Garden 2025

[rodentraiser]

Fresh corn ears are 33¢ each here. I think corn may be something you have to grow a lot of to make it cheaper than buying it.

CD

I forget what I paid for fresh corn but it was bi-color corn and while it was good, I'd prefer white corn like SIlver Queen. Anyway, all I did was pay $2.99 for the seed and then I built the bed. But I can keep using that every year. All I do is water. It's a little late for me to fertilize now. Safeway here is charging $5 for 4 partially peeled ears and I think 50 cents for loose ears. QFC probably charges more.

But, speaking of, I may get no corn this year. Raccoons. Last night it was a mom and three kits. The kits knocked over the bird feeder and I think only grabbed a stalk to see what it was. They can't haul themselves into the bed because the sides are too high and the wire is cut on top, making the top sharp. But they did get one little silk and I'm hoping they didn't get a taste of corn from that. If they did, it's all over.

 

[rodentraiser]

Have you thought about getting a pipe heater? I used on in the barn on the farm - they are not expensive, they have a thermostat so only come on when the temp drops, uses very little power, I don't think you'd see a single extra penny on your electric bill.
It is a coated wire that you wrap around your pipe and plug it into an outlet. They come in various lengths. Ask at your hardware store.
Most even have a light in the plug so that you actually know it is working.

Even if the pipes didn't freeze, the water in the hose going from the pipe into the trailer would. Some mornings it would take until noon for that water to melt enough for me to have running water inside, even if the temp was over freezing by 8am.

The way most trailers are set up is, all their connections are on one side and they should connect to all this stuff on that side. My crap-for-brains contractor put all the electrical connections and water spigot on the other side. There's no way to pull this trailer in next to them on the correct side because there's woods there - the trailer had to be backed in and that put all the connections of the trailer on the other side of the spigots and electrical. So all tubes and hoses have to run under the trailer.

 

[rodentraiser]

Does that mean you don't have water inside the trailer for those periods? What do you do to get water instead?

I have two 2 1/2 gallon jugs with spigots on my fridge and then I always keep a couple bottles of water in the fridge, even in winter. Our water is well water and if the power goes out, which it does summer and summer not, with disgusting regularity, we won't have any water anyway. So I'm always prepared for that. I should have larger containers in case of an earthquake, but that is on a future agenda. There's only so much I can do on my budget.

I've never had any hot running water inside this trailer because the 2 gallon water heater was rusted out, so I heat water on the stove. I will say one thing about trailers when the power is out: with a gas stove and a camp light, plus the trailer batteries still in pretty good condition so I can have light, if the power goes out, I'm set up pretty good. Except for heat, of course, and I still have an indoor propane heater in my shed if I need it.

Generally, if we get freezing temps, they don't go to freezing until almost midnight and they come back up by 6 or 7 the next morning so it doesn't affect me that much. It's only when we have a couple days of snow that it stays in the freezing range both day and night or if we have multiple freezing nights in a row. That's when I get cranky and when I really regret leaving California. I don't care what they say about Califonia - if I could afford it I'd move back to the Bay Area in a heartbeat.

 

[rodentraiser]

Because I haven't posted enough pics of my garden (heh heh heh), I'll post a few more. Because oh, guess what!?! I've been on pause with Starlink and now Starlink is forcing everyone to go on Standby for $5 a month. It's very slow internet, like 440 kbs or something like that. That means it can take a web page a couple minutes to load but for me, aside from not being able to watch movies or videos on YouTube, I have internet almost the same as always. For $5 a month. So I'll be back posting the same old boring things I eat all the time, too.

Anyway, back to the garden.

Same strawberries. Planted in the same dirt. Same water. Same sun. They came together in the same batch. Look at the difference. And speaking of, I had a huge strawberry on the plant on the right. Went to pull it off and pulled off the whole branch, complete with a couple new blossoms and a few other green strawberries. I was not happy with myself.

Yes indeedy, we have a red clover. I pulled about a quarter of this plant off, too, to plant it somewhere else. It's got one blossom on it and two more coming up. I'd love to have these all through my yard but the deer would think I'm ringing the dinner bell.

I clipped ALL the daisies down because they were through blooming. Now here's one lonely little blossom carrying the fight on.

My sad, sad, sad cherry tomato plants.

The lady who gave these to me first told me they were cypress trees, then told me she thought they were cedar trees. Whatever, it's growing and looking good. The little ones aren't as green but I've found out cedar trees don't like a lot of water when they're in containers.

The bird feeder with water on top and seed in the lower two levels. They love it. And speaking of sunflowers, I'd put mine at about 6 feet and it's finally setting a flower. I think it'll be too late for me to get any seed off it, but we can hope.

The weird pods on my butterfly weed. Only the white and purple butterfly weeds have pods like this. The orange one doesn't.

One side of the rock garden bed. Unfortunately, to see it you have to look through the fencing. That bush you can barely see all the way to the right and behind the marigolds is a blue mist plant. It's got blossoms on it and I'll take a pic when they bloom. As I remember, they look like blue azaleas.

Aaaand, it's time to weed again.

 

[Kathleen]

I harvested our first honeydew today. If the weather holds, there are six more of similar size and a few more trying to set on the vine. I've never had luck with melons before, so I am excited. I've trellised these. Unlike the cantaloupe, these are tasty!

