Monday
Jul202009
A Small Harvest
Monday, July 20, 2009 at 5:55AM 
It's a small harvest - but fresh veggies from the garden none the less. Actually - It's really the by-product of highly stressed tomato plants making the fruit that was set before the 9" of rain at the end of June and beginning of July that were forced into ripening. But we will take them. (and the single zucchini and MASSIVE quantities of broccoli not in the photo too)The red tomatoes are the variety New Girl - and the plants do not really appear to be coming back with any vigor from all the rainfall.
The yellow cherries were from the tomato rescue program...
About 2 weeks ago we secured about 7 - 1 gallon potted plants from a local nursery that had them deeply discounted... several varieties (really more of "whatever you have - we will take"). We then planted then very shallow in trenches and actually mounded top soil over the thickest section of their root ball. This will ensure their survival even if it continues to rain... and rain it did again after we had them in the ground - and other full inch in about an hour... lots of pooling, washing, and happy new tomato plantings.
However - it was during that storm when I was out trenching the garden for draining that I realized the full magnitude of our issues with water and tomatoes this year. We missed this when we configured this plot last year... the roof of the house and barn drain into the lawn... given the slope and shape of the yard, they drain right towards the tomato patch... and the punctuation to this - on the downhill side... I planted not one but 2 rows of potatoes... ensuring the soupy mess we have this year.
Well - live and learn. The potatoes plant stems have mostly all rotted and the potatoes are not worth digging at sub-salt potato size... which is too bad because all last year we lived off of our homegrown ones exclusively. Well - thank goodness for farmers markets (and not the ones were were planning on selling at this year but now will be exclusively buying from!)
Reader Comments (4)
Ew, I bet that potato patch will STINK if you dig into it.
I'm wondering if all the potato/tomato plants that die early from unexpected, cold-and-wet-weather-helped blights this year are going to make the soil that much worse for planting next year. Definitely a reason to rotate crops if you have the space for it.
The taters got disked up last night - there are just a few of any size on the surface now... but yes - no maters/peppers/taters there for 2 years now!
Ohh - and on the late blight - I learned today from a Cornell guy - the spores are wind driven - so even if you are safe now - you may not be later... his recommendation: even the most spray adverse people put and anti-fungal on every 5-7 days.
Ehhhhh.... I know, I know. I'm holding out for now. I wonder if wrapping the cages in floating row cover would be acceptable?
The answer is - no.