The leftovers of Beta should be here late tomorrow and Friday. And we need some rain, too.

Apparently, some of my squash plants were hit with some frost when our temps were colder a few days ago. However, the squash plants on the other end of the same garden appear to be untouched.

I got 4 inches of rain so far and I haven’t checked the gauge yet today. I lost about 10 squash plants and still have 4 replacement squash plants that I will plant tomorrow and 10-15 replacement tomato plants (which I have no place for now).

Jamie - For the months June, July, and August, Wichita is almost 5 inches below "normal" rainfall. I couldn't put my hands on the annual deficit, but as I recall, the spring wasn't especially wet. Makes things challenging for gardeners!

So, I need some help with bug identification. The photos here are from my garden and mostly on my Malabar spinach but also on my beans. First time for this pest. Does anyone know what they are? And what should I spray on them?

Cindy - Could be a Shield Bug. I have to admit, I'm no bug expert. I thought that looks like a badge. But Google didn't help with that one. So I searched for Shield Bug, and viola.

Cindy I'm pleased to say I have never seen anything that looks like that bug. It rained hard last night and this morning but we got a few hours of partial clearing this afternoon. I'm glad I rigged up cover for the tomatoes outside yesterday! There are a lot of very green fruit on those vines yet.

Pulled up the summer Kale crop and by the time I did it started raining so took whole bushes under cover and stripped for us to blanch and freeze tomorrow. Harvested first PPP and Chocolate Cherry tomatoes from greenhouse. Those plants were sown July 1. Also brought in a couple of pounds from hoophouse.

Cindy it is definitely some type of leaf-eating beetle. I found one that looks like it but when I click on the picture it freezes my phone.

Cindy--Holy cow, who knew there were so many Shield bugs! John was right that's what it is, so I did a search and to narrow it down I added Virginia. It's a Green Stink Bug, not something to invite to your garden party.

http://www.cirrusimage.com/bugs_stink_green.htm

Like Len, we had a lovely rain, 3/4" here, more in other places. Margi, I remember that warm summer rain when I was a kid in SE Kansas.

Lea, that is definitely the evil bug. All the stink bugs around here are colorless and I have never seen one with colors like that. Other bugs lay eggs on them too, so they are a smorgasbord of evil. I read the best way to kill them is to knock them into soapy water, but won’t they just fly away? I always use the spray version of insecticidal soap.

Lea and Richard - Thanks for the id. Looks like Captain Jack's will do the trick. That's on my 'to do' list for today.

This is the first time that I've had this particular bug. Hope it's the last. Wonder if it has anything to do with the very mild winter we had last winter?

Thanks again.

You’re welcome Cindy, although Lea was really the bug identifier. I’ll bet you are right about the mild winter and the northern influx of more types of pests. It is happening everywhere now. Pine beetles are destroying forests farther north every year and are at least partially responsible for the terrible fires on the west coast and Colorado.

I ended up not spraying yesterday because it started to drizzle. We got almost 4/10" of rain overnight. It's still a little drizzly now and the humidity is sky high. It was up to 98% though it's all the way down to 90% now. Tomorrow will be similar.

Sept 27

Cindy - I'm jealous of the rain you got.

Remember that i set out tomatoes late. Look at these photos of the results. Big, healthy looking tomatoes, and lots of them.

The plant looks better than what you see. All the tomatoes are at the bottom; but it's green above. The last tomatoes i set out was on July 6th, this plant was earlier maybe by a week?

Here's one of the two plants from July 6th:

And my Christmas Lima beans, which I decided to let dry on the plants. They don't get the bright colors till they dry and it's simpler to dry them there as they don't get moldy.

And finally, The progress on my last patch of corn:

Photos are from my new (used) camera which replaces the one that has some contact problems. Same camera model with the lens off the old one. Well under two figures.

Nice produce, John!

So I have another mystery. I know I planted this in my veggie garden, but I have no idea what it is and I didn't make a note of it in Excell, which I usually do. So, any guesses?

Cindy - Might be tasty.......Might not. Can't help any further.

Cindy - The leaf behind the bloom looks like a bean's leaf. How big is that blossom? Hard to tell from the pic.

John - Your tomatoes look beautiful, and look at that corn coming on. I'm a bit jealous.

Speaking of jealous...That's what I am when I read about Cindy's recent rain. There were storms around the state here today and a 90% chance of rain, but I don't think we got anything other than some mist, and wind. It was a quite dreary day. This morning the temp was 68 when I checked first thing. Now, at 6:30 in the evening it's 60. It's been falling all day. Yesterday it was hot, like 90ish. I am hopeful that was the last "summer" day of the year. I won't hold my breath.

