With A Blink Of An Eye

With a blink of an eye, it’s August and the new school year has already begun. It’s too bad school starts in August instead of after Labor Day. It would be nice to have our kids help canning and freezing vegetables this time of year. After a day at school, there’s not as much time for them to help out and learn these skills. Most gardens are at their peak harvest right now. Beans, tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers and summer squash are being picked daily in my garden right now. The rains of July helped the garden finally take off. The Scott Co. Jail garden still looks good. When I stopped by earlier this week they were picking dozens upon dozens of ears of corn and delivering them to various non-profits throughout the county.

I’ve had a pretty good blackberry harvest despite some dry conditions in June. I don’t know how many blackberry cobblers I’ve made this summer, but it’s been a lot! I am still competing with the Japanese beetles and the fruit flies. An entomologist from UK said that there was a new introduced fruit fly that was becoming a problem in this area and sure enough it has arrived on my berries. This fruit fly is particularly bad because it doesn’t wait for the fruit to get old to start chowing down on them.

Even though summer is winding down, it still isn’t too late to plant some seeds for a fall garden. I have my spinach, beets, swiss chard, sugar snap peas, lettuce and radish seeds laid out to plant. Now I just need the extra energy to get them in the ground. I definitely will be adding some compost to the beds before I replant. Katie Smith, who was our previous blog writer, gave me her pile of treasured homemade compost before she moved out West. It’s amazing how healthy the volunteer vegetables are that are growing on that neglected pile of compost! Making more compost is definitely in my to do list.