oakandsage posts

Banana s have taken off. Both doing well. They only have about a month before the weather starts getting a bit cold, nights are already getting down to 50F some nights. Will have to think about frost protection soon.

Grapes that survived are doing well. The on…

Arkansas Traveler is fruiting heavily now. The flavor is excellent. Got about 8 lbs of fruit this weekend, gave most of them to my landlady and her other boarder who lives in the big house with her. Unfortunately his dog got into them and ate them (yes, all of them. No, they did not stay down). T…

I got nearly 10 lbs of fruit from my San Marzano tomato last week, and the first three Arkansas Traveler fruit came ripe this weekend. Beefmaster is still thinking about it; I fear I'll receive a late glut of Beefmaster all at once. The yard long beans are doing great and I just picked my third b…

Even though I planted tomatoes reasonably early and the weather has been quite warm, the tomatoes are just… confused by the weather. I have a few good sized Brandy Boy and Persimmon but they're still green. I had one really early San Marzano back in june, and another is starting to turn red. …

So I completely don't have the time/energy to keep my crop list up to date, but this year I planted cucumbers. Or I thought I planted cucumbers. It turns out they are armenian cucumbers which are actually a particularly cucumbery variety of muskmelon. Many people like them but …

Tomatoes are "the thing" in my summer garden - they're what I plan everything else around, they're what gets me motivated to plant. Sure, I also grow and enjoy squash, eggplant, and other stuff, but tomatoes are my killer app, the thing that keeps me gardening when I'm blah and unmotivated and in…

So I have three volunteer tomatoes around where the Sunsugar was last year, and I didn't have much else there so I figured I'd just let them grow and see what happened. They've got small yellow fruit slightly larger than that of Sunsugar, but just barely - but it's sort of irregular. Not as irreg…

My landlady's plum tree is loaded with almost-ripe plums, light purple but still hard. The birds are going to town. In order to ensure that we get to eat some of the plums, we're picking buckets and boxes full.

Is it better to wash the plums right away, or to leave them unwashed until ready …

I harvested the black eyed peas today. Not sure how many plants I have (it's kind of a tangle because they're in with the melons) but I think only 1 or 2 and the other 2 are yard long beans. I got just enough black eyed peas to make a little Side dish sized bowl of peas with onions. Pretty tasty…

I shall label the seasons in my garden thusly:

Dec-Feb: The Season of Excessive Procrastination

Mar-May: The Season of Inarticulate Panic

Jun-August: The Season of Smugness

Sept-Nov: The Season of Isn't It Dead Yet I Need Room To Plant The Garlic

My potatoes are doing well, and o…

I have been assuming that the beans growing in my garden (that are finally taking off and seem healthy, Y A Y) are yard long beans because they match the picture on the package, and I want yard long beans. But recently (partly because the immature pods are getting thicker but not getting longer, …

Got way behind on my summer planting due to cherry season starting a few weeks early. On the other hand I have 50 lbs of cherries canned, so that's good.

You guys, the new Pomona's low-sugar jam book (which I am, er, using with Ball low-sugar pectin) is awesome. Cherry-port preserves. Serious …