

July and August are always the months when I look at our garden and
despair. Not for the usual reason --- weeds. But because perfection was
not achieved.
This year, we're trying out drip
irrigation, set on a timer to water for three hours twice a week.
When I got the first monthly water bill, it had skyrocketed up $55.
Yikes! Was the haul worth the sticker shock?
On the one hand...very much! All of that water has our asparagus
sending up enough spears that we're harvesting a meal weekly, figuring
we might as well pick the spears since the canopy is already completely
full of happy, older fronds. At organic, summer prices, that pays for
about half of our water bill right there.

And the cucumbers! I always succession plant in case bugs and disease
get the early crops, which means we've been rolling in cukes. We eat
about six a day and I've still been having to gift grocery bagsful to
the neighbors.
Oh, and did I mention lettuce? Mark's gotten into the habit of making
us salad for lunch every day, which can be tough in the summer. But
drip is keeping leaf lettuce soft and delicious as long as I plant a
new bed each month.
So what's the problem?

The walnut trees. We have a couple of largish black walnuts about
fifteen feet from one corner of the garden and they never caused
problems in the past. But I suspect irrigating strips of garden beds
tempted walnut roots to concentrate their attention on my growing area.
As you likely know, walnut roots produce toxic juglone. When many
garden plants come in contact, they go kaput.
To cut a long story short, the first to wilt were the tomatoes. Then
the summer squash --- we only got one zucchini! The pepper plants look
okay, but they're barely producing. Even the green beans appear to have
been hit.
And the walnuts are sandwiched right between the garden fence, the
electric pole, and the road. I suspect we're going to have to hire a
pro to cut them down. Expensive!

Hopefully that will be a one-time fix. The other issue, not so much.
The photo above shows my carrot bed. Notice how the only sizeable
plants are right along the drip line? I started some more carrots
inside (the tiny plants closer to the bucket) to fill in the gaps.
Lesson learned --- drip irrigation isn't sufficient to get fall crops
up and running during our parched summers up on the ridge.

Okay, enough about drip. How about Mark's caterpillar
tunnels?
On the one hand, they are awesome! Look at those brussels sprouts ---
thriving under their covers!
On the other hand...wedding tulle is so very, very tender. I swear, our
caterpillar tunnels sprout holes even when they haven't been touched.
I've been mending these gaps at least once a month, but even that
wasn't enough to keep caterpillar worms out of one tunnel. On the other
hand, the
real fabric intended for this use is $300 and up per roll, so maybe
I'll learn to enjoy mending.

In other news, while I've had lots of unexpected garden failures this
year, I've also had one unexpected success. I've never managed to ripen
melons previously, which was mostly due to viral diseases caused by
bugs. But research turned up the tidbit that melons are very sensitive
to cool soil, so I held my horses and planted a disease-resistant
cantaloupe (Divergent) outside on June 4 (after starting the seeds
inside a month before).
How's it doing? The vines are taking over the garden! There are lots of
big fruit hiding under those leaves, the skin crackling and starting to
yellow!
Which brings me to the garden lesson I never seem to learn --- for
every unexpected loss, there's an unexpected win. Now if I can just
figure out when cantaloupes are ripe...

I'm happiest when I have something complex and natural to keep my brain
occupied. This year I found the perfect hobby --- fireflies! A citizen
science project asks you to spend thirty seconds once a week
counting the firefly flashes in your backyard. I gave it a try...and
was instantly hooked.
Did you know that there are hundreds of species in the U.S., possibly
dozens within a single backyard? One species, though, is pretty simple
to figure out. The male Big Dipper (Photinus
pyralis) usually comes out right at sunset and flies for half an
hour or so. He's got long, yellow flashes that are either J-shaped or
(as in my yard) simply rise upward. Count about 5 seconds of darkness
in between at 76 F and you've got one firefly species to check off your
life list!
(Why do I say "he"? Because the female is hidden in the grass,
surveying the field and choosing a mate. Yes, firefly flashes are all
about sex.)

Then, of course, identification gets more complicated. The other common
type of fireflies --- Photuris
species --- is often predatory, preferring to hunt flashing fireflies
of other species rather than seeking mates of their own kind. So Photuris will mimic the flash
patterns of other fireflies as well as (sometimes) making specific
flash patterns of their own.
There are also a lot of Photuris species
out there. I've plotted out a 550 square foot section of our septic
field for summer studies and I usually manage to watch about the first
half hour of the Photuris
show twice a week. Over the course of the last month, I've found at
least five different Photuris
flash patterns before my eyelids get heavy. Are they all different
species? Who knows!
The flash photo above, by the way, shows a typical Photuris habit --- when caught (in
a petri dish in this case), they scurry around flashing as fast as they
can. Did you notice the flashes here are green rather than yellow, like
the Big Dipper's? That's a diagnostic difference between the two
genera, along with the long legs of the Photuris and the stripes you often
see on their wing covers.

