Okra and eggplant again? We understand if you are getting a little tired of summer and its vegetables. I am pretty tired of summer, too. When the weather is hot it’s hard to imagine that fall will ever come, but we are still getting ready for it. As for the okra/eggplant avalanche, this is what eating with the seasons is all about – eating so much of what’s in season that you get sick of it, which is wait makes it possible to wait the better part of a year to enjoy it again. I brought home about 10 pounds of okra from the market last weekend so we’ve been eating a lot, too. And we discovered that burgundy okra makes beautiful pickles.
As for what’s coming up: next week we’ll start harvesting the next round of watermelons (these ones are yellow on the inside). There is a third round of watermelon and cantaloupe in the field for early September. Zucchini got transplanted about a week ago and is tucked in under row cover to help protect against squash bugs. I’ve started harvesting butternut squash and am crossing my fingers that they can outrun the squash bugs. I can assure you that I have hand squished thousands of them in the last week. Randy has been hoeing the waist high weeds in the sweet potatoes, which will start coming in September. The second round of tomatoes were a bit of a flop but the third round is flowering and looking mighty fine.
August on the farm is like spring, round two. Snap beans are in the field, and the first round of cabbage and broccoli got set out this week In the greenhouse are beets, kale, collards, and another round of cabbage and broccoli. Soon we’ll be starting lettuce, snow peas, and all our other cool season favorites. So bear with the okra and eggplant a little while longer. You’ll miss it in February.
Good Bug Bad Bug: Assassin Bugs
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You know that something called as Assassin bug is going to be cool. This week I saw one on the farm for the first time, adding to our checklist of beneficial insects and reminding me why we strive for natural methods of pest control. The bug was on a squash plant, eating a striped cucumber beetle. Cucumber beetles are a menace – spreading bacterial wilt that kills melon, cucumber and winter squash vines.
