2018 Garden

[RWS]

This years garden has gotten off to a slow start.  This Spring has been unusually cool with rain when we needed it, however, it is getting dry now.  We had good luck with English peas.  So far we have put 35 packs in the freezer with one last picking tomorrow.

The early blue berries are starting to ripen up.  We don't get many early ones, but they are large.

The squash is starting to ripen up and I noticed small green tomatoes.  So this year's garden is off and running.

[revckd]

Nice, I am feeding the deer well but there is so much they should be some for me too... I hope

[RWS]

I started Saturday and finished this morning weeding out 8 rows of corn and a row of black beans.  I dug some potatoes the other day so today I thought I would dig some more.  I was only at it for about 15 minutes before it started to rain.  I need to get the potatoes up before they get too much moisture and start splitting as it rained several times yesterday.  I washed them and am drying them on top of some boxes.  They will then be separated into large and small.  The small ones I will can in pint jars.  Then I can open a quart jar of green beans, a pint of potatoes, drag a piece of meat thru it and call it dinner.

[RWS]

I checked the Golden Bantam corn this evening.  I have silk.  I cleaned out the sprayer and put a little 7 in it.  I spray corn every 3 days when the silk starts to show.  I just spray the silk as that is where the larva/worms crawl in. 
Why is there usually only one worm per ear of corn ? ? ?

It's because the larva/worm is so aggressive that the strongest one kills all the other ones so he gets all the corn himself....at least that is my understanding.....

[revckd]

Nice, I am feeding the deer well but there is so much they should be some for me too... I hope

Well there might not be any cukes, peas or beans... dang deer! BUT, I will have meat in the freezer for sure this fall.

[RWS]

Nice, I am feeding the deer well but there is so much they should be some for me too... I hope

Well there might not be any cukes, peas or beans... dang deer! BUT, I will have meat in the freezer for sure this fall.

Well fill the freezer with venison.  Backup your power source.  When food gets scarce, so will the deer.  Since you will have had practice gardening and have seed saved back, you should be in decent shape.

[revckd]

Nice, I am feeding the deer well but there is so much they should be some for me too... I hope

Well there might not be any cukes, peas or beans... dang deer! BUT, I will have meat in the freezer for sure this fall.

Well fill the freezer with venison.  Backup your power source.  When food gets scarce, so will the deer.  Since you will have had practice gardening and have seed saved back, you should be in decent shape.

yea, done planned that. But it still makes me mad, all that work and just to eat fattened deer meat. Food plots are so much easier and for them, but nooo, they want my food.

Oh I did not I tell ya, they're eating the new orchard trees too. 2 apple trees an apricot and a mulberry... gone. Nibbling on all the others they can reach too Can you guess what I will be eating at the fall camp-out

[Country Singer]

We used t-posts and poles that we had handy and enclosed our fruit trees with deer netting to a height of about four feet and about two feet from the tree.  It's been working great at keeping them from gnawing the young tree down to nubs.

[RWS]

I have started to spray the corn silks to prevent worms from crawling in.  I am supposed to do it every three days.  Well as soon as I spray, it rains and washes it away.  So far I have sprayed every other day.  Looks like I am going to have to spray every day early in the morning as we get rain every afternoon.  What makes it worse is now I am having to put on wading boots because of the soft dirt (mud) between the rows which is a result of recent tilling.  Gardening is always so much fun.......
It's been so wet, the donkey is left sitting on the fence.
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DeJ9SPTVQAAK8SV.jpg

[RWS]

What a day.  I am glad the sun is again on the horizon.  The day started at 5:38 with breakfast at 6.  I was net control this morning and I was late.  No matter, as usual the 75 meter band was stretched way out and I could not hear any Georgia stations.  The wife was out the door at 7 to pick blueberries while I was on the net until 8.  Instead of picking blueberries I started digging more potatoes.  I got tired of toting a 5 gal bucket at a time to the house so I got the wheel barrow.  The vegetable frig is already full.  After lunch we cleaned and canned 24 pints of potatoes.  That got rid of most of the smaller ones.  We still won't be able to eat all the potatoes before they go bad.  I will plant some of the small (golf ball size) in August to get a Fall seed potato crop I can plant next Spring.   

[RWS]

Well it is that time of year again.  The tomatoes are ripening faster than we can eat them.  What we do is make something out of them to freeze or can.  We still have lots of canned left over from last year so...  This is tomato soup for the freezer.  It just has to cool a bit first.

[RWS]

Corn......  We are in corn.  I checked it Thursday and figured a few more days.  I checked it this afternoon and it is ready.  I picked two ears for supper this evening.  For supper we are having silver queen corn and sliced Cherokee tomatoes.  Why?  Because that is what we have.  We don't have meat for every meal.  When it cools off a bit this evening I will go get in what needs to be picked today.  Then the problem will be to find room in the refrigerator.   
After supper as the evening cooled, I picked a 5 gallon bucket full.  The wife said that is all she wants to put up tomorrow.  She cleans it, cooks it, cuts it off the cob and puts it in zip lock bags for the freezer.  I gave away 2 grocery bags of corn and 2 gallons of blue berries.

[RWS]

The first day I picked corn I got a 5 gallon bucket full.  That's shucked.  The wife has me shuck it as it is picked.  She says if she is going to put it up, the least I could do is shuck it.  The second day I picked 1-1/2 five gallon bucket fulls.  It started to rain as I was picking just before dark.  I waited until it cooled off some as we had 3 digit temps.  This morning as the wife is cooking yesterdays corn,  I come dragging in 2  more 5 gallon bucket fulls.  I think the wife will be glad when the corn is done making.  Then we can go camping up high where it is cool.  Coming out of these hot temps, we have to take a long sleeve shirt for the early mornings.

[BennyMG1]

Do you freeze the corn or can it? What have you found works best?

[RWS]

We cook it, cut it off the cob and bag it for the freezer.  If we make vegetable soup and can it -- it has corn in it.  Anything canned with corn in it you need to run the pressure up to 15psi and hold it 30 min.  Corn & meat require higher temp & longer hold time than say  tomatoes or green beans.