end of August harvest

It has been quite a while since I wrote anything. Our area, in central Ontario, has been particularly hard hit by the lack of rain. I was in the Farm Supply last week and a farmer was saying there had been a total of 1mm of rain in July and 2mm in August at his farm.  Last week when there was a lovely slow drizzle on Monday afternoon and then torrential downpours in the evening in Toronto there was barely  10 minutes of rain in our area. So everything is really suffering; crunchy grass, trees dropping their leaves or the leaves curling up. Most annual vegetables don't have a deep or extensive root system to pull them through such a sustained drought.

The haul last Thursday

But some things have done well. This is a photograph of the pickings last Thursday afternoon. Included are heirloom tomatoes both full size and small, snap beans, patty pan squash. The next day was devoted to digging banana fingerling and blue potatoes, picking shelling beans and zucchini and cucumbers. It has been a bumper crop of zucchini and patty pan summer squash. Cukes have been plentiful but as the summer progressed they started to get that "lute" shape which indicates sufficient rain followed by too little.

Heirloom shelling beans Jacob's Cattle on the left, Carmina on the right

Snap beans have done well and the shelling beans have just started to dry on the vine. I think it may be one of the years when they can finish on the plant. Most years it gets too wet at the end of the summer and the pods threaten to rot so the whole plant has to be pulled out and hung in a well ventilated place so the pods can still dry on the plant. There are so many beautiful heirloom shelling beans. It is almost enough to grow them simply to display in mason jars all winter. Every year I save some beans for the next year and can't resist buying new ones. I have grown Rattlesnake, King Tut and Cranberry Pole beans for many years. Bush beans include Vermont Cranberry, Carmina, Jacob's Cattle, Cannelini, Black Valentine and others I've lost the  name for unfortunately. This year the new ones are all bush beans which include Red Swan and Orca.

And tomatoes have done well. I'm going to write a separate post on tomatoes.