The August Heatwave

 Welcome back to another episode of Lost in the Farmers Market.  This post is a bit late mostly due to work and the harvest season however I think you will find the photos discussed this time totally worth it. I should also mention that Blogspot has changed some of it's formatting so until I work out the kinks expect that the formatting of these posts may be a bit off for a while.

This tiny little Green Tree Frog popped out of my 'Cerveza & Lime' Cuban Oregano plant as I watered it and game me some serious 'side-eye'. They dont much like chlorinated tap water and I was watering with a hose. If you see these frogs in your garden it is a sign that you have a healthy ecosystem and you are doing the right thing.

Another bit of evidence that I am doing my ecosystem right, in the upper right next to the black pole holding up these two grow bags is a little Green Anole Lizard. These critters eat a LOT of bugs, and that helps me out. The trick to getting them, frogs and toads is to provide natural places for them to hide from things like birds, and domesticated cats. I spot several of these little lizards per month during the warm season so that means certain insect populations are kept in check.

Ripe fruit charts are where it is at. Here we have a ripe super-hot pepper chart. Notice the weird shapes of each type and the variations in an given harvest. Only the Lemon Drops are ever consistent, Fayetteville Inferno's are always sort of tri-lobed, Red Fatalii's are stretched and cylindrical roughly, Chocolate Fataliis are skinnier and more curva-licious than their Red Fatalii cousins. Golden Carolina Reapers are chunky as hell, while the Mad hatters are weird, tri-lobed and the lobes extend out like little pepper-feet. Its a mad world of peppers certainly, but I'm still shipping these to Fowler's Barbecue in town so they should have hot sauces soon.

Here is a handy fig chart, you can see the differences between the types all in one picture! Folks at the market were very concerned that the White Ischia were not ripe but as you can see figs ripen to a whole lot of differing colors. White Ischia ripen to like green if not green-yellow, Brown turkeys aren't always brown, and can have purple tinges, Magnolias are a weird taupe-tan color. Chicago Hardy can be brown, or a dirty brown sand color while Celeste can be a myriad shades of brown with red tinges. It varies greatly and so do the ripe sizes of fruit.

I never quite got the south's obsession with planting Crape Myrtles everywhere as a solution to everything. Yes I get they dont get diseases, can grow in crap soil and pretty much nothing short of a act of god kills them. The flowers aren't that great and then there's the fact their seeds are viable and they escape cultivation. Well this flower cluster with rain droplets from a brief rain shower changed my mind somewhat. This wont make me want to plant more of them but I can kinda understand why folks like the flowers now.

Some of you probably knew this was coming. This is what the 'Hairy Balls' Milkweed seedpods look like and well, if your balls look like this you need to talk to a doctor immediately! The plants get to about six feet tall and the flowers  hang upside down and only bumblebees seem to like them, so hair balls plant plus hairy bumbles...weird combination!

Muslin Bags are used to protect ripening figs from Grey Catbirds who are smart enough to observe me picking fruit and know it's food I'm picking. They don't usually figure this out immediately, but about halfway through the season they start pecking at figs and absconding with potentially saleable fruits. This is the inexpensive and organic solution, apparently the bags fool them into thinking the figs aren't fruit at all, or maybe it makes them look terribly unappetizing.

 

I do not as of the time of writing this know what species of Grasshopper or Locust this is. I found it in my 'Iron and Clay' Cowpeas that were knocked over by Tropical storm Isaias, this critter stood nice and still for the camera and was easily five or so inches long. It is the largest of it's type I've ever seen in the test gardens.

 

Much like tomatoes, figs can burst and split if they are ripening and receive too much water in a short period. This White Ishcia fig has fallen victim to heavy rain fall and practically exploded. Typically these figs are washed, inspected and frozen as soon as possible. I never take these to the market because they have no shelf life in a fresh state and will turn to pulp in processing.

The above are all Magnolia figs, at varied stages of ripening, the three in the back row are in the soft or firm ripeness stage while the one on the left is at soft-ripe stage and is about to burst. The fig on the right is soft-ripe and has begun to burst due to excessive rainfall. Sometimes the protective muslin bags I use can worsen this.

Here is a recent LITFM video about Pineapple Verbena.

This video is about the living Dinosaur plant known as Horsetail.

Ah, and here is a video about Carrots!

Last but definitely not least for this blog update we have a LITFM video covering Okinawa Spinach.

With all that garden goodness covered this is the part of the blog where I have to advertise for the Fayetteville City Market. Now I know you readers probably don’t much like advertisements, but by booth at the City Market helps to cover the costs of running the test garden and literally maintains the Research & Development budget that is used to bring you the information that has made up the backbone of this blog. Also, as of the start of 2019, my booth can now process credit or debit cards thanks to the acquisition of s a Square reader so your payment options have doubled. With that said, if you want to get some GMO-free, Organic vegetables, herbs and fruiting shrubs come on down to the Fayetteville City Market on 325 Maxwell Street in downtown Fayetteville between the Hours of 9:00 am and 1:00 pm on Saturdays. Even in bad weather the market goes on though you might have to look for me under the ‘arches’ of the Transportation Museum’s front entryway.

