Okay, savages is too strong a word. But munchers isn't strong enough.
Opportunists, perhaps?
We have been having deer come by daily now, sometimes several times a day. The days are getting shorter and the nights are cooler. Maybe they sense Fall is coming and they are trying to bulk up now. Earlier this week, in one visit, we had a mamma deer, three adolescents, and two very young ones. Adorable, though I was still glad I had the tomato plants and dry bush beans covered with sheets. They have left little of the sunflowers, nasturtiums, kale, asters, and pansies. They also managed to eat a few tomatoes and part of a large tomato plant that wasn't covered.
Midway through the summer, I potted a little volunteer tomato plant that I couldn't bring myself to compost. The garden was loaded with volunteer tomato plants, volunteer asters, and volunteer sunflowers. The little tomato plant settled in nicely, developing flowers and, eventually, two tomatoes.
To my great disappointment, I went outside a few mornings ago to find that a deer had stripped it bare during the night. Arhg! It looks even more pathetic than Charlie Brown's Christmas tree.
To add insult to injury, I also discovered that one of the French pumpkins had been chewed. Deer had never touched our squash or pumpkins before! I covered the pumpkins with several layers of floating row cover, and then harvested them yesterday.
On the upside, they haven't yet discovered this cheerful little "peek-a-boo" sunflower nestled among the tomatoes. :)
We'll only have a few this year, and they will be smaller than usual, but we're grateful for the ones that we do get. Here is the first little Galeux D'Eysine of the harvest. It seems like the perfect picture to post on a full-moon day.
Welcome, September! This will be a quick update with pictures taken on the fly during the last few days.
I decided to make a second batch of Green Tomato Chow Chow, this time using apple cider vinegar in place of white wine vinegar and adding a bit more brown sugar, to boot! Not the clearest picture, but voilà. The batch that included white wine vinegar will be shared with family and friends, mostly on the other side of the country. (Canada Post must love people like me at this time of year...)
The garlic has finished curing and has been trimmed up and organized. The kind pictured is Red Russian, a tried-and-true, hardy, and dependable variety.
The sunflowers are in their glory, loaded with pollen and buzzing with bees.
Dahlias
More sunflowers...love the little blooms on this one.
The first carrot of the season (Red Chantenay). They are juicy and flavourful.
Galeux D'Eysines winter squash
Flagg dry pole beans
Gold Harvest cooking peas, dried down and ready to store.
Fisher's Earliest Paste. I am looking forward to saving seeds from this variety!
Indigo Pear Drops - still dark purple, they haven't begun developing the gold blush they have on the bottom once ripe.
Lower Salmon River winter squash
Russian Mammoth sunflowers. These are supposed to be large, single heads atop single stems, but early in the season, deer chomped off the developing head. It stalled for a while, then recovered and shot up four new heads.
Swiss Giant pansies
The south garden
Another Russian Mammoth sunflower, this one in the east garden.
After a short two to three week reprieve, we are again being visited by deer at least once daily. I caught some pictures on August 28th, but have since stopped running to grab my camera when I spot them in the yard. There are too many to keep up. I didn't know whether to label this post with the tag 'wildlife' or 'pest'! (Joking...)
There have been the usual adult deer, but in the last few days, there has also been a mama deer visiting with her 2 little fawns (they still have their white spots). While washing the dishes in the kitchen, I looked up and was startled to see a fawn, right there, looking back at me through the window! What a sweet little soul.
They are so beautiful and gentle. Increasingly unfazed by people and vehicles, unfortunately. They often stop and listen while I explain that, while I treasure their visits, the tomatoes, cabbage, and bean are off limits for eating. Once I finish speaking, they smoothly and unironically resume their lunch. At that point, I start slowly walking towards them, 'shooing' or clapping behind them as they reluctantly head back to the street. Thankfully, for my sake and theirs, this is a quiet street with little traffic.
The latest visitors (click on pictures to enlarge):
It is a mild (17 degrees C), rainy afternoon here today. The garlic is on week two of curing in the shed. I'm keen to get the bulbs trimmed up, labeled, and bagged, but there is plenty in the garden to occupy my attention until the garlic is ready to be processed.
After a few less-than-stellar years for our crabapple tree, this year it produced fruit tightly bunched along the branches, like grapes. I made two batches of crabapple jelly this week. The colour is so pretty!
In addition to the jelly, I was also able to can batches of Zesty Zucchini relish, Sweet Zucchini relish, Dixie relish, Dill relish, and Green Tomato Chow Chow. I have memories of the delicious chow my grandmother used to make and have wanted to try making it myself for years. The good news is that the recipe made a lot (10.5 half-pints) and it tastes great. The unfortunate news is that the recipe called for white wine vinegar which, it turns out, I am sensitive to (are sulphites the culprit?). I would love to make a second batch using another recipe. We'll see how many green tomatoes there are to work with come harvest time.
Here is a very similar recipe for green tomato chow chow to the one linked above:
A walk around the garden...
Bellestar - While the tomatoes aren't as large as I expected, the plants are very productive and are early (unlike some varieties, which are described as being early but aren't...I'm looking at you, Dwarf Arctic Rose!). Very compact plants, too. We are already picking Bellestars as they ripen to enjoy in salads, stews, and on sandwiches. The tomatoes are quite meaty. I think they'll be great for dehydrating, sauces, and canning.
Dwarf Audrey's Love - I am so glad I gave these a second chance! The plants are more productive than I expected and many of the tomatoes are larger than I expected. Almost no BER at all. The plants are compact, too, and seem to be doing well in containers.
Taxi - an early, productive determinate tomato variety. Round, bright yellow when ripe. Mild flavour, but it looks pretty in salads or on a vegetable tray.
Fiesta beans - a large variety of dry bush bean with runners. The plants and runners are larger/taller than I expected, about 2.5 feet in height.
Galeux D'Eysines - I don't know what happened this year with my tried, true, and (usually) reliable Galeux D'Eysines. We will only get 2 or 3 from the plants this year, and it seems like they are slow to develop. Typically, we get around 8! Funny how you come to just assume certain things will always do well. Hopefully, the Burpee's Butterbush (planted in various spots around the garden) and Lower Salmon River (that I planted as an afterthought in a partially shady section of the south garden) pull through and make up for the lack of Galeux D'Eysines.
Giant Musselburgh leeks - so glad I finally mulched these. They love it! A small patch of leeks for our personal use, this year. I learned the hard way, after planting loads of them in previous years, that they are somewhat labour-intensive to process for storage. Also, the majority of people I offered to share them with declined because they'd never cooked with leeks before and were reluctant to try to 'figure it out'. My city-dwelling friends and family were baffled when they heard this. At $7-9 per bunch of 3 at their grocery stores, they would have gladly scooped up the extra leeks!
Morning Glories
Peach Melba nasturtiums. The largest and healthiest of the nasturtium varieties in the garden this year.
Bathtub pansies
Leek patch pansies
Sage
Teddy Bear sunflowers
I'm not sure what variety this sunflower is, but it looks like a lady with short, windswept blonde hair in this picture.
