I’m having second worst year ever for tomatoes in my back yard. What’s worse is we are going to visit her parents in the country Saturday and he will have baskets of them to give us. J Oh well, he won fair and square and Mimi says she would like to eat at least one big red tasty tomato this year.

We picked from the Collierville Victory Garden and delivered to the Collierville Food Pantry on Thursday and Page Robbins Center on Monday zucchini, yellow squash, butternut squash, watermelons, banana peppers, jalapeno peppers, bell peppers, and tomatoes. Total year-to-date is 690.1 lbs. We (that being an editorial we) dug water line and installed three spigots so we now have glorious water at the garden. Previously we had to drag five hoses to reach the garden and were losing water pressure. Sure has been hot and dry. I saw a pair of accipiters of some kind Monday morning. They had a falcon silhouette but were not kestrels. They were not any of the hawks I usually see and were not Mississippi kites. I wonder what they were.

We three Pontotoc County writers have a new free country email ‘zine which will begin bimonthly in September. Subscribe to the Bodock Post at: http://www.bodockpost.com/ or send me an email.

Teacakes in the Afternoon: 2008 Mississippi Gulf Coast Writers Anthology.

http://search.barnesandnoble.com/booksearch/results.asp?WRD=teacakes+in+the+afternoon

I have a story in it. While my story is clean and humorous, the language in some of the stories is not for children or your sweet granny. It’s available at Barnes & Noble.

Granddarlings are staying busy. Kristen has soccer practice. Corey has baseball pitching practice. Karli and Kristen stay busy with church youth group. Courtney and her daddy Scotty have gone to the Spring River in AR camping and canoeing yesterday and today.

Column / Short Story:

Zinnias June 6, 2008

“Whats not to like about a zinnia?”

~Carl Wayne

Zinnias are just about the best flower. They are easy to grow and need very little maintenance other than an occasional drink of water. They come in all sizes, heights, and colors, and have both annual and perennial varieties. They love full sun, and you don’t have to weed a thickly sown zinnia bed. Anything that saves me work is a winner.

They grow easily from seed, and will reseed themselves for a nice new crop next year. Or sprinkle seeds on a new patch of ground where they can have good soil contact, cover them with a little dirt or sand, keep them moist until they sprout, and you will be rewarded soon with a gift that keeps on giving. Not only will they reseed for next year, they will reseed this year giving you flowers until frost gets them.

My inlaws, Ralph and Opal Graham, used to have large beds of zinnias, which were the talk of their community. People would drive by and stop and ask about them. Their thickly sown beds would grow a riot of colors and heights, and be covered with butterflies, bluebirds, and goldfinches. A joy to behold. Both them and their zinnias.

Zinnias are grown by organic gardeners, too. Like squash used by the American Indians in a Three Sisters configuration with corn and beans, they shade the ground enough to discourage unwanted plants from growing. This is why thickly sown zinnia flowerbeds don’t need weeding. Neither do gardens with thickly sown zinnia planted in the middles between the rows but not so close to your veggies so as to shade them.

An additional benefit for veggie gardeners is they attract pollinators such as bees. Zinnias and sunflowers in your garden will attract both bees and birds, and the birds will not only eat seeds, but will catch a fat bug or worm they spot fixing to munch on your peas or tomatoes.

I love tall zinnias in a rich assortment of colors, but I find three varieties especially lovely: the lime green “Envy”, any of the multicolored dahlia-like ‘Swizzles”, and the “White Wedding”. Probably because like most gardeners, I enjoy the bragging rights of new and unusual plants.

Aint God good!

Carl Wayne Hardeman, Master Gardener

mymaters@yahoo.com

An OLD column/newsletter:

Eat Local July 17, 2007

“It’s difficult to think anything but pleasant thoughts while eating a homegrown tomato.

~Lewis Grizzard

Mine and Mimi’s parents in Pontotoc County MS raised much of what they ate, using natural fertilizers gleaned from barns and chicken yards and cotton gins.