 

Plants & Stuff Available Now:

Food Plants:
Peanuts, African Runner: $3.00

Herbs: (3” pots)
Black Fennel: $3.00
Chocolate Mint: $3.00
Horehound: $3.00
Mountain Mint: $3.00
Oregano: $3.00


Herbs: (5” pots)
Agatache, ‘Golden Jubilee’: $4.00
Cuban Oregano, ‘Cerveza & Lime’: $4.00
Horehound: $4.00
Oregano: $4.00
Oregano, Italian: $4.00
Roselle, ‘Thai Red’: $4.00
Thyme, English: $4.00

Herbs: Special Offer
Rosemary, Prostrate: $6.00


Ornamental Plants:
Coneflower, ‘Pow Wow Wild Berry: $4.00
Milkweed, ‘Milk Maid’: $3.00
Milkweed, ‘Passionate’: $3.00
Zinnia, Golden Star: $3.00


Coming Soon:
The Fall Crop Lineup: Kale, Collards, Mustard, Chard!

Due to the current Covid-19 situation and the state’s requirement that all citizens are not to gather in groups of more than ten, the weekly Sustainable neighbors meeting is online. Please check the sustainable neighbors Meetup.com page for more info about how to attend our online meeting.

https://www.meetup.com/SustainableNeighbors/

Since our meetings have an open-door policy you don’t need to sign up for anything or join anything, you can come on in and join the meetings. If not, you can always send me questions through this blog or visit the farmer’s market. This brings to a close the sixteenth LITFM post of 2020; stay tuned the next episode which should be posted on the 21st of August. There will be more garden updates and other cool stuff.

So much for in like a lion and out like a lamb.

Welcome back to another episode of Lost in the Farmers Market. This is the second post of March which by no measure of irony comes just two days after the first official day of spring which was Wednesday the 20^th.  So, as I always recommend, do not jump the gun and plant everything outside just yet, we can still have a freeze all the way up to the Easter weekend which is April 19^th through April 21^st. In short, we have a little way to go but, while you have to be careful about your warm season crops you can start to harden off your cold season stuff so it’s ready to go into the ground over the next three weeks or so.  For note, cold season stuff you can plant includes, lettuce, carrots, parsnips, cabbage, broccoli, kale, radicchio, mustard, turnips and some types of peas.  Now this leads to a question that I get somewhat rarely, ‘why do some plants freeze and die and others survive a front that killed everything else nearby?’  Well the simple answer is that some plants have biological adaptations that allow them to survive frost and cold with little or no damage. This protection is at a cellular level were some plants have

Leather Leaf Mahonia (Mahonia beali) prevents front damage by having both a waxy coating on it's leaves but rigid leaf structures full of fibrous lignin which makes it harder for frost to reach and freeze the water in the plant's vascular system and within it's cells cytoplasm.

The simplest answer for this is that freezing in general effects an organism on the cellular level by preventing the flow and or transfer of water between cells and in vascular pathways. This water once it freezes causes cells to burst which leads to that black color you see on plants that have frozen and thawed. This is literally the cold-induced equivalent to a bruise except the tissue destruction is far worse.  Some plants however have chemical compounds in their sap, and in the water stored in their cells that effectively lowers the freezing point for water so that they cannot as easily freeze. Literally some plants produce a biological equivalent to anti-freeze or something akin to alcohol. Before any of you get too excited about the idea of inebriated plants and consuming them, the reality is that it takes very little of these compounds to alter the freezing point of water within the plant.

Longleaf Pines (Pinus palustris) have waxy coating on their needles that allow them to survive low temperatures and freezing to a certain degree. The waxy coating on a plant's leaf is called a cuticle.

Likewise, plants also counter freezing with waxy coatings on their leaves (e.g. pines) and stems which also makes it harder for them to freeze. A third method is the geometry of the plants as is seen with some forms of cacti and succulents which may arrange their needles and spines in such a way to create airspaces where the temperature is controlled to a certain degree. This is the result of genetic selection for trails that increased the survivability of a given plant species which often produces interesting plant forms that most buyers at a garden center don’t fully appreciate or understand.  The discussion of how plants combat freezing ties into your garden planning by way of considering how wind travels through your yard which will tell you were cold and warm pockets might be allowing for better placement.  One of the interesting ways to spot where the wind forms temperature pockets is to look for where leaves swirl about in a cyclone like circle near structures or the placement of beds. Additionally, looking for spots where fallen leaves are thickest can often tell you that the wind is depositing them there due to the way it flows through your yard. Living windbreaks are the best way to control the movement of the wind and a good way to mitigate hot and cold pockets short of dramatic landscape alterations. But let’s move on to this week’s photographs from the field;

In numerous conversations and lectures I have called mosses an indicator plant because they only tend to appear where two specific environmental conditions are met. It has to be consistently moist and the soil has to be compacted to some degree for moss to reliably germinate and form colonies. the presence of moss is part of a naturally occurring terra-forming cycle where the moss will colonize an area and build up organic matter as it grows which then is colonized by other weeds that further defeat the compaction that initially may have left an area barren.