Yesterday I picked a couple big handfuls off of my summer-planted little pea plants. I've never seen such small plants. The "tall" ones are maybe 10-12" tall. It looks so funny to have mature pods on such small plants. We ate the shelled peas last night for dinner. Not as good as my favorite spring-planted Maestro.

Margi, it was 95 degrees here today. I had some bush beans like that too-I planted about 30 in a big container and got really good production.

John - Ha-ha! The deer love eating the vines of whatever it is.

Margi - The blossom is about an inch across and a little more from top to bottom.

To the gang...this morning I did a long post with photos which went POOF when I pressed Submit. Then a bit later I wrote it again with same photos....you guessed it POOF. Then worked all afternoon building a new trellis for the wisteria my neighbor and I chopped down. Not going to post a picture because I'm snake bit about houzz. Tomorrow I'll boot up with a different browser and try again.

John those are awesome tomatoes!

Cindy not sure what that pretty flower is.

Margi I never have any luck with second season peas and gave up for good after last fall.

Magnificent dish DW made tonight...this is recipe although without her skills not sure what results will be ;) I'm really looking forward to leftovers for lunch tomorrow as I'm too full to eat more tonight!

CARAMELIZED ONION AND BURST CHERRY TOMATO PASTA

prep time:

10 MINS

cook time:

50 MINS

total time:

1 HR

This caramelized onion tomato pasta is super simple and flavorful. Perfect for the end of summer! Delicious as a main dish or side.

INGREDIENTS

• 2 sweet onions, thinly sliced
• 2 tablespoons butter
• salt and pepper
• 8 ounces pasta
• 3 garlic cloves, minced
• 2 cups whole cherry tomatoes
• ⅓ cup fresh chopped basil ribbons, plus extra for topping
• ¼ cup finely grated parmesan cheese
• shaved parmesan for topping

INSTRUCTIONS

1. Heat the butter in a large skillet over medium-low heat. Stir in the onions with a big pinch of salt and pepper. Cook, stirring often, for 25 to 35 minutes, until the onions are golden and caramely.
2. Towards the end of the onions caramelizing, bring a pot of salted water to a boil and cook the pasta according to the package directions.
3. Add the garlic and cherry tomatoes into the skillet with the onions. Cook, stirring often, until the tomatoes begin to burst, about 10 minutes.
4. Stir the pasta into the skillet. Stir in the basil ribbons and the parmesan cheese. Taste and season with a pinch of salt and pepper if you feel it needs it.
5. Serve immediately with extra basil and parmesan for topping.

Good morning, everyone.

I haven’t caught up with all of the new posts, yet.

Len- I have had the same issues with posts disappearing. How many photos did you try to add? I’ve had to start reducing the size of the images when uploading them in order for everything to work more smoothly.

My second season of bush beans was wiped out by an early frost whilst my second season of peas was eaten by rabbits!!!!!

Linda

The pea plants...

Here’s a newly blooming Dahlia. I still have two others that I am waiting to see.

Linda - I'm sorry that your fall beans and peas met an early demise. I could send you some beans as I am tired of picking and freezing them. I think I've harvested about 30 lbs. so far in the last few weeks. The plants are not looking as healthy now and the quality is declining a bit but I'll harvest one more time midweek before we get a possible frost on Friday morning.

We got about 1.25" of rain yesterday which was very welcome. We hadn't had any for a couple weeks. I hadn't watered the beans at all since they sprouted so I'm surprised that they did so well. Every time I thought I should probably water them we got some rain. The water company was probably concerned since I haven't sent them very much money this year...probably less than half what is normal for the gardening season.

LoneJack, thanks for your kind offer. I'd love to have some fresh beans right about now! Seems it's either feast or famine with beans as I have zero luck freezing them during a glut, either blanching first or not :(. At least I have a ton of overly ripe pole beans drying on the vine..... Does anyone know if we can use dried runner beans in soups and stews? I've never tried.....

We'll just have to "enjoy" fresh chard and kale instead (although hubby isn't all that keen on either).

Linda

We are getting more rain today. It hasn’t been heavy, but it has been steady all morning but I think we are done for the day now.

Rain, rain, please come my way! Jack - I am surprised that your rain totals and mine are so different. We had a good rain (1.7" in my gauge) about 3 weeks ago. Nothing for several weeks before that, and yesterday's amounted to next-to-nothing. I saw radar a couple times yesterday with a couple big lines of storm marching across the north and central part of Kansas. I'm sure they both got to you, but the lines didn't build up far enough south to get me.

Jamie there were several photos but they were reduced because I had uploaded to g photos then dropped down into my laptop. It is time this morning to hard reboot computer and see if that has any affect. Sun is shining outside so will leave IT projects for later:)

We had a sunny afternoon also! The rain cleared out around lunch time

Glad to hear some of you are getting rain and good fall crops. We received badly needed rain last night and this morning. I'm happy!!