They raised pigs and chickens and an occasional beef cow.

They had fresh eggs and what are now called free range chickens. They had fresh milk from their cows fed on corn and hay they had raised.

My generation raises much less of its own food. We eat food from cans and packages sold in grocery stores, balanced with eating out.

We don’t get as much nutrition as found in fresh food.

The meat, eggs and milk we buy are produced on farms by animals given growth hormones and fed non-organically produced feed.

The produce we buy is often shipped hundreds, if not thousands, of miles. Thus much of the nutrition is lost.

To make matters worse, the animals and produce are fast growing hybrids, easy to ship, long shelf life, and are not as tasty or nutritious as fresh local products.

There are several “green” movements stirring: return to eating natural products, using sustainable farming and farming practices, and eating local. Here’s one in TN:

http://www.barefootfarmer.com/lhcf.html

Another growing movement is the opening of many farmer’s markets across the USA. You will support the local economy, get fresher and tastier and more nutritious produce and meats, have a wider variety of products, and save the planet by reducing the vast amount of fuel burned shipping food from far away.

Some of us believe eating local produce grown in local air and dirt and sunshine, in season, will attune our bodies to the rhythms and harmony of earth and improve our nutrition and health.

Good reasons to eat locally grown products:

http://fogcity.blogs.com/jen/2005/08/10_reasons_to_e.html

http://www.shorelinebeacon.com/News/323844.html

Someday government officials will appreciate having a farmers market so we can eat local is as important a quality of life issue, if not more so, than parks and greenbelts.

Maybe someday Mimi and I will not have to drive 20 miles, as we did last Saturday morning, to buy fresh local

sweetcorn, squash, okra, purplehull peas, butter beans,

lady peas, sugarbaby watermelons, and cucumbers.

Try it; you’ll like it. Visit a local farmers market and have a meal of all locally grown produce. Eat some of it uncooked. Even the kids will like their veggies.

http://www.eatlocalchallenge.com/

Ain’t God good!

Carl Wayne, Master Gardener

mailto:mymaters@yahoo.com

Web Gleanings:

Humor:

6 minute wedding party dance:

http://www.metacafe.com/watch/1030697/weding_party_dance/

Hillbilly tank top (G rated):

http://www.pheistyblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/03/redneck-tanktop-thumb.jpg

Science & Ecology & Medicine:

Abundant cheap fresh water could let us farm deserts and feed the world:

http://www.physorg.com/news135958814.html

How Seattle manages storm water 4 pages:

http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0HTO/is_3_34/ai_n25120965

http://www.djc.com/news/co/11138820.html http://www.greenroofs.org/boston/images/hires/Ballard1.JPG picture

http://www.djc.com/news/co/11138816.html

http://www.edcmag.com/CDA/Archives/76b0db719c697010VgnVCM100000f932a8c0____

Soil Strategies for Storm Water Management:

http://www.epa.gov/epaoswer/non-hw/green/pubs/asla-soil.pdf

Seattle SEA Street water retention through landscaping:

http://www.werf.org/livablecommunities/studies_sea_wa.htm

Virtual Tour (see link at bottom):

http://www.ci.seattle.wa.us/util/About_SPU/Drainage_&_Sewer_System/Natural_Drainage_Systems/Street_Edge_Alternatives/COS_004467.asp

California adopts green building code for all new construction:

http://www.greenbiz.com/news/2008/07/18/california-adopts-green-building-code-all-new-construction

Much cheaper and more efficient solar cells within 3 years:

http://www.physorg.com/news134917794.html

No more grassless barn lots and no more concrete driveways and parking lots:

http://www.ecoterr.com/et_start.html

http://www.stable-grid.com/

http://www.paversearch.com/grass-pavers-advantages.htm

Frederick W Smith on clean energy 36 min video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=raeNdsAUDkk

