As of this posting, we’re still waiting for Little Guy. We have to be coming closer, though, don't you think?
Mike
was packing the car for our quick trip to the farm yesterday (Tuesday, Oct. 5),
and as he lifted the laundry basket, I said to myself, “I must pack the camera.”
Immediately another thought came in, and that was that – the camera was left
behind. Photos here were taken with my phone.
 |
| The last of the crop |
Once at the farm, we set to work according to our individual lists. I visited the gardens and picked more ripe tomatoes than I ever imagined. Some were a little soft, but all are edible. The size and shape of the tomatoes varies. I found two largish zucchini, probably enough for four two-loaf batches, but the small ones I’d been watching were still small. And I picked two small honey crisp apples. Though small, they are beautiful, thanks to Hallie’s gift of netting bags. That’s the end-of- season bounty, and it’s not much.
An
article in the latest edition of the Ruralite about the “Lost Apple
Project” (info online here) explains that the hot, dry summer stunted the
apples, and I think it’s probably true of other fruits and vegetables. We just
can’t water enough to make up for that unrelenting heat and lack of rain. And it’s
still very dry. Mike noted that he would ordinarily mow one last time, but
there’s no point. Even the weeds are dead.
Discouraging as it is, we keep trying to grow something, and drought-tolerant is the way to go, even at the farm. No sense to dream of shady cottage gardens. A neighbor here in town has Russian sage, so I summoned my courage to ask if I might have some starts. “Have at it! Take all you want! I can’t keep up with it,” he said. So, I managed to pull up two with good roots, which I planted on the bank behind the farmhouse.
“I planted” – sounds so simple, but it wasn’t. The ground is hard, and I found the effort tiring. I mean, I was ready to just stretch out on the ground and go to sleep. Then I realized that I was having a reaction to the Pfizer booster I had on Monday.
But it was too late to rest. I had thawed serviceberry juice for jelly, so after lunch I made a batch. I have enough juice for at least two more batches of elderberry jelly, but now I’m out of lids. The shortage of lids for canning is a side effect of the pandemic. They aren’t available locally.
We left for town about 3:00. Supper was chili from the freezer. I fell asleep in the recliner and then climbed into bed for a long autumn’s nap. KW
2 comments:
Fancy wheels on that 4-wheeler! I'm impressed that you got a couple honey crisp apples--it was so easy once another tree was introduced. I bought a second blueberry bush to go along with a self-pollinator we already have. The man at the nursery said that even self-pollinators do better with a friend, so I'm interested to see what next year brings.
That *is* a fancy 4-wheeler! Dan's still putting around on his close to thirty-year-old one. He mostly uses it for snowplowing these days. Meanwhile garden-wise, I'm thankful it frosted and no more zucchini will be showing up in my kitchen 'til next summer. :-)
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