garden gloves to turn the composter. Here’s the link to my post about the black widow.
Looking Ahead
Looking ahead, this week will hopefully be planting all my fall tomatoes. The forecast shows chances of rain through Thursday, and around here that can mean no rain at all or too much rain to plant. I’m not planting in soggy ground just to get them in — not this time. The weather shows no chance of rain starting Friday and then into the following week, so what’s a few days. I would rather set up my tomatoes to grow instead of stressing them with too much water or other conditions like wind.