Begging For Zucchini

What happens when you take a short trip and leave the garden unattended for a couple of days? Monster zucchinis try to take over the place. Rusty and Bucket like raw zucchini and know Jo usually gives them a slice of the overgrown squash before tossing the rest in the compost. They are waiting not very patiently for their treat.

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Begging For Zucchini

Garden 2009: Garlic Planting

In the garden over the past several days:

GARLIC:  Jo planted garlic. Her technique is to use a spacing board and lay out all the cloves. Then, she uses the trowel to plant each clove. There's only one problem with this technique: Canine garden buddies. When Jo's back was turned, the dogs kept stealing garlic cloves. The didn't eat the garlic, just carried it off and played with it.

Here in the south, garlic is planted in late summer. It sprouts and the plants grow to a modest size before winter when they go dormant. As soon as the weather warms up in the spring, the garlic begins growing again. It's dug in mid-summer.

GREEN BEANS: Jo picked more and got them into the freezer.

YELLOW SQUASH AND ZUCCHINI: Mother Hubbard's cupboard was bare; ours is full of yellow squash and zucchini. Jo has tried freezing them in the past, but when thawed they are fall-apart mushy. She read somewhere online that they remain more firm if sliced and steam blanch instead of blanching in boiling water. She experimented with freezing a couple of pints using that method. We'll see.

CUCUMBERS: Production is far surpassing what I can eat. (Jo doesn't care for cucumbers.) Jo's intending to make some quickie pickles. We have quarts of regular canned pickles still left over from years past.

BED MULCHING: I've got three of the four fallow beds heavily mulched with grass clipping. I spread a layer of compost followed by a layer of manure. Then, I cover the beds with a layer of newspaper with the grass clipping on top. Our plan is that all we'll need to do next spring is pull back the mulch and plant. The possible flaw in this plan is: Armadillos. Armadillos love the bugs and earthworms that thrive under the mulch. If an armadillo discovers the beds and goes on a overnight feeding frenzy, the beds will look as if they've been tilled. Later in the fall, I can cover the beds with chicken wire we have for that purpose, but for now the beds have to stay uncovered so I can keep the weeds and especially Bermuda grass from growing into the beds from the aisles.

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Garden 2009: Garlic Planting

Garden 2009: A Squash Is Born

Summer (Yellow) Squash

And a zucchini too.

Due to our late start and abbreviated garden, we have three beds we are not using this summer. Two of those beds have been fully weeded and we are working on the third. My current project is getting these three beds heavily mulched. Our plan is to just leave them fallow until next spring. The mulch will keep the beds from refilling with weeds. They should be ready to plant with little effort next spring. The one possible major flaw in this plan is if an armadillo decides to search for insects in one (or more) of these fallow beds. After an armadillo roots around to his/her satisfaction, a bed ends up looking as if it's been tilled.

Garden 2009: A Squash Is Born

Garden 2009: Zucchini Unveiled

Jo planted three hills of squash on 6/19: Two yellow summer squash and one zucchini. She built row cover huts to protect the little squash plants once they sprouted. The huts provides some protection from the intense summer sun, but more importantly, they keep squash bugs and squash vine bore moths off the plants for a little while. Both pests are inescapable here if you garden without using pesticides as we do. The plants will eventually succumb to the bores or the bacterial wilt spread by the squash bugs. The goal is to get as much production out of the squash plants as possible before they die.

All the squash sprouted well and by 7/6 the zucchini filled its row cover hut. The summer squash plants are smaller and can probably remain covered until they bloom. They must be uncovered then so they can be pollinated and produce fruit.

Jo uncovered the zucchini on 7/8. They now on their own against the squash vine bores and squash bugs.

I'm not a big fan of summer squash or zucchini. Both are okay if stir fried with enough other veggies to cover their taste. Jo likes both so we grow them. We also grow cucumbers which Jo doesn't care for.

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Garden 2009: Zucchini Unveiled