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.

Technical Difficulties and whatnot

Welcome back to another episode of Lost in the Farmers Market.  As you will notice this post is late, and this is getting to become a habit. The work making the YouTube videos is eating up more time than I thought it would and it’s producing longer videos of improved quality that I hope you all are enjoying. I’m going to try and keep this blog to the twice per month schedule and align its content with the video content. The next post up here which is due next Friday will align with the 30^th video LITFM Garden Shorts video. Basically the written transcript of the video will be up here and you can see more details than were available in the video. This post although a week late, is going to focus on cool stuff going on in the test gardens.

Before I get into the lavish photographs of plants you have a mighty need for in your gardens there is one more thing. As a point of obligatory social responsibility I have to state here, that we are in the grips of a pandemic. While I will not dare speak of how the rest of the world is handling it, I can say that United States has not done so well. We haven’t even finished the first wave and now states that thought bravado would suffice, and bought into the falsehood that summer heat would defeat the virus and that once you had it you are immune are ironically now being hit with the virus. The problem with Covid-19 is that it kills 1% of those it infects which is still a little over three million people if you consider the United States population of 328.2 million as of 2019. That’s a lot of dead people, but that in a full nineteen percent of the people it infects they are left with permanent lung and heart damage, circulatory issues, the damage from strokes and other maladies that may take them out of the workforce and put them on some form of disability. That’s 20% of the entire potential and or existing workforce gone, that is why this pandemic is no laughing matter. The intention of this statement is to hammer home the point that has been made by so many health professionals across the world, if you are out and about limit your trips, avoid crowds, practice social distancing and wear a facial covering that securely covers the mouth and nose. This is as much for you as it is for everyone around you. I have personally already had three close calls with Covid-19 and two of them were because of a third party’s negligence. Being required to wear a mask is not an infringement of your first amendment rights, it is not going to kill you with C02, and anyone who prints out those fake ADA cards to get around doing the right thing should feel ashamed for being so selfish. If you want to make Covid-19 and this stupid Pandemic go away and get things back to normal, wear the damn mask!

Now, that was kind of dark but, as promised I have some garden highlights that will perk you up not unlike a thunder-shower perks up wilted plants in the afternoon. Firstly as some of you might know it is pepper season. Pepper season is that magical three or so month’s right on the tail end of the Blueberry season when my wide array of pepper varieties start ripening. For years I’ve had this crazy idea that at some point I should do a composite picture with the pepper varieties marked and noted so customers could tell them apart when they buy the pepper bags at the market. Well in 2020 that idea became a reality with the first big pepper harvest of the year. I’ll do another sheet like this when other varieties are ready to harvest.

Here we have a mixture of varied Coneflower varieties that are so tall they are practically mocking your garden books! They are over three feet tall, and what’s not to love about one of the most widely known medicinal daisies?

This is Beach Rose (Rosa rugosa) in bloom, and what a lovely shade of pink. Beach rose is one of the few rose family members that can handle salt spray, sandy soils and will spread by underground runners at a somewhat slow pace. It produces the largest rosehips of the entire rose family and those hips are packed with vitamin C.

 

Oh look it’s the coneheads…but a week later. Literally a week after I noted the heights of my coneflowers in the picture above, they produces taller flower stalks that were at eye level on me, that’s six feet high folks! Remember what I always say, plants are illiterate, they don’t care what your books say.

 

How about them Hibiscuses! This is a Swamp Mallow (Hibiscus moscheutos) and it is one of the more tropical looking hibiscus that are perennial in your garden here in North Carolina. These herbaceous perennials are hardy from USDA zones 5 through 8.  But the real reward is those giant 6” super-red flowers that look like they belong in the tropics! That these plants can get to six feet tall in a growing season is a double bonus.

 

Ah yes, some of you know what this is, some of you do not know. These are the flowers of the ‘Hairy Balls’ Milkweed (Gomphocarpus physocarpus), they hang upside down and the bumble bees seem to love them. Honestly I like the white and pink coloration as it’s completely random to what you expect from Mlikweed. Once the seed pods form you can bet there will be photographs posted here.

Now this is not normal, here we have the bloom of a domesticated carrot (Daucus carrota). Its bloom resembles several poisonous lookalikes in the wild. I know it is a Luna White carrot because I grew it from seed purchased from a reputable vendor. I should note that a wild carrot is commonly known as Queen Anne’s Lace and such a plant has the same scientific name as a domesticated carrot. There are several deadly lookalikes such as wild parsnip and poison hemlock.

 

Lastly we have one hell of a prize, here is the flower of ‘Giant Mission’ Marigolds (Tagetes erecta). The seed for these annuals is only available through Burpee seeds and these marigolds can get up to three feet tall. Their flowers have a chrysanthemum style of petals and shape and if I am lucky the seed harvested will be viable enough to grow a crop next year. Even if not, just for truly giant Marigolds it was all worth it.

 

Lastly here are several of my last LITFM Videos, we're nearing 30 videos and the possibility of releasing a full-on playlist.

One about Lemon Verbena.

This one is about Lemon Grass.

Lemon Balm is in the mix too.

Of course Lemon Thyme had to be in here.

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:

Okra, Baby Bubba: $3.00

Peanuts, African Runner: $3.00

Herbs:

Herb, Basil – Eritrean: $3.00

Herb, Basil – Holy: $3.00

Herb, Cuban Oregano – Cerveza & Lime: $3.00

Herb, Horehound: $3.00

Herb, Oregano, Italian: $3.00

Herb, Roselle – Thai Red: $3.00

Herb, Thyme – English: $3.00

Herb, Horehound, 5" pot: $4.00

Herb, Oregano, 6” pot: $5.00

Herb, Italian Oregano, 5” pot: $4.00

Herb, Bristol Cross Oregano –  6” Pot: $5.00

Herb, Sage,  5" pot: $4.00

Herb, Shiso, 5" pot $5.00

Herb, English Thyme, 5" pot:$4.00

Ornamental Plants:

Cotton, Erlene’s Green: $3.00

Cotton,  Mississippi Brown Lint: $3.00

Cotton , Red Foliated White: $3.00

Marigold, Pineapple Crush: $3.00

Marigold, Signet Red: $3.00

Zinnia, Golden Star: $3.00

Milkweed, Hairy Balls: $4.00

Rudbeckia, Prarie Glow: $4.00

Coming Soon:

[TBA]

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 thirteenth LITFM post of 2020; stay tuned the next episode which should be posted on the 24^th of July. There will be more garden updates and other cool stuff.