September 1 video tour of my kitchen garden

Here's this month's video tour:

Spotlight on: Scarlet Emperor Runner Bean

I have grown runner beans in my kitchen garden several times over the last ten years. Each time I enjoyed the flowers, but was disappointed by the low production of beans-- the few I got were wonderful, with a deep rich flavor, but production was sparse compared to pole beans such as Rattlesnake.
This winter the catalog description of Scarlet Emperor convinced me to include runner beans in my garden again. Well, despite a rainy spring the seeds sprouted well. During the heat wave last month there were more flowers than beans (heat can reduce bean set in runner beans), but now that nights are cool and days are warm the Scarlet Emperor is the ruler of my August garden, producing lots of deep green, rich flavored beans that are still tender even when eight inches long.  And the flowers! Every time I'm in the garden the resident female hummingbird buzzes by, protecting her beloved red runner bean blooms from all comers.

Here's the trellis full to overflowing this week:

And a  closer view of the many young beans and flowers:

And a stem of  buds and blooms -by far the showiest runner bean flowers I've grown:

Besides the runner beans, romano pole beans, trombone squash, raspberries, Hungarian wax peppers, and finally, tomatoes are yielding well. Here's a picture of today's harvest:

And lots more tomatoes coming -- I have 24 plants left after the early demise of the potato leafed heirloom.  Which, by the way, ended up producing a dozen fruit, since all the fruit  I harvested green when I pulled the plant ended up ripened on the kitchen counter to red juicy deliciousness. I still prefer my Mortgage Lifters --- I have a dozen healthy specimens full to falling over with fruit.

Hunting the tomato hornworm

Last week I noticed something new about a clump of intertwined Celebrity and Mortgage Lifter tomatoes in a planter -- leaves were disappearing.  When I looked closely I realized that it had been going on for some time, but the overall lushness of the two plants had hidden the loss until it was substantial.

Here's a picture of the plants.  As usual I did not offer them enough support, and the strategically placed garden chair is helping them stay up right under the weight of a hefty load of young tomatoes.

Here's a close up of a well trimmed branch, with all the soft tasty foliage eaten:

And horror of horrors, a half eaten green tomato:

After I examined the damage I knew the culprit, because I had seen it before -- a tomato hornworm.  A week before this discovery I removed and killed one on a hungarian wax pepper plant. Unfortunately I killed the hornworm after it had eaten a substantial portion of the plant, but I have hope that there is still  time for regrowth and new peppers.
I also recently found a  rather deflated hornworm covered with the spiky white eggs of a predatory wasp, which I left to die slowly in place (they stop eating when they start getting eaten). It's  a gruesome fate that I have no sadness about after observing the damage done by  hornworms left unchecked.

But I could not find the hornworm on the intertwined plants. For three days I searched, looking for the characteristic drops of black worm poop, and gently pushing eaten leaves aside to search for the elusive pest. It was obviously healthy and not wasp infected, based on the newly denuded leaves I found each day.

Finally yesterday I found it! A drop of poop on a leaf, and just above, fat and munching slowly, my enemy. I read an essay in my local paper by a squeamish gardener who put a live horn worm, attached to a small branch, in a sealed baggie and into the trash to suffocate. That seems crueler and less green than my solution-- position it under a brick and step on the brick. Here's a portrait of my enemy shortly before it's demise:

The good, the bad and the ugly-- heirloom tomatoes, bean beetles and a young toad

First the good-- I took a lot of green tomatoes off my potato leafed heirloom tomato that died. And they are turning red! The other 24 tomato plants are full of mostly still green fruit, but are largely healthy.

Now the bad: I grew "Burgundy' bush beans for the first time this year, and possibly the last.  They are beautiful and productive, but at least from my so far limited experience, a magnet for mexican bean beetles. I fought a good fight squashing larvae, eggs and mature beetles, but finally gave up and pulled the plants.
Meanwhile, elsewhere in the garden I got only a few beetles on my 'Dragon Tongue' bush beans and yellow romano pole beans. Were the "Burgundy' a trap crop, which means that now that they are gone I will get more beetles on the other beans? I will watch and report back.
Meanwhile I killed as many stages of the been life cycle as I could when I pulled the crop-- I squished the adults and left the plants on the lawn to dry and deprive the larvae of enough food to get them to maturity, then composted them on the other side of the garden.
Here's a picture of a just pulled 'Burgundy' -- still full of good beans which I harvested after I took the photo:

And here are some eggs:

And the voracious larvae:

I took a lot of satisfaction in leaving the larvae to starve on the dried up plants. I can't always win in my fight for organic pest control, but I can glory in the death of my enemy.... even if it is a tiny yellow larvae.

I don't have a picture of my ugly new friend, but it is a young toad, about an inch long, that I found in the middle of the lawn. I moved it to the 'Dragon Tongue' bean patch last week, and found it there today,  quite feisty and camera shy. I hope it like the taste of been beetles-- I could use the help.

My colorful kitchen garden yesterday

It's been quite bright and sunny lately, which is good for the crops, but tough for taking good pictures.  Today was rainy and windy, but last night, just as it was clouding up, I took this picture.
 The trombone squash is draping it's silver dappled leaves  (that is not mildew!) across the fence, with a pink knockout rose backed by scarlet runner beans, amaranth and sunflowers.

This month's video tour

It was a beautiful sunny morning (not the best for video, but great for the garden), and I shot this video before harvesting beans and squash to eat with fresh pesto for lunch.

Potato and bean salad with New Zealand spinach

Ok, I admit it, I love a nice vinegary potato salad. I know I wrote about new potato salad earlier this  month, but this is another twist on the recipe, and salads have been my go-to thing to eat during this endless month of heat.
Anyway, I'm writing about potato salad again because I harvested the rest of my my blue potatoes last week, since the foliage had died back completely. They were one of the first crops I planted, way back on April 4th.
 The yield was a bit less than last year. According to my research this is due to all our wet, hot weather-- apparently  potatoes are stressed by being too wet for too long.
After I put  some medium tubers aside in the crisper for next year's crop I had about 15 pounds from 2 lbs of seed pots, half mine, half from H Depot. I am going to harvest the Yukon Gold  and fingerlings next week -- the foliage has died back indicating that they are ready. I still have a couple of healthy patches of Russet pots, so I hope I get decent yield over all.
To make the salad I boiled some small blues and a mix of Burgundy and Dragon Tongue beans, then diced  half of a Candy onion  and mixed it with the warm pots and beans.  I dressed them in olive oil, red wine vinegar, a bit of grain mustard, salt and pepper. Then I ate the salad over a bed of New Zealand Spinach-- a new crop for me, and an excellent substitute for spinach. I added a slab of feta and it was delicious!

Here is the potato harvest:

And the salad: