Today I could tell it was going to be hot, as the low was 76°F and there was a heat advisory with the heat index expected to reach 107°F. I was at the patch in record time, since on weekends it’s okay for me to take the highway. Why? Traffic — and I don’t want to stress out about it. I’d rather take the backroads, which are just a teensy bit longer. If I take them on my way home, I usually stop at Stewart Brothers: Do It Center. This hardware store carries just what I need: bulk seeds, and cheap too! I might stop on Tuesday before documents to pick up Seven Top seeds (turnip greens only).
Now, back to today’s log.
The first thing I did was get both sprayers ready — the 2‑gallon with copper fungicide and the 1‑gallon with BT. I sprayed the CF on just about everything except basil, eggplant and okra. As I worked my way down the rows, I checked each tomato plant to see if any spots needed trimming. I kept an alcohol‑dampened paper towel handy to wipe the blades so I wouldn’t spread disease from plant to plant. There wasn’t much trimming to do today, which to me means the CF is working — and maybe the few days of lower temperatures and humidity helped as well.
I have to say the first July transplants that I planted, I think mid‑July, have blooms. They look good. I don’t want to jinx a good thing, but I am very happy.
After finishing with the copper fungicide, I started BT. This is only good on certain plants, as it deals with caterpillar‑type insects. BT went on cucumbers, pumpkins, cantaloupe, watermelon, yellow squash, zucchini, and my volunteer tomatillo. Yep — I think I killed some of it when I was weed‑whacking the other day, until I finally realized it wasn’t a weed and I had seen that plant before. It was among the blueberry row weeds.
When I discovered it, I had to save it, just like that sweet‑tasting compost cantaloupe. I quickly got a cage for it to mark it when I come back to weed around it. Usually the volunteers are much hardier, as they grew on their own. I always like to find plants. Where the blueberries are was where I had six tomatillo plants, so it makes sense their dropped fruit would produce a new plant now.
While spraying, I made some great discoveries — and one not so great. I’ll start with the bad. I found a hole right next to my tomato plant in Rudy’s Radish Ranch (RRR). I snapped a picture and asked Copilot what kind of animal it could be. He looked at it and said it was a rat hole. I’ve seen holes like that before — just never this close to my veggies. Copilot told me to fill in the hole, press it down with my foot, and then pour water over it. I did everything he said, and I’ll see tomorrow whether the hole comes back.
My three great discoveries were that I found two cantaloupes hanging at the bottom of the okra. Yay, another chance to taste them, since the last one got gnawed, probably by the rat that made the hole. In the Learning Patch, I found my other surprises: three good‑size watermelons growing and one pumpkin. This amazes me that I didn’t see any of them on Friday, and the watermelons are almost the size of a 12‑inch softball.
I know that because I played that as a kid, and would you believe when I was a senior in high school our team made the state finals! I wish we won, but it was a thrill of a lifetime. I have to say that putting the boxes down and straw on top is working out well, as all the watermelons are being cushioned and not sitting in wet soil, which I had trouble with in the past with rot. Hopefully no rot with straw.
While here I checked on the butternut germination and discovered that I have 4 yellow squash coming up where now I planted butternut. I plan to relocate them to the back40. I have butternut coming up and I hope it will produce like my watermelons are. Fingers crossed.
My main physical chore today was cutting the bocking 14 (sterile comfrey). I rough‑chopped it and spread it across the fall bed I’m prepping, which is 6′ x 17′. So far, I’ve tilled once after removing the landscape fabric, and I plan to till a second time once the bocking 14 dries in 3–5 days. The third till will be for the final amendments.
Before leaving for the day, I picked okra designated for the church drive‑thru. My to‑do list for tomorrow includes seeing if I can salvage the Plaza Latina tomatillos in the back 40 — maybe if I get the weeds out, they’ll perk up. I also need to move both the zucchini and yellow squash duplicates to their own holes. It doesn’t sound like much, but trust me, any work in the sun zaps your energy quickly. I try to pace myself, especially since this week is going to be a heat‑advisory week well over 100°F.
I never know what I’ll walk into, because it might have rained at the patch. My daughter doesn’t live too far away, and she said it rained at her place. If it did, I’ll have to repeat the spraying again. I’ll be checking my rain gauge tomorrow for sure.
As always, happy gardening!