September is almost here and we have enjoyed the fruits from all our hard work in the garden. We saved several packages of green peas from the 2 rows that were behind the electric fence to keep the deer out. Green peas are an early crop, so the plants have now dried up and were pulled from the garden but not before we saved plenty seed for next year.
The tomatoes took a long time to start turning red. We have some plants inside the greenhouse and some others outside. It is best to try both ways if you have the space. The large tomatoes are from the greenhouse and the variety is a cross that my father developed several years ago. The smaller tomatoes are Roma tomatoes and are excellent for canning and making tomato sauce.
The peaches are doing great; in fact, we had to prop up the limbs because there were so many peaches. I froze many bags, but wanted some in jars. There are still more on the later varieties. An electric fence is used to keep out the raccoons, which climb the tree and break the limbs to reach the peaches.
The garlic as always, did well, but the onions started rotting in the ground, so we pulled them while they were green, put them in partial sun to dry and I am dehydrating most of them except the few white, yellow, and purple ones below. I will dehydrate garlic during the winter because it dries up too much. The younger cooks like the dehydrated onions so they don’t cry when cutting them up. We enjoy the onions and garlic and always remember in the Bible where the Israelites wanted to go back to Egypt, so they would have their garlic and onions.
We planted potatoes in three different places to try to outsmart the potato bugs. No bugs this year and we were so grateful. Our worst enemy this year was the hornworm or also called tabocca worm. He is scary just to see him. He eats the tomato plant, and we do not use pesticides, so they have to be hunted, removed, and killed. We tried wheat and oats, but don’t have the know-how or equipment to get it to the kitchen so it will be saved for seed and for the chickens. Maybe we will cut the cost of chicken food from the feed store. We cut the oats before the birds got them, so we had to put them in the sun to dry.
Learn to grow your own food and not depend on the grocery store. We recommend growing without pesticides. It is more work and sometimes the worms get in the apple or peach especially in the corn. When I was young and worked at the Farmers’ Market, we always told the customer if the corn is good enough for the worm then it is good. Learn to cut the worm out after all now bugs are being processed and sold to the public and the government allows it. They say it is protein I think I will cut the worm out of my peach before I eat it.