 

[rodentraiser]

Casey, I was wrong about the price of corn at Safeway. The loose ears are a dollar each. I'm old enough to remember when we'd pay 29 cents for a dozen ears in Minnesota. This was during the 60s.

 

[caseydog]

Casey, I was wrong about the price of corn at Safeway. The loose ears are a dollar each. I'm old enough to remember when we'd pay 29 cents for a dozen ears in Minnesota. This was during the 60s.

They went from 33 cents to 50 cents, and then back to 33 cents per ear at Walmart. It was very good, sweet corn, too. They have the husks on them, but I've not had any surprises. They've all been good.

CD

 

[dragnlaw]

They have the husks on them, but I've not had any surprises.

What kind of surprises are you talking about? I've never bought corn already husked.

1. More expensive and now that ...
2. I've learned the micro way and the silk just disappears - even less reason to purchase pre-husked.

 

[caseydog]

What kind of surprises are you talking about? I've never bought corn already husked.

1. More expensive and now that ...
2. I've learned the micro way and the silk just disappears - even less reason to purchase pre-husked.

Surprises? Rotten kernels, insect damage, excessive immature kernels.

CD

 

[taxlady]

Don't you pull the husk down and check? When they sold corn that wasn't ridiculously sweet, I would do that. Say I was buying a dozen ears of corn - I would pull down the husk on two or three and ears and if those were fine, I wouldn't bother with more. If some were less good, then I would check them all.

 

[caseydog]

Don't you pull the husk down and check? When they sold corn that wasn't ridiculously sweet, I would do that. Say I was buying a dozen ears of corn - I would pull down the husk on two or three and ears and if those were fine, I wouldn't bother with more. If some were less good, then I would check them all.

So, if you didn't like them, did you put them back? I've seen shoppers husk corn in the store, not be 100 percent happy, and just toss them back. I'm sure those ears ended up in a dumpster, because most people won't buy food that's been "opened."

I will pull back about an inch to look for something obvious, like mold, but that's all.

CD

 

[dragnlaw]

I've never seen anybody completely husk in the store. There is one store here that has a smaller empty bin for the leaves, right beside the one full of corn. As many people do take off lot of the outer leaves, this gives them a place to toss them rather than back in the big bin covering the rest of the corn. I thought that very astute of them.

I don't even pull back an inch to peek like most people I see do. I look for and feel the tips of the ears (silk end) and if that feels full and rounded then 99% of the time the ear is mature right to the tip.
I think through all the decades I've bought corn, I don't think I can count on one hand the number of larva I've found inside. And it was also only one single little worm in a dozen or more.

Guess Canadian corn is just more mature and clean than our southern cousins...

 

[caseydog]

I don't even pull back an inch to peek like most people I see do. I look for and feel the tips of the ears (silk end) and if that feels full and rounded then 99% of the time the ear is mature right to the tip.
I think through all the decades I've bought corn, I don't think I can count on one hand the number of larva I've found inside. And it was also only one single little worm in a dozen or more.

I go by feel, too. If the corn is firm all over, its not likely to be damaged or have insects.

CD

 

[rodentraiser]

What kind of surprises are you talking about? I've never bought corn already husked.

1. More expensive and now that ...
2. I've learned the micro way and the silk just disappears - even less reason to purchase pre-husked.

I had a wonderful surprise on an ear of corn a customer gave me once. I started to unwrap it and it had a great, big caterpillar wrapped around the tip. Your shock and horror is worse when you're totally not expecting that. The raccoons had some extra protein with their dinner that night.

What's the micro way? I'm having corn tonight.

 

[rodentraiser]

I'm sort of happy with my garden today. There's seven roses on the rose bush and a ton of buds. The big clover now has five red blossoms and the little part that I pulled away and thought I killed is finally standing upright and it has two blossoms. I do believe it is going to live.

And my large blue mist plant is blooming and OMG is it pretty! It hasn't entirely bloomed but when it does, I'll post a picture here. The marigolds are going bananas. A hundred blooms (I stopped counting at 100) and still a ton of buds.

Usually it gets cold in October and everything starts dying. I hope the cold holds off this year a little.

 

[dragnlaw]

For your corn, use a scissors to cut off the unruly pieces of husk sticking out and the excess silk on the top.

I trim the stem end back a bit to fit in the micro better. Next step I personally do, some don't, but I loosen the husk at the tip and run water into it.

Micro on high for 2 or 3 minutes (depends on your power).
Using an oven mitt or dry towel to hold the corn - cut off the bottom of the corn by approx, one or two rows of corn.

Grab the tip of the corn securely (I have to use two hands) and SQUEEZE the corn out.
Done! clean, no silk,

 

[rodentraiser]

Thank you! I am going to have to try that!

 

[Rocklobster]

Some of this year’s tomatoes. We’ve been too busy for juice, salsa and stuff so we’re just trying to quickly deal with them to avoid loss. I’m straining the Early girls for the freezer and just coring snd shrink wrapping the San Marzans. I’ll process them further as I thaw and use them down the line.

 

[larry_stewart]

You're one day ahead of me. That looks like my tomorrow .

 

[Rocklobster]

You're one day ahead of me. That looks like my tomorrow .

It’s such a relief to be done for now. We are going away for a few days and I was afraid I was going to lose some. Talk about last minute. I still have more but they can wait for a few days. The plants are pretty much done producing. They just all have to ripen.