Plant Life

Hello Readers. It’s been quite a while since I last wrote in this Plant Life blog and for that I apologize. I have no excuses except life and work intervened.

Fall seems to be falling and the best part about fall is it’s one of the most perfect times to plant in our gardens. So get out there and visit your favorite nursery (many of them are having fall sales) and pick up some great perennials and/or woody shrubs and trees to brighten up a spot of your garden. Or maybe quite a few spots of your garden.

We’re massively renovating some of our garden(s) surrounding our house. Last weekend with help from my digging hubbie we moved 4 dwarf pieris and 2 dwarf osmanthus onto a hillside we’re renovating. They look great and we’ll be planting other plants into the mix. As soon as I figure out how to download the photos I’ll post them on this Plant Life blog.

Also last Wednesday my rhodie loving hubbie Pat and I went with the WSNLA Olympic Chapter up to Chimicum Woods (a rhododendron species garden) for a tour and lecture. It was fabulous and if you’re reading this column this weekend (Sept. 11 & 12) – hop in your car and drive over to Thorndyke Road in Jefferson County to visit this amazing rhododendron garden and nursery. It is only open to the public by appointment, but this weekend it’s open both days and you won’t want to miss this opportunity. Here’s the website so you can get driving directions and see for yourself how gorgeous these rhodies are:  http://www.chimacumwoods.com/

Here too in today’s blog is the tomato report – they’re green, green, green. I’ll be catching up with the Port Orchard and Poulsbo Farmers Market managers this weekend since it was their tomato tasteoff day and will post a report on what’s up with the tomatoes. Blueberry Park in Bremerton (Sylvan Way) is having a tomato tasteoff tomorrow. Check it out.

Several folks in the north and south have reported blight already. So keep an eye on your tomotoes – the blight is alive and well in parts of Kitsap County. Here is an excellent webpage from Cornell University (another land grant university) with photos of late blight and also how to distinguish it form other diseases and conditions of tomatoes:  http://www.hort.cornell.edu/department/Facilities/lihrec/vegpath/photos/lateblight_tomato.htm

Did you know you can pull up your tomatoes, strip off the leaves, leave the fruit on and attached to the vines and hang the tomatoes upside down (as in hanging down from their roots hitched at the top to something)? This method allows them to cure in a cool garage or room – near a window works best. The tomatoes will ripen that way. This is a trick I learned years ago when we lived in England. We had an outside laundry room off the garage and it had a well lit, but not sunny window. We were eating tomatoes for several months after the season was well over. Try it and report back next spring to me. One caveat – the tomatoes don’t get bigger, they just ripen.

It’s also a perfect time to harvest our squash such as acorn and spaghetti squash as they ripen – cut the stems one to two inches long; leave these stems on and store the squash in a cool garage or laundry room. We stored ours in 5 gallon buckets. We did this last year (thanks Chris Smith for the tip) and we ate acorn squash for months all fall and winter long – it was wonderful. Try it – it actually works.

Well, dear readers, I have to go figure out how to download photos from an android phone and load them here on Plant Life. Cheerio and happy gardening. I promise I won’t take nearly 3 months to blog again.

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