I am a brave bug hunter. Kind of.

This week I've tried to make a concerted effort to spend more time in the garden performing bug maintenance, because the squash bug eggs have begun to hatch, and it isn't pretty.  Squash bug nymphs have little white bodies and black legs, and they gross me out (not as much as potato bug larvae, though).  Mamie and I first noticed them on Sunday when I asked her to help me scrape squash bug eggs off of the plant leaves, and we found these little guys in addition to eggs.  These little guys move fairly quickly, so I'm becoming much more motivated to eradicate all of the squash bug eggs to prevent more of the nymphs.  Those squash bugs are prolific reproducers, though, so it feels like a never ending battle.  The giant pumpkin plant has the most squash bugs/eggs/nymphs, while the actual squash field itself isn't so badly infested.  Part of my daily routine is now to scrap eggs and kill nymphs, in addition to patrolling for potato bugs.  Hopefully I'll be able to kill most of them before they grow into adult squash bugs, who, in addition to damaging squash plants, also look and smell and awful lot like stinkbugs.

In happier squash news, the spaghetti squash plant won the race in the squash field to be the first plant to produce flowers!  Below is a female flower on the spaghetti squash plant - female flowers have fruit at the base, while male flowers are only a flower on a stem.  If the female blossom is fertilized by a male blossom, then the fruit will grow into a mature squash.  If not, it will shrivel up and die.  In the squash kingdom, reproduction is not a game!


female spaghetti squash blossom 7-27-2011

 On the potato bug front, it looks like I am beginning to win my battle with the disgusting larvae.  I still find a few every day, but not so many as I was finding even a week ago.  Some of my potato plants still aren't looking so good, but I'm trying to remain optimistic after last week's sampling of new potatoes.

This week, I've noticed a beautiful sound when I'm being quiet in the garden - the soft hum of bees.  My flowers are covered in them, and in the mornings I can see the bees working hard to fertilize my squash plants (I know, I said I was going to help with that.  I haven't yet.  I'm trusting in the bees for now).  I've even seen a few honey bees, which makes me especially happy to see.  Hearing that gentle vibration from the flowers makes me happy that we've gone without pesticides in the garden, as I can see by the substantial bee presence that at least I have some good bugs in there.

Bee in marigold 7-27-2011

Bee in pattypan squash flower 7-27-2011

Also, isn't that marigold above just gorgeous?  It's one of the marigold plants that survived my shock therapy transplant technique.  I love the soft yellow white of the flowers, and the plants themselves are looking lush, green, and very happy.  I'm definitely growing more unique marigolds next year, and maybe I'll even be kinder to them when I set them out.

When Mike came home from work on Wednesday, I greeted him at the car with the terrible news that "we have a tomato situation."  While doing my daily bug inspection, I noticed with horror that most of the tomatoes in one of the beds had turned black at the bottoms.  I anxiously googled "tomatoes turning brown," and learned that these plants are experiencing blossom end rot.  Luckily, it's not terribly serious, and it's not an infectious condition.  Most likely, the temperature and water fluctuations were too much for these plants, and the calcium uptake to the fruits was interrupted, which causes them to rot from the bottom up.  It shouldn't affect new fruits that the plants produce, and it only happened in one bed, so the tomato situation isn't as bad as I first thought, although it is quite ugly on the affected fruits.  I've started picking the bad fruits and offered some to the chickens, but they weren't terribly interested, so I'll have to compost the rest.


Heirloom tomatoes with blossom end rot 7-27-2011

I think I mentioned before that the heat wave we had was not kind to my broccoli and cauliflower plants.  A few of the broccoli plants have some small shoots that are still nice and green, but the cauliflower is just a disaster.  I've been pulling the plants out and giving them to the girls, to make room in the beds for the next crops (I haven't figured out what those will be yet - this is a plan in stages).  The chickens are funny - they have a distinct preference for broccoli plants over cauliflower plants.  They'll eat both, but they will strip a broccoli plant of leaves and buds within five minutes, while they'll work over a cauliflower plant over the course of an afternoon.  The girls even prefer broccoli plants to lettuce.  Funny, funny chickens.

Chickens eating broccoli and cauliflower plants 7-27-2011

All week I've been watching the swallow eggplant, and yesterday the first fruit was ready for harvest!  The swallow eggplant is the plant that was under the heaviest attack by potato bugs a few weeks ago, and I feel gratified that it became the first plant to produce fruit, and that it is now potato bug free - it gives me hope that I'll be able to keep the potato plants going.  Swallow eggplants are an Asian hybrid, so they have a long, slender fruit that is not bitter - pretty much my ideal eggplant (I find that eggplant is often a vegetable that I like more in theory than on the plant).  I don't like the large eggplants that you usually find in the store, but love the more unique, smaller varieties.

Swallow eggplant 7-27-2011

In addition to the eggplant, I also grabbed a green pepper, carrots, green beans, snap peas, broccoli, scallions, chard, thai basil, and a baby pattypan squash for dinner.  I cooked up some udon noodles and sauteed all of the veggies, then once the veggies were cooked I made a quick spicy peanut sauce with coconut milk, crunchy peanut butter, chili garlic sauce, and soy sauce, and tossed everything together.  I don't have a picture of the final dish, because we were too hungry for photography by the time it was finished.  This is the dinner harvest, though.

Long carrot!  7-28-2011

Harvesting a pepper 7-27-2011

Dinner harvest 7-28-2011

We took the dogs to a local trail system that has river access in the evening, for a nice walk/jog.  The dogs had a fantastic time - Bullet absolutely loves the water and cannonballs into the river at every opportunity, while Lily prefers to gently dip her tushy in, and then wait to tackle Bullet on the shore.  Bullet and Lily had a great time running, swimming, and wrestling at the park, but it meant that by the time we got home, their dinner had been delayed by about an hour.  As I was cleaning veggies, I looked down the hall to find Lily in her best starving pathetic dog pose.  Note that she is using the counter to support herself, as she is so weak from hunger.  Completely understandable, since the only snacks she got on our walk/jog were ample amounts of cheese and chicken.  How does Mike not think this girl is a lab???


Starving Lily 7-28-2011