Summer Squash, Apples, Corn and Garlic

Following a dry spring, timely precipitation since May resulted in bumper crops of shell peas, sugar snap peas, string beans, potatoes, beets, strawberries, raspberries, currants, gooseberries, and many different herbs. 

Garlic Scapes Being Prepared for the Freezer

We're harvesting enough summer squash to be able to share more than 40 pounds a week with neighbors and a homeless shelter. 

Striped Zucchini Squash

Yellow Summer Squash

Our first planting of sweet corn was fully mature and we've harvested ears from all 160 plants. It's a hybrid yellow Se+ Corn called Sugar Buns from Johnny's Selected Seeds. 

The First Crop of Corn Has Been Pulled Out and Laid Down So It Can Compost. Four Rows of the Second Crop, in the Background, Is Beginning to Ripen.

 We steamed the ears for a few minutes and then stripped the kernels from the cobs using an implement made for this purpose that has a cylinder of stainless steel with tiny teeth on one end. By squeezing the handles together, the cylinder becomes smaller so it matches the diameter of the cob.

Seventy Pounds of Corn Ready for Stripping Off the Kernels

Leather Gloves Are Required to Process This Amount of Corn Because the Handles of the Tool Are Small And Eventually Cause Blisters. The Hand Opposite the Stripping Hand Often Gets Hit by the Sharp Teeth of the Stripper and a Glove Prevents Blood That Would Contaminate the Kernels.

160 Corn Plants Not Only Delivered a Few Dozen Meals for Us and Neighbors But Also This Pile of Cobs and Ready to Freeze One Pound Packages. Each Tray Weighs Around 35 pounds.

The next harvesting effort will be processing apples. One of our trees is laden with perfect apples - when last year it did not produce a single one. This process probably interrupted the parasite cycle so that there were none to devour this year's crop. Until they are all gone, each week we'll deliver 50 pounds of freshly picked apples to the homeless shelter we support. Every day we gather a bucket or two of drops that we'll process into juice and sauce. We've already made a few pies and crisps and will probably make a few more. We also have a few Granny Smith Apple Trees that are loaded, but their crop won't be ready until late September.

The Apple Tree Had So Many Fruit That Props Were Necessary to Prevent the Limbs from Breaking. 

This Unnamed Variety of Apple Is the Earliest Ripening One We Know: Last Week of July.

Harvest: 2014

There may be a killing frost tonight so I spent the day bringing in the last of the sweet corn, pumpkins, tomatoes, potatoes and peppers. A few weeks ago I had harvested spaghetti and butternut squash because their vines had been damaged by earlier frosts that didn't harm tomatoes and peppers. Figure 1 shows the squash and pumpkins under cover where they’ll be safe for a while longer. Squash that doesn't go to a homeless shelter we’ll store in our basement.

Figure 1: Pumpkins, Butternut and Spaghetti Squash Waiting Distribution

During spring 2012 we inoculated cottonwood logs with sawdust in which oyster mushroom mycelium was growing, see Figures 2 & 3. Two months ago we started harvesting quite a few pounds of mushrooms per week from these logs, see Figures 4 & 5. They fruit on their own schedule and we missed quite a few before we learned to check them every day. Mushrooms are super additions to stir fries, sauces and other dishes and, for variety, next spring we plan to inoculate oak logs with shiitake mushroom spawn. Both varieties should keep producing for years until they completely digest the wood they are living in.

Figure 2: Drilling 1.5" deep Holes in Cottonwood Logs

Figure 3: "Pock-marked" Logs Sealed with Red Cheese Wax Covering Holes Filled with Mycelium/Sawdust 

Figure 4: Oyster Mushrooms Growing 17 Months Later

Figure 5: First Harvest of Oyster Mushrooms, Fall 2013

Figure 6: Typical Harvest Every 2-3 Days, October 2014 

This year we had plenty of sweet corn, see Figure 6, but our third planting is not quite ready to harvest in mid October. Shorter days and cool weather slow ripening: the kernels are still small, though edible. Next year for the last planting we'll have to anticipate a growing period longer than the package estimate.

Figure 7: Mid-season Sweet Corn Harvest, 2014