my messy room: The Dog Days of Summer-

Tuesday, August 1, 2023

The Dog Days of Summer-

Here we are in the middle of the dog days of summer. It is so hot and humid that my doggie has to come in during the high temperatures to stay cool. Here is Charlotte definitely playing hookie from her duties as guardian to the farm animals. It's too hot to ask her to stay outside with her double thick coat. My kitchen is too hot to do much creativity. Who wants to turn on the oven?

***For for pics of our "dogs" scroll to bottom of post*****

But what are the dog days of summer? The Farmers Almanac sites from July 3 - August 11 - the middle of summer and when the temperatures are highest along with high humidity. After a little research I found out that the "dog" is Sirius from the constellation Canis Majoris. It seems that the bright star of Sirius appears in the morning sky announcing changes in the weather pattern......some good like flooding in Egypt providing water to the desert fields and some bad.....high temperatures and humidity.

But also in the Farmer's Almanac is the fact that most of the spring planting is now bearing its fruit and the vines and plants that once provided water and nourishment are drying out allowing the fruit to reach maximum sweetness and announcing harvest time. All the work from the last few months is now paying off.

Some of the garden planted itself. This single scarlet runner bean sprouted so I gave it a stick to climb on. The pods have now dried and the beans are ready to harvest. The beans are such a beautiful color. And don't worry the pods are given to the goats. They are dry and crispy and the goats consider them potato chips.

The Satsuma plums are ripening.

I planted blackberry "sticks" and they are starting to ripen

I planted shallots for the first time this year. When the top green spikes start to wilt and fall to the side they are ready to harvest. I see caramelized shallots in my near future:

I also planted sweet onion starts - about 50 of them and they are ready to pull as well. Last night I grilled two along side my Halibut. Yes there are apricot preserves and jam on the shelf behind...June's project

Lava flow tomatoes ripening on the now brown vines

I did plant a variety of pumpkins--most of them are still on the vine but the funny one with peanuts on the skin - "Galeux D'Eysines" started on its own producing about 500 square feet of vines and these 4 large pumpkins. The largest one weighs about 25 pound and produces the sweetest of pumpkin pies and muffins. The orange one is a Cinderella "Rouge vis d'Etampes" and the green is "Jarrahdale"

Yes all of this for 4 pumpkins

Here is a "Jarrahdale hanging from the squash trellis.

But my new adventure was planting a melon patch. I started in March clearing a space about 10' by 10 " and enriching the soil with compost.. I built up mounds with furrows in between and installed an irrigation system that would flood the furrows therefore avoiding watering from above which can cause mildew to the plant. Of course no proper melon patch is complete without a dozen or so sunflowers:

Here was the tricky part: Most melons take about 90 days to develop after 7-14 days for the seed to germinate in 70-90 degree temperatures. It was cold and wet this spring and not warm enough for the seeds to germinate until Easter weekend. April 8 But just as the weather cooperated I didn't feel like planting seeds. In fact I didn't feel like doing anything. COVID In spite of feeling awful I planted 4 rows of 12 different varieties before climbing in bed for 3 days.

Today 114 days after sowing my melon seeds I picked this melon from my patch and ate it for my lunch.

It is a French melon: "Petit Gris de Rennes" You can smell its perfumes 5 feet away. It is amazingly fragrant and the orange meat is so sweet. Pairing melons with salty or cured meats and fishes is amazing so this melon draped in prosciutto was perfect.

French melon "Chanterais" hiding under cover.

You can tell a melon is ripe by looking for a scar on the vine end. The scar is telling us that the vine is about to pull off of the fruit. It should also smell amazing.

Petit gris de Rennes cut open....must save some seeds for next year

Cantaloupe

So much for the melon lesson. Just choose one that smells divine from the stem end cut open and eat. No cooking recipes this months. The kitchen is just too hot. Dog days.

The sunflowers have all nodded their heads. This one will be fed to the goats and chickens tonight....maybe I'll save some seeds first

Rose loves to clean up the garden vines and sunflowers

But I still have some garden growing. Next month: green beans, butternut squash, berries, nectarines, lots of herbs, eggplant, more zucchini, cucumbers, haricots vests, beets and then time to plant again

Enjoy your dog days. keep your cool

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