Rapid Alzheimer improvement:

http://www.biomedcentral.com/1471-2377/8/27/abstract

http://w02.biomedcentral.com/download/pr/PPA1280.mov

World’s largest helicopter:

http://southbros.blogspot.com/2007/07/largest-helicopter.html

Having to rewrite the history books, again:

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/07/080701193203.htm

Eat less and save the planet:

http://www.physorg.com/news136028669.html

Conservative News:

Need for H1B visas debunked (AMEN!!!!):

http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=viewArticleBasic&articleId=9110379&source=NLT_AM&nlid=1

Socialist country Bulgaria adopts 10% falt personal income tax rate:

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=69667

Andrea Mitchell on fake Obama interviews in Iraq etc:

http://newsbusters.org/node/22753?q=blogs/mark-finkelstein/2008/07/21/andrea-obama-trip-what-some-would-call-fake-interviews

Collierville Mayor web sites:

http://tomallenformayor.com/

http://brannonhowse.com/

Poll shows majority of economists see McCain better for stock market:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080723/ts_nm/economy_usa_politics_poll_dc_7

Gardening & Eating:

Vigorous pruning discourages early blight in tomatoes:

http://www.motherearthnews.com/Grow-It/Organic-Gardening/Preventive-Pruning-for-Tomato-Early-Blight-Control.aspx?blogid=1502&utm_source=iPost&utm_medium=email

Agriculture and Forestry Commissioner Mike Strain, D.V.M. is challenging Louisiana to eat local for one week.:

http://www.ldaf.state.la.us/portal/Offices/MarketingAgriculturalEconomicDevelopment/FarmersMarketProgram/EatLocalLouisianaChallenge/tabid/480/Default.aspx

http://www.ldaf.state.la.us/portal/Offices/MarketingAgriculturalEconomicDevelopment/FarmersMarketProgram/tabid/317/Default.aspx

Beautiful lightning pix:

http://www.freshplaza.com/news_detail.asp?id=26185

Miscellaneous:

Tony Snow’s testimony:

http://weblog.xanga.com/NYVogue/630362687/tony-snows-testimony.html

The Book of Common Prayer:

http://www.bcponline.org/

…the end…

Carl Wayne’s Weekly Columns and Newsletter July 18, 2008

Welcome to the 47th issue of this usually weekly newsletter. Subscribers: 111

Please forward this to anyone who may be interested.

Archived at http://rowsofbuttercups.wordpress.com/

Subscribe/unsubscribe by sending an email to rowsofbuttercups@yahoo.com with Yes/No in the subject line.

Click on any of these links:

Current Memphis Metro Radar Me on AuthorsDen.com

Current weather conditions

NWS climatological data for Memphis by day of month find CLIMEM

Town Square webcam and date and time

Collierville Town Information

Collierville & Shelby county resizable maps

Memphis Area Master Gardeners website and newsletter

Pikes Peak Webcam

This week:

You may have noticed I took the week off last week. We and the kids and the granddarlings enjoyed staying in Phoenix V condos in Orange Beach AL, and eating all the boiled peanuts and friend seafood we wanted. It was hot! The jellyfish were bad. But we had a wonderful time together. Ginger stayed with Nana. Domino stayed at Four Paws Pet Spa with Monica, And Belle had three visits oer day by a loving dog sitter. All did well.

Trivia question:

Name the 6 kings of Memphis.

One is symbolic; the others are real people living or dead.

I’ m getting some medium size tomatoes and eggplants from my backyard containers. Mimi fixed Monday night supper fried eggplants, a cucumber-onion-tomato-oil-vinegar salad, boiled new potatoes, niblet corn, and oven BBQ’ed chicken, with my favorite dessert: frozen fruit salad with cherries, nuts, etc. YUM YUM!!!!!

We picked and delivered to the local Food Pantry from the Collierville Victory Garden this week 126.4 lbs for a year-to-date total of 572.1 lbs.

