Corn harvest

Every day brings new things from the garden. Three cantaloupe were ready on Friday. Hilda and I also harvested the Kandy Korn and Incredible sweet corn.

Corn harvest with the best of the first three cantaloupes.

The hot weather finally broke. Out of habit, Hilda and I set up our corn husking operation in the shade of the second oak. With a brisk wind blowing, I was almost cold! We would have been more comfortable in the sun. We put up 14 ten-ounce bags of sweet corn from that day’s harvest. With the 9 bags we froze when the Peaches and Cream corn was ripe, our total yield came to nearly 15 pounds! That should do us for the winter.

Hilda cuts corn from the cob using an angelfood cake pan to catch the kernals.

There were a few ears of Peach and Cream left, but we found them to be overly mature. As with all things that get away from us, we fed them to the chickens. They enjoyed the corn very much.

Mmmm! Overripe corn is the BEST!!!

I finally took the row cover off the cabbage and Brussels sprouts. It did a pretty good job reducing the number of cabbage worms, more so on the cabbage than the Brussels sprouts. I have never had such beautiful cabbages!

Such beautiful cabbages!

 I picked several worms off the Brussels sprouts and fed them to the chickens. That was the best thing they’d ever had since the overripe corn! The chickens are still living in the moment. It was quite fun to watch them steal cabbage worms from each other. Too bad I didn’t have my camera handy.

The green beans did not do well this year. The peppers, on the other hand, are fabulous. They must like the hot weather. The fruits are so numerous and heavy that I worry about the plants toppling over.

A yellow pepper plant loaded with fruit

I started harvesting baby lima beans today. I haven’t shelled them yet, so it remains to be seen if I was rushing it. Zucchini, eggplant, and cucumbers are still coming in. So far we have donated over a hundred pounds of cucumbers to the food pantry. We have never done so well with cucumbers. The tomatoes are gearing up to full production. It never fails that the garden is busiest just when classes start.