Mistakes

Well, we are certainly learning from our mistakes this year. After the deer ravaged the green beans I coated them in cayenne pepper, but was certain that they were ruined and left them alone for a week or so. I came back to find that not only had the pepper worked, but I was overrun by green beans almost overnight. Some had grown too big to use. I will dry them for beans to plant next year or use in bean and ham soup. I did can quite a bit (seven quarts, I think). So, I picked and picked and then picked and picked a couple days later. For some reason I thought they were done. I'm not sure why. I didn't bother to weed, I just left them alone and assumed we'd till that area up sooner or later. Tonight I was out by the green beans and looked again to find them covered in more blossoms, trying to grow more green beans for me. So, I have a HUGE weeding job to do now. The grass has come up between them and gone to seed and grown fox tails. I feel sort of guilty for this but at least I'll know next time. The only good thing about the weeds being so big is that they're almost easier to pull than when they're tiny. I just grab a hold and pull huge masses out at a time. Hopefully my hard work tonight and early tomorrow morning will pay off in several more quarts of home-canned green beans.

Now, on to the cayenne pepper - it DOES work. It works VERY well. We have been quite pleased. While I never was brave enough to "drop trou" and try urinating on the garden as some suggested (LOL, as if I would even consider doing that), Bryan did find a product at the farm and home supply store called "Deer Fortress." It was on clearance so he bought it. It's so gross I almost don't want to blog about it but I will. It comes in a package with six gray cylinder-shaped canisters and these little metal spikes to hang them on around your garden. Inside of the canisters is dried hog blood. Apparently the smell frightens the deer. If I could smell it, I'm sure it'd work on me, too. Yuck. Anyway, the deer have stayed away.

Another important note about weeding: Some of our watermelon have rotted underneath. We thought they were doing great but we've had an onslaught of rain this spring and summer with tons of hard rainstorms. We haven't had to water our garden once. Not once! And it's now August! But, with all that rain, any produce that was touching the ground and not getting a chance to dry out well during the day got rotten. We lost a lot of bell peppers this way even though they were weeded, they just got too wet. So, another lesson learned. We are going to be SUCH good gardeners next year! :)

I have been canning tomatoes and even peaches. The peaches were juicy and I canned them in their own juices like you would tomatoes. It's been a very rewarding experience to put up my canned produce in my pantry and think about the wintry days ahead when I'll pull them out to prepare meals for our family.