Pix of this week’s harvest (I snuck in a few pix of my yard):

http://www.kodakgallery.com/I.jsp?c=5jpx39n.8yolrfmb&x=0&h=1&y=-32ftx7&localeid=en_US

I have joined the rest of the family on www.facebook.com Carl Wayne Hardeman.

Column / Short Story:

Pocket Knives June 6, 2008

“A mind all logic is like a knife all blade. It makes the hand bleed that uses it.”

~Rabindrath Tagore

Thursday mornings we harvest from the Victory Garden for the local Food Pantry. So far this year we have harvested and donated 124+ pounds of fresh, nutritious produce to those who would otherwise only get boxes and bags and cans of food.

We have harvested this year cabbages, broccoli, bell peppers, and squash. Some lop eared lagomorphs (Flopsy, Mopsy, Cottontail, and Peter) “done et” all one hundred cauliflower plants and most of the broccoli plants. I’m not sure what to do except put up an expensive fence, since guns are not allowed to be used in town, and dogs must be on leashes.

Last year Mimi gave me the best knife I have ever had. It’s a Bear brand with blades of Damascus steel. Damascus steel is a several thousand year old process which creates a very high quality blade. Multiple plies of varying hardness are hammered together. The resultant blade combines the best of both hard and soft metals making it strong, flexible, and holds an edge.

It has a distinctive water pattern, water being Damascus in Arabic. Did I mention it’s not cheap? Nice present, ladies, for your favorite man.

This morning while relieving a stalk of broccoli of its delicious head, I demonstrated yet again some people don’t need to let near a sharp knife. Oh well. My finger stopped bleeding after being wrapped tightly with several Bandaids. It should be fine in a few weeks.

I have enjoyed listening to many a knife swappings my daddy-in-law, Ralph Graham, participated in. Seems to have been a fun pastime, and some people, including him, were real good at it.

If I got it right, both of the swapping parties will boast of having gotten the better deal and will have pulled one over on the other party. It took me a while to figure out what “giving boot” meant and what key words were used to indicate you were going to swap and were just arguing the details. There’s an art to all that.

I suppose that art form will fade away and probably has. Even so, I wouldn’t swap my Damascus steel blade Bear knife, though I may need to get a cheaper, duller one to harvest the garden.

Aint God good!

Carl Wayne Hardeman, Master Gardener, mymaters@yahoo.com

An OLD column/newsletter:

Picking Tomatoes July 11, 2007

“Of the seven deadly sins, surely it is pride that most commonly afflicts the gardener.”

~ Michael Pollan

It’s showdown time in the Great Mater Race with Ralph Graham, my daddy-in-law in Pontotoc County MS. I had the earliest mater started indoors. He had the earliest one grown outside. He’s winning the most maters contest. I am winning the biggest mater contest.

Most of the early blossom end rot maters are gone by mid

July. It’s OK to cut off the leathery bottom and eat them.

In hot dry weather you will have some leaves turn brown and some leaf curl. If you don’t see any insect damage or black spots, the vines are probably just adjusting to available moisture and leaf area to total root area.

You can find basic tomato gardening information online:

http://plantanswers.tamu.edu/vegetables/tomato.html

My two Mortgage Lifter vines only have two or three maters each, but they are huge. I picked the largest. It’s almost two pounds and half as big again as a slice of bologna.

It’s an heirloom variety developed by Radiator Charlie in the 1940’s. He sold 6,000 plants in six years at a dollar each and paid off his mortgage.

I picked one when it began to turn pink to beat the birds to it. It’s uglier than homemade soap, and I don’t know

how it will taste, since it’s not fully ripe.

I’m getting tasty maters from my heirloom varieties:

Arkansas Traveler, Abe Lincoln, Brandywine,

Cherokee Purple, Homestead, and Good Old Fashion Red.

