The Dean Homestead

Had fun working in the garden today. I was able to harvest a few eggplants, tomatoes, peppers, cucmbers, onions and onion top sets.

So we were able to harvest some produce from our garden today. Here is a big dish pan full of tall telephone pole peas. I love these peas. They are super easy to pick, easy to shell and sweet when cooked.

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I just had to take a picture of my friends tomato trellis.



Every year they have a problem of their tomato plants laying on the ground, loosing fruit to bugs and rot. They have tried to use the cage trellises but the plants get much to heavy.

I love what they did this year! Great idea!

Just wanted to write a reminder to myself of the snow we had this morning. We had snow the other year in April as well... not such an unusual occurrence around here. You just have to be paying attention.

I haven't weeded my garden beds this summer and you would not believe what all is growing in there. Here is a picture of my walking onions that were left in because I thought they were dead. Boy oh boy was I wrong! They are doing very well.



We also had a lot of cherry tomatoes come up but we allowed them to go back to the soil. There will probably be millions coming up as weeds next year. I'd be lying if I said that I was upset about that. :)

Here is picture of the cute little caterpillar that the children brought to show me. They were so excited they wanted to know what type it was.



As you can see from the photo this is clearly an orange caterpillar. However, if you do a search for orange caterpillar you will not come up with much. Finally, I figured out that this is a yellow bear caterpillar, Virginian Tiger Moth and Spilosoma virginica.

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Last year we had the pumpkins next to the squash. This didn't make much of a difference in the overall produce. However, we did have several fruit that were a terrible mix. There was one zucchini in particular that had orange striped skin that was very thick, almost as thick as a pumpkins, and the seeds were thick and tough just like a pumpkins. I had used it in a stir fry and the offending zucchini pieces had to be removed before the dish could be eaten.

This year we have a beautiful hybrid volunteer that has come up. The only problem is that the only thing it is good for is the flower. Here is a picture. You can see that the leaves are that of a pumpkin and the flowers are that of a zucchini squash. Also, it is a vining plant and I do believe that all of the flowers are male and none will be setting fruit. None have so far.



With it being the Sabbath year, we are not harvesting anything from the garden. Otherwise I would be trying out a new recipe that I have: Stuffed Zucchini Flowers. Perhaps we will have another volunteer in the future that wants to produce dozens upon dozens of useless flowers for us to eat. We can always hope. I don't think that we will be planning another cross like this unless the Stuffed Flowers recipe turns into my families new favorite meal.

By habit, when I passed by some basil plants and saw a dying leaf, I plucked it off. The only thing is that it wasn't a leaf. I have never seen one of these in my garden and in most years will probably not welcome them. This year however, I am thankful to have gotten the chance to see this beautiful creature.

We are taking the Sabbath year and are amazed at what is happening in our garden.

For several years now I have been wanting to have honey suckle on our property. I have never done anything to bring this about but was happy to find some growing up behind and over our pea trellis. I had been watching the plant for some time, wondering what it could be that grew so well. It grew up from behind the trellis, pushing it forward, causing the trellis to be damaged beyond repair. Not really a problem, I wanted to replace it next year anyway. Besides, the sweet smell and nectar for the insects is more than worth it.



Also, we just left the walking onion in the raised bed, thinking that it was dead and would add to the organic matter in the soil. Instead, it has grown amazingly well!



We have other stowaways from last year as well. This beautiful leaf lettuce has grown wonderfully where the seed landed last fall.



Since this is the Sabbath Year, we will not be harvesting any of these wonders. It's just nice to have the beauty and sweet smells that come from letting God's land rest.

Bakers Creek Heirloom Seeds 2008 Pure Seed Book has come! It took me two days to go through the catalog but I am finally done! This is a great resource for those that are searching for heirloom seed. This 100 page full color catalog is Full of heirlooms from around the world.

The only problem that I had was limiting myself to regional plants only. If I wanted to, I could have some of every known plant from around the world and all heirlooms.

I will not list the my seeds of choice because they are all very good seed. Some I have found in other catalogs and some are very new that I have never heard of.

The Bakers Creek Heirloom Seeds website is www.RareSeeds.com