What a Wild Week!

We found another SVB in the zucchini earlier in the week. I look for frass on the stem of the plant during my daily inspection of the crops. Frass is "a sawdust-like substance made up of plant material and insect waste. Excreted by borers, it is a tell-tale sign of the presence of a pest in a tree, shrub, or other plant." (Definition compliments of Terry on Dave's Garden, http://davesgarden.com/guides/terms/go/1906/) This time, rather than yanking the plant out, my very dear husband, sliced the stem open, removed the borer, then closed the stem up with a piece of pantyhose tied to the incision site. The plant is looking great and we harvested our first zuke yesterday. Sweet!

See that yellow ooey gooey looking stuff? That's the frass.

Not exactly a pic of the zucchini plant, but it's there on the far left. This thing has really taken off in the past couple of weeks. It must love the hot temps we've been having.

Yesterday's harvest. That zucchini is really big! It's much bigger than any zucchini you'd find in the stores. I think I should make some zucchini bread with it since we're not big squash eaters here. I might end up taking it to my co-worker who loves zukes, though. We'll see!

This past Wednesday brought a powerful storm to our area. We had winds in excess of 40 mph, maybe even as high as 60 mph! The trellis on our small bed of pole beans blew over. DH went out during a break in the storm and propped it back up until he can make a more permanent support.
We lost a couple of pole bean plants and some bush bean plants. Losing the bush beans was tough. Some of them were loaded with buds and baby beans. While I'm thankful for the rain and thankful that we didn't suffer any damage to our home, pets or ourselves, it's disappointing to lose something that you've babied along and have been so looking forward to harvesting.
Some of the tops of the tomato plants got bent, too. They kinda look like they've got broken legs! I've clipped the tops off and stuck them in a bucket of water for the time being. I'm going to root them and plant them in the fall to have some more plants for fall harvest.
The zucchini that had the squash vine borer in it got blown around pretty good. We were afraid that we'd lose the plant to the harsh treatment of the wind since the plant was a bit delicate and recovering from surgery, but it survived. In this pic, it looks like it's been through a wind storm. We harvested the zuke on it yesterday.


Earlier in the week, I was on the hunt to find whatever pest left this evidence behind. If you can't figure it out, these are balls of poop from some little critter. I'm telling you, they were about the size of a pea, so whatever was chowing down on my peppers was pretty big. I diligently searched under the leaves, down the stems of the plant, and around the base, but I couldn't find anything.
The next morning, while doing my inspection of the gardens, I stumbled upon the culprit, a LARGE hornworm. Ewwww!! It was very well concealed on the underside of an eaten leaf. These things are like teenage boys. They're constantly hungry and eat all the time!!
Again, DH to the rescue! After proclaiming, "He's a big 'un!", he quickly discharged the pest to hornworm heaven.
Still, his damage has been done. Thankfully, the plant is okay, even if it looks a little nekkid. There's no harm done to the peppers, and the leaves should grow back. Tonight, I need to spray both the peppers and the tomatoes with Bt, an organic, good-bug friendly product that will kill the hornworms, but not destroy the plant, the good bugs, or the soil. I've been trying to do this for the past 3 nights, but rain has altered that course of action.

The jalapeno peppers have finally started setting fruit. Now we can start planning some serious Mexican cooking!! I'm thinking these would taste great as a topper on some nachos or on some homemade enchiladas. They'd even be great in some salsa or pico de gallo. This plant was just a wee seedling when I got it at the plant swap in early April. Now look at it. It's producing some great looking peppers!!

The two Sugar Baby watermelons we planted have started taking over the universe! Seriously, the vines have almost reached to the other end of the raised bed and that thing is 10' (that FEET) long!
Nestled amongst the twining vines going all over the yard, I found these three little babies.
In addition to these three babies, there's another one just down the vine from these. On the other side of the bed, there's at least one other baby and perhaps two. The first watermelon is still growing nice and fat and sweet. It's turned a very dark green, almost black. We're waiting for all the signs to show it's ready for harvest: a nice yellow spot on its underbelly and dry tendrils near the top of its stem. Maybe it'll ripen in time for 4th of July!

Also discovered in the garden this week:
Blooms on the pole beans. We should start harvesting in the coming weeks! I'm ready for some tasty green beans!
Another yellow squash. This guy got blown up into the bed with the strong winds the other night. He's resting peacefully near the edge of the bed and will be harvested today.
Our first burpless cuke. He's been growing steadily for the past couple of days. Not sure when he'll be ready to consume, so I need to do some research on that.

The flower beds didn't suffer the same damage as the vegetable beds, thank goodness! They actually have flourished under the bits of rain and cloud cover we've been having. The natives and the adapted plants are thriving in the hot temps we've had this past week.

My daylily 'Capernaum Cocktail' opened for the first time yesterday. Ain't she a beaut? Just a gorgeous color in the garden.


The Blanket Flower (gaillardia aristata) seeds I winter sowed are getting ready to bloom. I love these flowers and think every garden should have some!

