[gardeners] The last week in July, kaPOW!!!
Margaret Lauterbach (gardeners@globalgarden.com)
Tue, 31 Jul 2001 09:37:59 -0600
Okay, it's official. It's the last week in July when the garden explodes.
We have two summer squash plants producing (Zephyr, from Johnny's), and are
up to our eyeballs with squash. I don't recall how many cucumber seeds
germinated, but it's a "row" less than 4 feet wide, climbing over a two
foot high A-frame, and we're up to our yo-hos in cucumbers. Have about 10
gallons of green snap beans (Contenders) from a 17-foot row, and they'll
need to be picked again tomorrow, and have a couple of gallons of yellow
wax beans. None of the picked beans have been snapped. Tomatoes barely
beginning to color. We've had chard for a while, and the second round of
lettuces are ready to be picked. Variety called "Dapple" is lovely in a
bowl, not spectacular in the ground, Merlot is spectacular anywhere, but is
slightly slower-growing than Dapple (freckled). I have the lettuces under
raised shade cloth, and at the other end of that raised bed, I have the
Mother Lode of basils. My round plastic dehydrator isn't worth squat at
dehydrating basil. DH has to juggle cars to get my large homemade
dehydrator out of the garage and onto the deck, where I can clean off
shelves and use it to dry basil. It will just take a few hours at that. I
have put things like paprika peppers that are mostly dried but not
completely dry on the shelves, letting them continue to dry naturally until
I need to use them. I think now is the time...We also need to pick
eggplants again. Wow. Gailaan is ready to be picked, but the stalks I
picked are somewhat bitter. Any ideas? TIA, Margaret L