today in my garden there was once again that suspiciously looking animal that i finally was able to identify as opossum (thanks god it's not a rat!)

I've seen opossum in my back garden too -- and I'm in a pretty urban area. The sheer size of the one I saw rooting around the fountain gave me the creeps.

I need advice: I pulled out about 6 huge valerian plants that were taking up space in the border and threatening to go to seed at any moment. Now I have a sizable hole to fill in the bed. We need some mid-late summer color in that spot, but it doesn't get a lot of sun. Was originally thinking fritillaria, since I have such a crush on them, but usually they're way too subtle (sort of mauvey and I'd like bright red or orange). Now I'm considering bleeding heart but am wondering what other perennials should I look into? The soil isn't super, although my neighbor and I put down organic manure every spring so it could be worse. Drainage is good. I'm in zone 6 here in Somerville, MA. What am I forgetting?

I've watched a skunk sauntering up my garden path to the compost. Something is digging up my flagstone patio.

First beans of the season! Tarahumara Tekomari runner beans (Phaseolus coccineus)


Blue speckled tepary


Blue speckled tepary bean

my cherry tomaotes (sugarsnacks) are producing luverly, sweet fruit regularly. my yellow pear plant has also begun to fruit like crazy. the stupice has begun to put out fruit as well. still waiting on the two pomodori plants (bought from the farmer's market) to move from flower to fruit. these are the plants i grew from seedlings. the mature transplants have also put out more fruit but these plants look less robust (more yellowing leaves). the one roma plant is producing very small fruit. the fruit on the celebrities seem to be in stasis. ditto for the one champion--though in good news, the last fruit to ripen on that one was free of the blossom-end rot that plagued the first few. all of these mature transplants are producing far smaller fruit than i expected from online descriptions.

my mistake this year was to do so many different kinds of tomatoes. next year i'm going with 6 sugarsnacks, 6 yellow pears and 2-4 of a big, slicing heirloom variety suited to our climate.

the peppers--which were also mature transplants--are also in stasis.

My only tomatoes that have been worth a sh** this summer have been the sungold cherry tomatoes, although I'm finally starting to see something from my lemon boys-the only problem is since they're yellow, it's hard to tell when they're ripe.

This weekend, while babysitting my inlaws' toddlers (oh god, I am so glad my children are older), I made a tomato sald that was in the Food section (8/16) of the WA Post, from Cathal Armstrong-very simple, halved cherry tomatoes, shaved shallots (I thought about this for awhile, then used the Benriner & minced w/ a knife), olive oil, white balsamic, & basil (I used Thai, that's what I had & tossed in some tiny mozzarella pearlini), grilled some steaks & chick breasts, made a cheese pie, served with a salad. The tomatoes were awesome, the kids didn't know what they were missing!...

Question, please, experienced gardeners.

How do you know when corn on the cob is ripe? Do you need to pick it when the silk is brown? Can you leave it on there to keep growing? Will it get starchy?

Ours isn't very big, but I am under the impression that it should get picked as soon as it is ripe, to enjoy maximum tenderness and sweetness. But I'm willing to be wrong.

Thanks!

We have never grown corn, so alas I can't respond. There must be a few out there who have?

Not today in the garden, alas - it's raining - but Friday evening:

Kale in front, chard behind it, cherry tomatoes and scarlet runner beans on the fence:



Glads:



Fly

Impressive!
Are you going to eat the beans fresh or let them dry? I had them for lunch today (check out the Lunch thread)

I usually dry them (on the vine) then shell them and use them in something or other. We grow them because they are beautiful (and cover the rather ugly chain link fence) so the beans are a bonus!

Fly

the last few days here have been quite chilly--minimums in the mid-40s. i fear that most of my still ripening tomatoes will not see maturity. i have one stupice plant that is supposed to do well in colder climates. if this proves to be true i think this might end up being my large tomato of choice next year.

This is one of Shelora's black beans looking for somewhere to go, so it made it's way onto this amaranth stalk. I didn't plant any amaranth thhis year but I've got plenty.



This is a Tarahumara sunflower. Apparently superior seeds for eating.



Huazontle. The Mexicans like to deep fry it in a batter and I think I will!