My sole surviving Lemon Mint (aka horsemint or Monarda) has started blooming this week. I have a feeling this is going to be an invasive plant, but I love it anyway and will tolerate it spreading. Here, it's hiding behind the blue salvia and in front of the pink hummingbird sage. It's a very dainty flower head.
I know there are all kinds of colors of Monardas, but I'm a purist and love the original, old-fashioned variety.

I leave you with a pic of the girls watching me work out in the front yard and waiting for me to come back inside to feed them. It's all about the food with these two precious girls. The cat from outer space is my precious Callie and the other one not paying any attention to the camera is Hannah. Actually, I think she was paying attention to a bird in the yard, daydreaming of stalking him and pouncing on him for a delicious little treat.

A Loss, Recovery, and Beans, Baby!

A couple of weeks ago, my DH and I discovered this little white caterpillar/worm on one of our puny tomato plants. Had no idea what it was and chalked it up to being a baby tomato hornworm.


Now, I think it was a squash vine borer larva. The SVB moth lays eggs on the stems and leaves of squash, and other members of the squash family like pumpkins. The eggs hatch and the little worm bores its way into the stem where it tunnels out the inside of the squash stem. The only evidence you see of damage on the outside is a little sawdust looking pile of stuff (excrement and gunk from the inside of the bug), followed by a dead plant. In most cases, it's fatal to the plant.

A few days ago, I noticed that one of our yellow squash plants had quit producing anything, had turned a very, very dark green, and had developed damaged leaves. I also noticed the tell-tale sawdust looking pile of stuff at the base and hanging off the stem itself.



We yanked the plant out this morning since it was too far gone. DH cut open the stem and found the little squash vine borer inside carrying out his destruction. We killed the worm and put the plant in the paper yard waste bag to go to the curb with the trash next week. We are watching the other squash plants carefully.

In better news, the sick pole beans are on the mend. I did end up yanking quite a few of the struggling plants, but several have made a great recovery and have started climbing the trellis.


I cut off the affected/diseased leaves and the rest of the plant has really greened up. It's fun to see them catch onto the trellis and start climbing it.


Different plant, but you can see it climbing the string trellis. Everytime I see the beans climbing the trellises, I think of the kid's song, "We are Climbing Jacob's Ladder". LOL

The pole beans in the small bed have taken off like crazy! Still not setting pods, but growing up the trellis, adding lots of leaves, and just looking good in general.


They've gone over the top and made a little arch for themselves! Too cute!


Meanwhile, the Blue Lake bush beans in the small bed continue to bloom and set pods. I love seeing the little bitty pods, just about 1/4" in length still fuzzy from birth. On most of the plants, there are flowers and pods in various stages of development.


Here are the biggest pods we have. They're about 3" long. Sorry for the not so great pic. The pea vines in front were moving in the breeze and I couldn't get a good shot without the tendrils from the pea vines.

Some Views from the Garden

First Female Zucchini Flower
Bean pod on Blue Lake Bush Beans
Moon and Stars Watermelon Starting to Take Off
Cantaloupe Vining out of the Bed
Sugar Baby Watermelon Flower
Sugar Baby Watermelon after the Rain
Alaska Peas
Tomato Patch
Bunch of Tomatoes
Raindrop on a Yellow Pepper
Cluster of Red Peppers
First Cigar Plant Blooms
Clump on NOID Daylilies
Daylily 'Torrid Tango' FFO
Daylily 'Silver Ripples'

Trouble and Triumph in Bean Town

No, not Boston, but the mass of bean plants in my backyard! The trouble is from a common mistake newbie gardeners make: over watering and watering at the wrong times. I was watering my veggies too often and, as a result, the ground wasn't drying out enough. I was also watering in the heat of the day or before the day heated up, but not enough that any water that splashes onto the leaves would dry before the heat of the sun got to them. As a result, the plants got burned and also developed rust.


To combat the rust, I sprayed a product called Plant Wash on the leaves, then I put down horticultural cornmeal and dry powdered garlic (from the kitchen) on the ground under the plants. Both the cornmeal and the garlic help curtail fungal infections. Garlic also helps deter pests, too. The following evening, I sprayed the leaves with a concoction of Garrett Juice (compost tea, apple cider vinegar, liquid molasses, and liquid seaweed). While doing this, I found a cabbage looper (ick!) and quickly sent it to worm heaven. I also quit watering them, but tested the soil daily with my water meter to check moisture level. I went for about a week before God sent some rain my way to take care of my watering needs. I really didn't need to water, but apparently God thought it was time, so He watered everything for me. Despite the rain, they seem to be doing well.


During the week with no watering, I checked the plants daily for more infection. I finally made the difficult decision to cut off affected leaves on plants that I felt would make it and yank the ones that were way past gone. The ones with new leaves made the cut. The ones with no new leaves got pulled. In the picture above, the plant at the bottom got yanked, the plant in the middle became a "maybe" and was watched, and the plant at the top got to stay. Because I didn't really know what the problem was with the beans, the ones that were pulled got put in the yard waste bag that goes to the curb rather than thrown in my compost pile. I lost almost all of my pole beans in the big bean bed!


A survivor of the great bean tragedy. Fortunately, I was able to save some of the pole beans from total ruin.