August garden blahs

August is the least inspiring garden month, at least for me in Sacramento.

Everything looks a little tired and dusty since it hasn’t rained in months. The daddy long leg spider webs and dropping blossoms from my huge crepe myrtle tree are working together to make everything messier, and I can’t justify wasting water to blow them away since they’ll only be back in a day or two.

The vegetables have been blasted with several 100+ degree days, and show the effects. I’m even beginning to have blasphemous thoughts about being tired of tomatoes and green beans, something that seemed impossible only a few weeks ago.

One end of the green bean wall was savaged by aphids while we were away for a week, and the catsitter apparently isn’t that wild about beans, because I came home to lots and lots of tough stringy beans that stayed on the vine too long. I almost filled a five-gallon bucket with the tough ones, but now the vines are producing nice tender beans again. I wonder if they would have been good as shelled beans if I had left them to ripen all the way.

It’s hard to believe, but the tomato hornworm I pictured in my last post seems to have been my ONLY one this year! Usually I find at least a dozen. The tomatoes quit setting during the hot spells, but they will probably revive and start producing lots of fruit next month, just when I’m beginning to think about pulling them up and planting cabbages or something. My huge orange strawberry tomato has redeemed itself. Later, more fully ripe fruits turned out to have lots more flavor. One of them is enough for pasta for the two of us.

I’ve already ordered a big batch of seeds for lettuces, peas and radishes for fall planting, including rat-tailed radishes. I’d never heard of them until we were served them as an amuse bouche along with fava beans at an Oregon restaurant.

Garden characters

This eating machine is the first tomato hornworm I’ve spotted this year on my tomato plants. Left alone, these worms can virtually strip a tomato plant in a few days. This little guy was about the size of my middle finger before he was relocated to the garbage can!

Tomatoes come in all sizes. A new variety I planted this year, the “orange strawberry,” has turned out to be a giant. It’s a pleasantly mild (not terribly exciting), very meaty tomato weighing more than a pound. It’s shown here with a sungold cherry tomato and a mid-sized Carmello. I don’t think I’ll bother to grow this one again, given my limited garden space.

Finally, sometimes tomatoes are a little weird. I think this one has sleep apnea.

Road trip in the Sierras

A couple of weeks ago, we took a few days for a road trip south to Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Park. It’s a quick 3 or 4 hour drive down Highway 99 from here, but we spent nearly two days getting there, all the way down Highway 49 and then down back roads to Three Rivers. We encountered this tiny still lake along one of those back roads south of Mariposa.

I was completely blown away by Kings Canyon National Park. It’s the DEEPEST canyon in North America — yes, deeper than the Grand Canyon — at 8200 feet, and some of the massive granite cliffs seem to be even higher once you’ve driven along the edge of the world down to the bottom of the canyon. There’s not much civilization down there, just a few basic park facilities and some campgrounds, but the canyon walls and the spectacular Kings River roaring down over the rocks are well worth the scary drive. None of my river photos turned out, but I did like this one of Grizzly Falls.

We also drove through Sequoia National Park where the trees are big, very big.

This little boy was too intimidated by the size to obey his parents’ request that he pose next to it. All he could do was run toward it, then turn and run away.

Yesterday’s harvest

From left to right, bush beans (the little haricots verts),  sungolds, a small carmello, a midsize big beef, two lemon cucumbers, and a mess ‘o’ beans.   Also my handy-dandy tongs.

July garden

At this point the vegetable beds look pretty much the same as earlier posts except a little taller, so this photo is of the big border at the back of my yard that used to be shaded by the pine tree and now soaks up the sun.

Note to self: Next year, don’t plant so damned many beans! I love green beans, but I’m beginning to lose my enthusiasm for them. We’ve had them at least once a day for a few weeks now, I have about a dozen packages in the freezer, and I know there’s another big batch out there waiting for me to pick this morning.

I’ve discovered that my long-handled OXO Good Grips tongs, my favorite kitchen tool, are also best for picking beans I can’t reach otherwise.

We’re eating lots of sungold cherry tomatoes now, and the lovely mid-size carmellos. I’ve picked one Big Beef, but none of the “orange strawberry” variety are ripening yet. I’m intrigued by them, because they’re huge, strawberry-shaped, and the catalog described them as orange with red shoulders when they’re ripe.

We’ve got all the lemon cukes we can use, and plenty of baby leeks. I’m waiting for the bell peppers to ripen, since I don’t like them green.

The weather has helped make this a really successful year. We’ve only had a couple of really hot days, with most of our days in the low to mid 80s. I’m already starting to think about what I’ll plant for a fall/winter garden. Sugar snap and snow peas on that bean fence for sure!

A detail of the paving shown in the photo at the top.