Nico on a tomatillo hunt.

i just hate how much better your pictures are than mine.

Can't you just be happy for me?

Some people look and some people see.

I wish I'd taken that.

Thank you!

In other news, has anyone grown sunchokes/jerusalem aritchokes? Do they really take over? Could I put them in a corner and forget about them? The Johnny's Seed catalogue is going to ship them in October and I was considering them but fear a massive invasion.

I've got some growing in dry, clay soil, in an unforgiving, sun-drenched western exposure; I don't water them; they survive, but in those conditions, they don't take over. In that same area, I grow mint and other potential invasives. None of them muster the strength to dominate. I have no experience with what happens if sunchokes are cultivated and coddled.

Do they flower? Maybe they'd be good in far off borders. Thanks for the good news.

Yep. Big, yellow; like sunflowers.

Yes, they flower. But like a bad burrito (w/canned beans), they tend to keep coming back. Friends of ours have them in their Western Mass. garden, and it's my pleasure every fall to go out and dig the suckers up and take as many chokes as I can carry, which, to their advantage, has reduced the spread. I'd imagine they'd be pretty happy in your sunny Napa garden.

Scroll down for flower photo.

Messy! My mother used to go out in the early morning when its still dewy with a 2 pound coffee can, fill it, lid it and toss it in the garbage can. My husband amuses himself on early morning walks by clearing the sidewalks, tossing late crawlers into the street. Different strokes!

For Omni, for years I have tried to anticipate the arrival of whatever caterpiller demolishes the anemonies in our front entry. This year, they have left the anemonies completely alone. But we came home to find that they had eaten my husband's roses out on the walk down to the bare stalk. Nature: 1 Gardener: 0

Technically yesterday in the garden, we put together our new garden shed. The bumpf said two adults could assemble this in about two hours. It took close to six for the family Fly, not counting the assembly of the foundation and the unwrapping and organizing of the various bits and pieces. Still, it was a great day for such a project and we count ourselves lucky in suffering only one bruised thumb and one broken thumbnail in the process:

Allright- my new obsession is sunflowers. I've only grown them once before and I hate how the birds got to the seeds before I did. This year I grew Tarahunmara sunflowers from Seeds of Change.

I woke up to no fog this morning and more flowers opening up. And if you look closely you can see bees doing their thing.











This is a stupid questiopn but making sunflower oil is probably out of my skill set, right?

This is why 7.1 megapixels can be handy:

i have a bottle of Rapunzel sunflower oil in my fridge like forever - still half full...

question - how to plant a garlic?

Garlic needs very rich soil. That's the hard part. Once you are ready to plant, about six weeks before the ground freezes, get nice local garlic from a farmer's market or nursery (don't use imported stuff from the grocery store), break apart the heads and bury the cloves pointed side up about 2 inches deep. It should be mulched.

Here's a page with more details:

http://www.ehow.com/how_317_grow-garlic.html

Home grown garlic is great!

Fly

Just harvested the first Paimpol beans. Will steam them then give a flash braise in a little veal glaze and herbs. Stuffed (more ) squash blossoms with herbed goat cheese before their flour-eggwash-crumb coating. Will dispatch a hidden zucchini that was trying to make like a fat stem as a simple buttered puree.

Why is it that just as the garden gets its legs, the fog settles in for the duration! Most of the carrots and beets didn't even germinate. I tell myself, 3 carrots are good, 4 beets are good, better than none.

Mexican sunflower:


Here's a bee about to make a landing on the sunflower:

The garden is done for the season – killing frost on Friday night. Overall, a disappointing year, thanks to bizarre and difficult weather and a schedule that kept me from the dirt. Some things did beautifully – carrots, beets, haricots verts, tomatoes, garlic, shallots, greens, and – almost inexplicably – poblano peppers. Others were a complete bust: eggplant, winter squashes (though the cucumbers were great), cauliflower, basil and (go figure) jalapeño peppers.

Oh, well. There's always next year. Although TJ finally got around to building the long-promised cold frame, so it looks like we'll have baby greens well into early winter:

For RG:

I harvested baby lettuce, arugula, and microgreens from the coldframe (see upthread) for last night's dinner. Gorgeous greens – pristine on account of being grown “indoors.” I sowed more mache, lettuce, and microgreens yesterday.