The best way to avoid birds getting to maters is to pick them when they have begun to ripen. Another reason to pick early is to avoid uneven ripening caused by excessive heat. That’s when they look ripe but have hard yellow insides.

Maters will ripen just fine on the kitchen counter or even

better in a paper sack. I have used bird netting but find this method just as effective. I don’t begrudge the birds an occasional mater. I cut off the pecked spot and eat

the rest when Mimi isn’t looking.

Someone came up with the idea of frustrating birds with red Christmas tree balls on the vines, but I don’t want my granddarlings excited too early either. Tinfoil pie pans, scarecrows, and computer CD’s will scare them, too.

Ralph may have the best way of keeping birds away. He sits on the porch with Little Bit, his feist terrier, Tom, Opal’s cat, and his trusty 22 caliber rifle. At least one of those will do the trick.

My fennel and parsley were covered in tiny swallowtail

butterfly caterpillars earlier this week. They were cuter

than a basket of new puppies. But they were all gone this

morning. So much for trying to raise caterpillars and feeding the birds in the same backyard.

Ain’t God good!

Carl Wayne, Master Gardener

mymaters@yahoo.com

Web Gleanings:

Quotes:

Carl: Someday your watch or cell phone will be a platform and not just an application.

Carl: World’s top destroyer of the environment. It is not the car, or the plane; it is the cow:

http://www.ccchina.gov.cn/en/NewsInfo.asp?NewsId=6564

Carl: next big energy savings thang will be geothermal sinks:

http://www.igshpa.okstate.edu/geothermal/residential.htm

http://www.heatfromtheearth.com/

and tankless water heaters:

http://www.gotankless.com/

and insulated sheets for rooftops and walls:

http://www.mascoat.com/weatherbloc.php

http://www.roofingcontractor.com/CDA/Articles/Cool_Roof/47887df78b7ad010VgnVCM100000f932a8c0____

water runoff prevention (1 inch rain = 17.38 million gallons per square mile):

http://ga.water.usgs.gov/edu/earthrain.html

My yard = 100 X 165 = 16,500 square feet = just over 1/4^th acre.

One inch rainfall over one acre = 27,143 / 4 = 6,785 gallons on my yard.

Humor:

Lady and the wasp:

http://www.freshplaza.com/news_detail.asp?id=25021

Campaign spoof:

http://blogs.usatoday.com/onpolitics/2008/07/jibjabs-time-fo.html

Science & Ecology & Medicine:

Germany to build 30 offshore wind farms:

http://www.physorg.com/news134557678.html

Ferrari to slash cars’ carbon emmisions:

http://www.physorg.com/news134531759.html

Biofuels have caused world food prices to increase by 75 percent:

http://us.mg1.mail.yahoo.com/dc/launch?.rand=cs4fo30057j8p

Exploding asteroid over Canada may have caused end of the last Ice Age:

http://www.physorg.com/news134233301.html

Improved treatment for children with ADHD:

http://www.physorg.com/news134617797.html

MLG&W meter intelligence:

http://www.mlgw.com/SubView.php?key=comm_meterintelligence

New Smart Pen records audio and writing:

http://www.livescribe.com/press/releases/release_070530.html

Conservative News:

All the oil we need for 200 years:

http://www.americanfreepress.net/html/gull_island_oil.html

Short video about John McCain:

http://www.johnmccain.com/videolanding/love.htm

Apparently winning in Iraq isn’t news:

http://www.ibdeditorials.com/IBDArticles.aspx?id=300324023809577

George W’s War:

http://washingtoncountyrepublicanparty.blogspot.com/2008/07/george-ws-war.html

T. Boone Pickens much need energy plan:

http://www.pickensplan.com/

What I Am ad in Washington Post, by a Republican:

http://www.snopes.com/politics/soapbox/whatiam.asp

Obama to put Hillary on the Supreme Court???:

http://bsimmons.wordpress.com/2008/06/11/jerry-molen-on-obama-pass-it-along/

Gardening & Eating:

