This year has been the most challenging gardening year for us here at Gardenerd HQ. Even with dozens of rat traps, our cat Mittens, and night vision cameras, we’re still losing to rats this year. But that makes the harvest we do get all the more delicious. Here is some inspiration for your gardening week, a share in our garden production.
Our potatoes are safe from rats and other critters underground. Now they’re curing in the garage under newspaper. We’re picking Striped Roman and Black Plum tomatoes before the rats can get them. We’re harvesting yard-long beans as long as my arm. Those tomatoes that rats ate through the stems have regrown and are now setting fruit. Automatic late season tomatoes!Tomatoes for Tomato Cobbler (see below). Varieties include Yellow Pear, Azoychka, Black Plum, Thorburn’s Terra Cotta, Tigerella, San Marzano, Green Vernissage, and Nikolayev Yellow cherry (and an unripe Saucy Mary’s).Tomato Cobbler is a once-a-year treat made with fresh cherry tomatoes from the garden. Lemon cucumbers are a delight on a hot day.
Cucumber citrus water is a summer treat. Just mix slices of cucumber with slices of orange in water and enjoy the refreshment. Refill the pitcher several times to get the most out of it before composting the slices.
We’re growing spaghetti squash as a living mulch under the corn. They’re starting to flower. Quick diversion: The results of our first sourdough community bread bake in person since lockdown! A few of us were testing the oven to keep it in use. Not open to the public just yet, but we’re hopeful.
Don’t let the setbacks get you down, gardenerds. There’s still plenty of seasonal gardening to enjoy. Share your own summer production with us on Instagram and tag us @gardenerd1 #summerproduction
Hi there.
I’m having the same problem with rates and mice eating my corn. Question: The picture you have shows a clothes pin at the top of the corn by the silk. Is that to keep those buggars out or to keep those pecky worms out? Both?
Also, do you have a fungicide I can add to my soil next year so my tomatoes don’t get that leaf wilt situation once they start getting big? I know I’m not supposed to grow tomatoes in the same soil as the previous year but where I have them is the best place in my small garden.
Thank you for your help.
Sincerely,
Natalie
This technique prevents worms from working their way into the ear of corn. The moth usually lays eggs on the silk and the larvae travel down into the ear. But the clothes pin keeps them from passing through. It unfortunately doesn’t do much to keep the rats out. They still nibble away the silks (or worse the tassels, leaving nothing to pollinate the silks) and you end up with what I call “toothless sister cousin corn”.
As for fungicides, I general don’t recommend them, but offer instead that aerated compost tea, compost, and worm castings will help balance out the situation. There are several nematodes that hunt for the bacteria that cause bacterial wilt as well (more for squash than tomatoes, but worth mentioning). A lot of the time the diseases that show up in tomatoes are there from the beginning, so be sure to buy your tomato plants from reputable sources, rather than big-box stores. They test for diseases there.
Hi there.
I’m having the same problem with rates and mice eating my corn. Question: The picture you have shows a clothes pin at the top of the corn by the silk. Is that to keep those buggars out or to keep those pecky worms out? Both?
Also, do you have a fungicide I can add to my soil next year so my tomatoes don’t get that leaf wilt situation once they start getting big? I know I’m not supposed to grow tomatoes in the same soil as the previous year but where I have them is the best place in my small garden.
Thank you for your help.
Sincerely,
Natalie
This technique prevents worms from working their way into the ear of corn. The moth usually lays eggs on the silk and the larvae travel down into the ear. But the clothes pin keeps them from passing through. It unfortunately doesn’t do much to keep the rats out. They still nibble away the silks (or worse the tassels, leaving nothing to pollinate the silks) and you end up with what I call “toothless sister cousin corn”.
As for fungicides, I general don’t recommend them, but offer instead that aerated compost tea, compost, and worm castings will help balance out the situation. There are several nematodes that hunt for the bacteria that cause bacterial wilt as well (more for squash than tomatoes, but worth mentioning). A lot of the time the diseases that show up in tomatoes are there from the beginning, so be sure to buy your tomato plants from reputable sources, rather than big-box stores. They test for diseases there.