The moments when you are reminded of gardening's joys: yanking weeds, trellising tomatoes, smashing cucumber beetles between your fingers, and the blissful sound of water gushing through a rainwand. This past week has been an absolute scorcher in Wisconsin. I can't remember the last time we had rain. Typically, I work in the garden despite the heat but the one hundred degree temperatures sent me inside.
The cucumbers, butternut squash, sunflowers, and tomatoes have loved the heat. Finally, last night, the heat wave abated and we determinedly went to our community garden plot to trellis tomatoes and combat nasty voles. This summer, it has been an epic battle in a rodent-infested community garden. Two weeks ago, our absolutely gorgeous eight-inch tall 'Shirofumi' edible soybeans, also known as edamame, were clipped to the ground by several hideously obese voles. We had an extensive network of wildlife netting, firmly secured with landscape staples, that proved completely ineffective against the repeated onslaught of hungry rodents. This week, a rabbit had a lovely meal of 'Midnight Black Turtle' bean plants. Somehow, the 'Sarian' strawberry plants, that I started from seed in February, have escaped unscathed.
On a lighter note, this week's harvest: two 'Eight Ball' zucchini fruits, a handful of 'Red Norland' potatoes, several 'Poona Kheera' cucumbers, and a 'Calypso' pickling cucumber. Other veggies that were ready to harvest include: 'Beedy's Camden' kale, immature onions, swiss chard, young 'Ventura' celery stalks, Verbena bonariensis flowers, and 'Red-Cored Chantenay' and 'Shin Kuroda' carrots.
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