If you want to delve deeper into fireflies, I can recommend some books
and gear. Fireflies, Glow-worms, and
Lightning Bugs
is a beautifully illustrated and easy to read field guide...to a few of
the most common species.
Definitely start there, then once you outgrow easy you might want to
download the free, intense, and highly technical A
naturalist’s long walk among shadows: of North American Photuris –
patterns, outlines, silhouettes… This book will help you realize
that scientists don't know enough yet to ID a lot of the Photurises. Still, it's fun to try!
Trying involves catching and photographing fireflies after you've
gotten a handle on their flash patterns. (Here's
a free download to some of the most common patterns.) For catching,
I found this net to be cheap and
effective (especially when combined with masked, socially distancing
neighbor kids). Glass petri dishes
made it much easier to photograph fast-moving Photurises, and it's now a breeze
to measure insects in those photos since I drew a 1 cm grid on the
bottom of the petri dish with a sharpie.
Other than that, the only hard part is staying up late (can't help you
there --- I'm terrible at it). Oh, and accepting that firefly season is
fleeting with species winking out with each week of summer. What better
way to squeeze every bit of joy out of the year, though, than to watch
fireflies during these short, hot nights?
I have a new book out...and it's a total pandemic experiment. Gap Year
is available in print only and is on the pricey side for 32 pages
(full-color will do that), but it should also be very easy to request
at your local library through their regular channels.
The book is a travelogue, mostly in pictures, from the time I spent
backpacking and drawing plants right after college. I figure there's a
50% chance no one except my mother will be interested, so feel free to
skip this one if it's not your cup of tea. On the other hand, if you
like it, writing a review and spreading the word will ensure there's a
sequel.
Speaking of reviews, here's one to give you an idea of what you'll find
inside:
“This will be one of the easiest 5-star ratings I’ve ever given. The
journal style of the book presents the reader with a unique glimpse
into the author’s year-long journey around Europe. Beautiful drawings
and snippets from her letters home draw the reader into her adventure.
I’m definitely looking forward to the next volume. This book would make
a beautiful gift to anyone who loves travel or nature.” — Turtle Dove
Available on Amazon and Barnes
& Noble. Thanks in advance for giving it a try!


Summer is here, and with it comes the learning portion of the gardening
year. On the positive side, Mark's caterpillar
tunnels are game changers. Seen above are little brussels sprout
plants, thriving without the cabbageworm pressure I usually struggle
with.

Also under caterpillar tunnels, our broccoli has treated us to weeks of
daily meals. For the first time in my gardening life, I'm preparing to
pull the plants out, not because they're so bug-bitten there's no point
in keeping them, but because the side shoots are getting small and
tough and the soil is ready for some compost and rest. (Plus, our
palates are ready for summer crops.)

With all of that success, I went a little crazy and put a caterpillar
tunnel over some cucurbits, in hopes of keeping various bug issues at
bay. Of course, unlike crucifers, the covered squash and cucumbers
require pollination. So once the plants were big enough, I started
hand-pollinating.
The hand-pollinating got old after a week, at which point I took the
caterpillar tunnels off. But, in the meantime, I learned why my recent
summer-squash harvests have been so-so. Without chickens to eat excess
fruits, I'd cut back to one crookneck squash and one zucchini during
each succession-planting
period...but that's not enough for proper pollination since the two
species don't cross!
On many of my hand-pollinating days, there were no male flowers open
when a female squash flower was due to be pollinated. Sometimes, I was
able to tear open yesterday's spent male flower and get a bit of
pollen. Sometimes that didn't work. Now I know --- better to plant each
summer squash species at least in pairs!

Now for the failure. Berries, berries, beautiful berries! We built a
netted enclosure after the chipmunks ate all of our strawberries last
year, and for a couple of weeks it seemed to be working. Then the
chipmunks found a way in and demolished the rest of the patch in a
matter of days. We'll be working on that problem before next year. In
the meantime, at least the evil rodents can't reach our raspberries and
the netting keeps the birds out.

On a happier note, we spent some of our stimulus money on drip
irrigation this spring and it's working like a charm! If you're
pinching pennies, you can put together a cheaper option piecemeal, but
we opted for a
kit from Johnny's (who gives us no kickback for mentioning them,
darn it! But their products are so good I do it anyway). Mark put the
pieces together without needing to read the instructions, and now the
timer automatically soaks the soil for three hours twice a week.
The question will be --- how much does our water bill rise as a result
of giving the garden what it needs? Since we're steering clear of the
farmer's market this year due to crowded coronavirus concerns,
high-quality produce is likely to be worth whatever the water costs.

And that's all for now, although I have something different and fun
coming your way later this week. Stay tuned (or follow me on Amazon if you think
you'll forget).
I have something new and different coming down the pike in the book
department this month (or possibly next month....). While you wait, I
couldn't resist sharing this deep price-drop sale on The Weekend Homesteader.
Now is the perfect time to start with small projects that build your
self-sufficiency. I hope you enjoy the journey!
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About us: Anna Hess and Mark Hamilton spent over a decade living self-sufficiently in the mountains of Virginia before moving north to start over from scratch in the foothills of Ohio. They've experimented with permaculture, no-till gardening, trailersteading, home-based microbusinesses and much more, writing about their adventures in both blogs and books.