Well, I did something last evening that was kind of difficult -- I pulled up my okra plants. Linda had been telling me she had put up all the okra she wanted so I knew I needed to pull the plants, but I guess I had some sort of sentimental attachment to them. The okra has been so productive and the plants were so pretty I really hated to see them go. I left one plant so we could have some pods dry on the stalk for next year's seed. I'll probably plant a cover crop in that bed now. Possible cereal rye or wheat -- I'm not sure yet.
While I was out there, I picked a few tomatoes. We have been getting quite a few tomatoes the past few weeks. This is just from one plant from back in the spring. This plant is well over my head, so I have to reach way up to reach some of the fruit. I still have the three plants I started from suckers. They are loaded with big fruit which is almost ready for picking.
We will save some seed from these plants for next year's garden since they are Cherokee Stripe. We love the sweet taste of the Cherokee Stripe. I don't know how many quarts of tomatoes Linda put up this year, but it has been a good year for tomatoes. Lately she has been making pasta sauce.
I checked our fall potato plants and they have some nice-sized potatoes on them. It won't be long and they will be ready to dig. I am encouraged with planting fall potatoes even though I had to plant them twice in order to get a successful crop. We still have quite a few potatoes in the basement from our spring crop, although some of them have begun to sprout.
The elephant garlic is just starting to come up. I had checked it the other day and some of the bulbs had put down a good root system. Now the shoots are starting to appear above the surface of the soil. I did notice that a few of the bulbs had gone bad and rotted in the ground. I don't know for sure why this happened. I have never really lost any garlic bulbs to rot. It may have been too hot when I planted them -- I don't know. That's the only thing I can think of, anyway.
The turnips have done well. The bottoms are beginning to be large enough to be good eats. We like to cook the greens with the bottoms. Turnips are a good cool-season dish. At least, I associate eating them with late fall, winter, and early spring. I enjoy eating fresh radishes with turnips and, of course, corn bread. A little pepper sauce and diced onion, and there you go.
The asparagus bed looks like I never cut it all down earlier. It has grown out again and is just as dense and tall as it was before I chopped it down. I'm not sure what this means for next spring, but I am hoping for the best. Actually, I expect a bumper crop next year, but time will tell. I will wait until the plants actually do die down this time before I cut them again. It will probably take a good freeze for that to happen.
Sam Byrnes is a Gentry-area resident and weekly contributor to the Eagle Observer. He may be contacted by email at [email protected]. Opinions expressed are those of the author.
Editorial on 10/21/2015