Yes its real lettuce on that McDonald’s billboard sign:

http://www.treehugger.com/files/2008/06/lettuce-billboard.php

Miscellaneous:

IRS Taxpayer Advocacy Office:

http://www.irs.gov/advocate/index.html

40 Ways to Live a Better Life:

http://www.ehow.com/how_2279765_live-better-life.html

Free Online office apps: Google Docs vs. ThinkFree vs Zoho: http://cwflyris.computerworld.com/t/3358002/216481/126148/2/

…the end…

1 Comment

Carl Wayne’s newsletter July 4 2008

July 7, 2008, 3:53 pm
Filed under: conservative, gardening, humor, links, southern

Carl Wayne’s Weekly Columns and Newsletter July 04, 2008

Welcome to the 46th issue of this usually weekly newsletter. Subscribers: 111

Please forward this to anyone who may be interested.

Archived at http://rowsofbuttercups.wordpress.com/

Subscribe/unsubscribe by sending an email to rowsofbuttercups@yahoo.com with Yes/No in the subject line.

Click on any of these links:

Current Memphis Metro Radar Me on AuthorsDen.com

Current weather conditions

NWS climatological data for Memphis by day of month find CLIMEM

Town Square webcam and date and time

Collierville Town Information

Collierville & Shelby county resizable maps

Memphis Area Master Gardeners website and newsletter

Pikes Peak Webcam

This week:

We enjoyed the concert and fireworks in the park Thursday night July 3. We also enjoyed family cookout with niece Carla Warren on Saturday July 5. We just took it easy on the 4^th.

We’re getting ready to head to the redneck Riviera Tuesday-Saturday next week with Lisa and Michael and their families. We’ll be in 2 beachfront Phoenix condos. We enjoy that time together and watching the granddarlings play, and getting to see brother-in-law Dave Warren who lives in Pensacola.

We picked and delivered to the local Food Pantry from the Collierville Victory Garden this week 103.7 lbs of squash, cucumbers, zucchini, bell peppers, tomatoes, potatoes, purplehull peas, and jalapeno peppers for a year-to-date total of 435.6 lbs.

Then another 9.8 lbs this morning July 7 for Page Robbins Adult Day care for YTD total of 445.4 lbs. We have begun planning the fall garden. The flower beds and flowers in the veggie beds are in full bloom and gorgeous and doing a wonderful job of attracting bees to do the pollination.

Collierville Victory Garden Thursday July 3 2008 harvest:

http://www.kodakgallery.com/ShareLandingSignin.jsp?Uc=5jpx39n.bt7sqihv&Uy=-gguuth&Upost_signin=Slideshow.jsp%3Fmode%3Dfromshare&Ux=0&UV=571643352619_837809222307&localeid=en_US

I have joined the rest of the family on www.facebook.com as Carl Wayne Hardeman.

Column / Short Story:

Some More Convenient Day June 4, 2008

“Some more convenient day….” ~P.P. Bliss, from the hymn: Almost Persuaded

Have you ever noticed when you have an all volunteer effort, such as our Victory Garden for the needy, most of the work is done by a few people?

It is true that if you want something done, ask a busy person. When I came up with the proposal for the garden, I asked the two busiest gardeners I know, and they immediately agreed not only to work, but to help lead and coordinate the work. I have not been disappointed, and stand amazed at their hard work.

We have raised a garden for the needy both last year and again this year. All the produce is donated to local charities, mainly the local Food Pantry. We are blessed with a long list of people who can work every now and then and even more blessed with a small group who work when it needs done.

A preacher once said something about not doing evangelism, but being an evangelist. Gardening is the same in that you don’t do gardening, you are a gardener.