Who says carrots don't have a sense of humor?

Those carrots are amazing - how did they taste?

Question - I am planning to start the kitchen garden from scratch in the spring (herbs, peppers, some flowers...). Should I take everything out of it now and turn the soil? I'd rather wait for springtime to do it, before I plant....but is there a compelling reason to do it now rather than then?

The carrots are delicious – sweet and intensely carroty without being harsh the way some carrots are. I credit the variety – Napoli. It's the only carrot I grow.

No real reason to turn the soil now, Omni, but do pull up the old plants on toss them on the compost heap. You might spread a layer of some sort of poo over the soil; you can turn it under in the spring.

We don't have a compost heap, I'm sorry to say. It's on the list of things to do someday. Given that fact, should I still pull out the plants? Or should I leave them in to fertilize the soil over the winter? I have no idea what I'm talking about, obviously.

And I guess I need some advice on starting a compost heap...

Well...you could use those plants to start a heap. Just pick a convenient spot, somewhere you don't have to look at (like out behind the barn), somewhere that's easy enough to get to from the kitchen, and just start piling your dead plant matter, leaves, vegetable and fruit scraps from the kitchen, coffee grounds, egg shells (don't add meat scraps or bones). Whether or not you ever get around to using it in the garden is almost beside the point. It's just a sound way to deal with discarding biodegradable matter.

You can leave the plants in the ground over winter. They won't hurt anything, but they won't do much to enrich the soil, either.

Okay, thanks. I will start a compost heap, behind the barn is good, but it's no where near the kitchen...so I'll just have to shlep it and keep a compost container near the sink in the kitchen. I'll wait until after the winter, because if I do it now, it will just get covered with snow pretty soon anyway.

I sure hope so (said she who lives for snow).

I would pull up the vegatation and leave the ground bare for the winter. Less places for insects to lay their eggs that hatch in the Spring.

Well regardless of whether or not ranitidine knows what he's talking about , I pulled everything out of the kitchen garden.

Okay - I piled all the stuff I pulled from the garden into a pile behind the shed - the beginning of a compost heap. Would it be better to put it in a container of some sort? A large plastic garbage can, for example? Or what else? Do I need to buy some kind of bacteria kit or something to get it started?

Visit a local horse farm. Fill several large, black plastic bags with manure. Bring it back and throw it on the garden clippings. Nature will take care of the rest. Don't put it in a container.

Um, um, um....no.

Well, that's the way to do it.

you could always wait for the circus to come to town and acquire elephant manure - said to be very potent. I only know that my cat waltzed out back for his usual morning ablutions, turned the corner, got one whiff of the elephant doo, arched his back, hissed and ran back inside

But seriously, do some casual layering of hot stuff, like manure, fresh grass clippings, or alfalfa pellets, with brown stuff like dead leaves, with the leftover veg/fruit scraps - layer after layer as you go through the winter. By spring, it will be a nice mix.

There are a few good santized poo-in-a-bag products that you can haul home cleanly from a garden center. Moo Doo is my brand of choice. Omni, isn't there an Agway along Rt. 22 down your way? They should carry it. Also, alfalfa meal is an excellent addition to the compost pile (Agway also).

Comon! Butch it up, Omni! Even I do this at my friend Eileen's stable. How big is the garden? I bet one bag would do you.
You can spread the poo chips throughout the garden if you do it now and things will be great by spring.
re: the compost, you can leave it in a pile but it's more efficient to put it in some kind of container so it can build up heat. Three wooden pallets hammered together would work or you can buy one of those $40 black plastic composters which are good because the rain won't leech all the goodness out.
When you got to a Starbucks or any coffee place, ask for their spent coffee grounds for your compost.
Manure tea is next!

Butch shmutch. I think I can deal with bagged stuff from Agway. Yes GG, there is an Agway not far from us - it's on Rte 7 near Troy.

My mom got one for free from University City Greens. I bet there is a similar program in NY.

Horse manure is a better ingredient than cow manure.