The above are the blooms of 'Kolibri' Kohlrabi plants in their second year. Honestly the deep purple stems, grey-green leaves and cheery yellow flowers are quite a combo.

Some varieties of Camellias bloom in the later winter and serve as the final indicator that spring is coming. This specimen is in full bloom right now.

With all that garden goodness covered this is the part of the blog where I have to advertise for the Fayetteville City Market. Now I know you readers probably don’t much like advertisements, but by booth at the City Market helps to cover the costs of running the test garden and literally maintains the Research & Development budget that is used to bring you the information that has made up the backbone of this blog. With that said, if you want to get some GMO-free, Organic vegetables, herbs and fruiting shrubs come on down to the Fayetteville City Market on 325 Maxwell Street in downtown Fayetteville between the Hours of 9:00 am and 1:00 pm on Saturdays. Even in bad weather the market goes on though you might have to look for me under the ‘arches’ of the Transportation Museum’s front entryway.

Plants & Stuff Available Now:

Soup Kit, Parsnip - $5.00  (Not available after March 30^th)

Soup Kit, Turnip - $5.00  (Not available after March 30^th)

Garlic, Whole bulb - $1.00  (Not available after March 30^th)

Garden Plants:

Lettuce, Cimarron, 3” - $3.00

Mustard, Red Giant, 3” - $3.00

House Plants:

Coffee Plants, 4” - $6.00

Flowering Maple, 4” - $3.00

Flowering Maple, 6” - $5.00

Polka-Dot Plant, 4” - $3.00

Coming Soon:

Basil, Cinnamon

Basil, Sweet Genovese

Cilantro

Carrot, Amarillo

Carrot, Atomic Red

Carrot, Black Nebula

Carrot, Lunar White

Garlic, Jerimiah’s Heirloom

Lettuce, Parris Island

Parsnip, Hollow Crown

Peppers, 11 varieties (TBA)

Potatoes, Dark Red Norland

Tomatoes, 12 varieties (TBA)

Pomegranate, Dwarf

Spice Bush, Calycanthus

Coneflower, Cayenne Red

Coneflower, PowWow Wildberry Mix

Datura, Black Currant

Datura, Indigo (rare!)

Datura, White Ballerina

Lupine, Carolina

Milkweed, (Asclepias tuberosa)

Whorled Milkweed, (Asclepias verticillata)

These days I am generally at Leclair’s General Store once a week, for the weekly Sustainable Neighbors meeting at 5:30pm through 7:00 pm. If you have questions then I will be there to answer your questions. Since our meetings have an open-door policy you don’t need to sign up for anything or join anything, you can come on in ask for us and join the meetings. If not, you can always send me questions through this blog or visit the farmer’s market or pay attention to what Sustainable Neighbors is doing at the link below.

https://www.meetup.com/SustainableNeighbors/

                        This brings to a close the sixth LITFM post of the new year, stay tuned the next episode which should be posted on the 5^th of April. There will be more garden updates and other cool stuff.

In Winter's Grasp

 As always in February there is some sort of winter precipitation event and this year we got to the third week before we got hit. These pansies will recover, but while partially encased in ice they serve as a metaphor for that sort of crazy impatience gardeners get in longing for the spring.

Some azaleas were not so fortunate just a few feet away, encased in ice I cannot count on this area not being damaged.

In a repeat of last yer icicles form a neat trim on the gutter of the rear of the house.

The white pines are used to being treated harshly by old man winter, you could say they relish it as though it were a sick pleasure.

Figs were encased also and only the spring will determine if they survive this brief encounter.

Looking like some crystalline spider, or a mass of strange coaxial cables this muscadine grape stands out as a delicately frozen ice sculpture.

I wonder, will this juvenile long leaf pine survive being frozen solid and  flattened to the ground due to the weight of the ice that suffocates it?

What is this? I don't even!

As much as the white pine can scoff at winter's abuse someone had to take the retaliation, here one pine has shed a large number of branches on one facing, a tragedy of sorts.

The heavenly bamboo did alright.

That's all for this week, LITFM will be back next week with a serious indoor project in progress that all of you out there might be very interested in. Check back soon!