Garden work, other than the gathering the harvest, is not glamorous. It is working in the dirt and getting dirty and hot and sweaty. It’s pulling or hoeing weeds. It’s dragging hoses and mixing and spraying foliar fertilizer. It’s spreading rotted manure.

And in our style of sustainable gardening, it is grabbing bags of leaves and grass from curbside, hauling them in your trunk or back seat to the garden, grinding them up with a mulching lawn mower, and spreading them on the garden, and saving newspapers to lay in the garden to keep down weeds and conserve moisture.

As any veggie gardener knows, you work a garden when the work needs done. My daddy-in-law says you can lose a crop sleeping till sunup. The work has to be done come rain or shine. It’s a personal sacrifice of not doing other things. And it is honoring a commitment.

There’s about a one or two day difference between weeds starting to appear and a crop lost in weeds. A garden which needs watering can’t wait until next week. Ripe veggies can’t wait until the weekend or next week or the next weekend.

A veggie garden can’t wait for “ some more convenient day” and hungry people at the Food Pantry shouldn’t have to wait.

Aint God good!

Carl Wayne Hardeman, Master Gardener mymaters@yahoo.com

An OLD column/newsletter:

Growing Taters Carl Wayne June 29, 2007

“Every problem has a solution; you just have to find it.”

~Janet Stevenson

Every tater vine has at least one tater; you just have to find it. You can go back and redig each row and almost always find one more tater. It’s more fun than finding

Easter eggs, or your chewing gum in the chicken yard.

We dug taters in our garden this week, then tilled it all up and planted crowder peas and more okra. In 110 feet of rows we had carefully dug, I tilled up 7 more nice taters.

Growing good old Pontotoc County MS red russet taters is easy. Ralph Graham, my daddy-in-law, told me about them poking seed taters into a big pile of sweepings at the feed mill where he worked. It seems they grew about as well as those lovingly and carefully placed in deeply worked soil in his garden.

Nowadays he and I do things the easiest way we know. Since he had told me about some folks simply laying seed taters on top of loosely tilled soil and covering them deeply with straw, we decided to fill containers with straw and a little planting mix and lay the seed taters in them.

When we harvest, all we will do is dump them out. It’s not as much fun, but a whole lot less work than digging them, and we hope to get almost as many taters.

Potatoes were an important crop in the “old sod” for those of Scots and Irish heritage, which the Grahams are. They grow deep and tall (the potatoes, not the Grahams) in the cool damp climate of the British Isles.

Taters can be planted early and harvested early. They break the dietary boredom of long winters long before vegetables are ready in the garden.

In the garden we hilled up the rows and planted the seed taters deep and covered them with straw. When the vines began to bloom and the soil cracked, Ralph says they would grabble stemwinders. He had to explain to me this meant they stole new taters from under the vines. I’ve eaten boiled new taters many times. My momma-in-law Opal can cook new taters which will melt in your mouth.

A story I once heard had one farmer asking another about his tater crop. He said it was just fine. He had some the size of a quarter, some the size of a fifty cents piece, and then he had a few small ones.

Ain’t God good!

Carl Wayne, Master Gardener

mymaters@yahoo.com

Web Gleanings:

Quotes:

From http://www.savvygardener.com/:

Although tomatoes are self-pollinating, they need movement to transfer pollen. If it is hot and calm for several days you may need to gently shake your plants to assure that pollen

is properly transferred. Very hot temperatures can also interfere with blossomset. “Gardens, scholars say, are the first sign of commitment to a community. When people plant corn they are saying, let’s stay here. And by their connection to the land, they are connected to one another.”

~ Anne Raver

Thomas Jefferson:

No occupation is so delightful to me as the culture of the earth, and no culture comparable to that of the garden.

Humor:

If elected, I will:

http://www.news3online.com/index.php?code=3N21nM542u85tg10pfma

Creative web site:

http://producten.hema.nl/

The half-wit:

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20071210155048AAGBAI8

Science & Ecology & Medicine:

10 new facts about birds: