Perkins Update
I'd be surprised if we received as much as an inch of rainfall in Grand Rapids during the entire month of August. But it appears the tomatoes at Perkins have tapped in to the shallow aquifer below. Today I picked a whole mess of maters, and Julie and Abbey are busy canning them right now. Abbey has memorized the ingredients for a quart of canned maters.
The dry weather also made it ideal for picking shallots. They did pretty well at Perkins and are on the list again for next year.
The pumpkin vines all dried out while we were on Beaver Island, so this year's crop will be modest and the carvers are small. We'll probably eat them and buy something more impressive to decorate the front porch for Halloween.
The sweet corn is excellent given the drought. While ears are small, kernels are big, sweet and juicy. We'll certainly be bringing some ears up to Wheatland this weekend.
The row cover continues to amaze me. Pac choi grows on, and vigorously. The broccoli and cabbage I direct seeded under the row cover looks better than any transplant I've ever planted and the broccoli stands more than 15" tall.
Today I seeded in some more late lettuce and spinach. It's supposed to be a steamer tomorrow, but after that the weather report calls for all low to mid 70's, great temps for growing greens.
The electric fence continues to do its job, with the racoons only getting one ear of corn while we were gone and one squirrel trespassing to bury some nuts in a squash mound. Now if it would only keep out the flea beetles, squash bugs and cucumber beetles...
