#33 Coming Back From The Road Trip
Sometimes the best part of going on a road trip is coming back from the road trip. We love Connecticut. Although this country has some very beautiful areas, we always feel good about getting back home. Since the madman has this habit of booking a return flight that lands around midnight, we never get to fully appreciate being home until the next day when the sun comes up.
And, true to form, he was out there bright and early. We left the garden in good hands. Bridget, Doug and Bill watered and all claim they picked plenty of produce during our absence. But, when we saw how much was hanging on the plants, we weren’t sure how much they had picked. Guess that’s an indication that it has been a real good year.
While We Were Away
So much happened in the week we were gone. Three and a half inches of rain fell in one night, and temperatures soared to the nineties. The plants loved it, but unfortunately so did the weeds. We have spent the past week or so playing catch up. Where to begin? For us, catch-up has been weed at bit, harvest a bit, store a bit then run up to the lake to play a bit.
Picking Up After the Madman
Weeding would have gone a lot better if the madman followed through with good gardening practices. In his hurry to get the potatoes and onions on to their drying racks, he left behind piles of weeds and other debris pulled from the rows. Any gardener knows that these should be removed from the garden, but, the madman was more focused on his upcoming trip. With the rain we had while we were gone, these piles turned into quite the mess. I didn’t have to say much, but I noticed that he wrote in the journal, “Pick up weeds!”
Sharing Our Harvest
Harvesting was a bit more fun. I guess our garden crew didn’t like eggplant, or okra for that matter. We found lots of both. Unfortunately big okra pods get a bit stringy, but we ate our share and thanks to cousin Dolores and neighbors, none of it went to waste – didn’t know Dolores liked eggplant so well.
She also likes tomatoes, but how many tomatoes can she and Bob really eat? Ask any Connecticut gardener, they will tell you this was one of the best years for tomatoes ever; except, of course, for the madman’s friend Bill – but, that’s another story. We lost a lot of the smaller tomatoes like Sun Sugar, Sweet 100s and Coyote – the heavy rain made them split. Still, we harvested a lot.
After giving a bunch away, we froze a good supply of tomatoes for the winter. At one time we canned our tomatoes, but it always seemed that canning day was the hottest day of the summer. For our use, freezing works best because we freeze some whole, some in chunks and some in the form of puree.
Potential disaster in the Beans
Speaking of good harvests, one of our bean towers got pulled over by the sheer weight of the beans. Luckily that was an easy fix. This year the madman experimented with a couple of new varieties. They did okay, but we prefer the taste of our old standards. Next year we’ll go back to the Purple podded and Rattlesnake varieties of pole beans, although I know he will throw some new varieties in; he can’t resist the call of the seed catalogs. What beans we didn’t eat or give away, we froze.
Giant Vegetables
Our cucumbers and squash have been shutting down – probably because the madman discovered some extra-large fruits on both types of vines. Unfortunately, with cucumbers and squash, oversized fruits send a message to the plant that it has produced enough seeds and it’s job is over. I think there were plenty of these giants. The madman says that it’s a small consolation that the squash bugs didn’t get them. Next year, we’ll try to be better about picking.
A New Philosophy
At one time, we would have returned home and been overjoyed by our garden’s production, and that would have been it. But, thanks to the Master Gardener program, our gardening philosophy has evolved. We don’t garden just for ourselves and our two legged friends anymore. Sure, the produce is great and the flowers are nice to look at, but, as Professor Doug Tallamy says, we spend a lot of time “bringing nature home.”
These days, the madman gets as excited by a butterfly larva as he does a perfect tomato. When he went to fill the back hummingbird feeder the first day back, the madman noticed a monarch caterpillar happily munching away on a milkweed leaf. Then he saw another, and another, and another…Wow! We actually did it, we successfully attracted breeding monarchs. While many gardeners consider milkweed, as its name implies, a weed, we have struggled to introduce it to our yard. After many seasons of failure, we tried sowing the seeds in the fall. This has worked. Last summer, we had good milkweed, but no monarch caterpillars. This year we had good milkweed and plenty of monarchs.
Caterpillar Spotting
A Swallowtail from our fennel plants at home. 
A Swallowtail the madman found in theTetons.
Besides monarchs, we have done a good job with the Swallowtails breeding on our dill and fennel. Although we see lots of caterpillars, we understand the nature of the food chain and accept the fact that only a few will make it to the butterfly stage. We like to think we are doing our share to support them. Over the past couple of days, the madman has noticed a couple of Giant Swallowtails on his citrus plants. Citrus are host plants for this species and the Giant Swallowtail is considered a major pest in citrus-producing areas. I have found the madman examining his citrus trees every day, looking for the larva that resembles bird droppings. He says it’s just a matter of time before he finds one.
In the meantime, we’ll sit in the garden watching all the pollinators – lemonade in hand.