Itsmce, the pea plants are cute. How tall did you expect them to grow?

Cindy, your flower reminds me of Vigna sp. bloomslike those of various yard long beans and cowpeas. The leaves in the photo look like they could go with either of those. Any chance you planted those?

We dodged frost a couple nights last week when temps were in the mid 30's. I'm still getting a few Sungold and Large Red Cherry tomatoes. A few regular sized tomatoes are still on the vines, too. My mildew covered zucchini and yellow squash are still yielding the occasional fruit - not sure how the sunlight even gets through to the surface of the leaves. The cucumbers were yanked yesterday after pulling off some weird shaped, but tasty, cukes. The garden looks rather sad.

Yesterday I dug some potatoes. They are on the small side, but most all of them are perfectly shaped. I'm happy with 9 pounds from 8 plants that went in late. I'm waiting on some others that have not died back much. They were planted even later. We may have lots of potatoes once those are dug.

My acorn squash are okay. I will have a dozen or so. I prefer a sweeter or starchier squash and am hoping that my mini butternuts will mature and be more what I like in a winter squash.

I have 3 small bean plantings. All look ragged but still yield enough beans that I'll keep them until frost kills them. The Royal Burgundy plants were seeded back in May. They have been producing constantly even after being trimmed by deer and having many leaves die back during hot, dry weather.

My fall plantings included only radishes. They were an experiment with 5 old seed varieties from 2012 and 2013. I had great germination with some, just okay with other. I was surprised that each variety had at least some seeds that grew. We have plenty of radishes now to eat and share.

It was 49 degrees here this morning and the high is only going to be 68 today. The cold front that brought the rain also brought some cooler temperatures. Our first frost isn’t until Halloween ,usually, and I am hoping that is the case this year also.

I still need to do some final preparations on the fall beds. We spent this past weekend removing the last of the carpet in the house and replacing it with laminate- well,the only carpet that is left is the bit that’s on the stairs.

nauregirl - I know I didn't plant cowpeas but it's quite possible it's some type of bean. I planted more beans this year than I usually do. Also, I may not get any production from it before the cold weather gets here this weekend.

Jamie - If you got down to 49 where you are, than we could very well be getting a frost or freeze here. DC is supposed to be 47 overnight Saturday and it's possible for it to be ten to twelve degrees colder here. September has been running almost two degrees below average this year.

OK the photos made it loaded from phone now let's see if the text survives the edit! They are not in any order so just have to accept how they are!

Lots of green tomatoes in the hoop house with several days of sun in forecast so hopefully get some color on most of them. That monster squash on the left is still growing...sort of fatter now not longer.

Some of the green stuff I have in for fall/winter. Mizuna and Pink Mizona on the right and Tatsoi on the left. Some of these will go into hoop house when the tomatoes and peppers are done along with spinach and lettuce and a bunch of other stuff I never grew or ate before :) I'll post photos of the seedlings later.

More Tatsoi and Bok Choi with some golden beets in foreground

These tomatoes are outside with poly stretched over them for the several days of rain we had. DW and I rolled the plastic up yesterday because it is sunny now for the next few days; actually no rain forecast for 10 days and temps in the 50's at night which is a blessing.

Len - Have you measured your Tromboncino lately?

That is a lot of nice looking tomatoes Len!!!

Hopefully I will get a few like that too.

It is supposed to get down in the lower 60s for the next 3 nights, so hopefully I can get some blooms pollinated. I only have tomatoes on 6 plants so far and the Sungold are leading the way and are the best tasting so far. Makes a pretty big difference between a pure plant and a wild one that was crossbred. Even the tomatoes of the pure breed are much smaller and 3 times as tasty.

Cindy I measured the monster squash this afternoon and it is 48" long. I don't think it is growing longer but is swelling up...

Harvested a batch of tomatillos today; they are still blooming like crazy and lots of small ones on

This is 3 tomatillo vines...they grow like crazy.

My outdoor nursery for fall greens. When it gets cold these tubs can go into greenhouse where there is a little heat at night.

Lots of babies

Spinach and Chard Starts

Wow, Len. It looks like you have a whole farm going there.

I'm wondering if you, and others, buy many vegetables from the store during the growing and/or off season.

We eat a lot from the garden but seem to buy plenty, too. We love our fruits and veggies and many things at the store look good, too. I know we bought watermelon, sweet corn, bananas, blueberries, and celery (plus others I'm sure) in the last month. I did not grow any of those this year. Also romaine and spinach during the heat of summer - or when I don't time plantings right. But there were definitely no summer squash, zucchini, tomatoes, peppers, or beans purchased recently.

During the late fall/winter I'll have garlic, onions, winter squash, and potatoes stored from the garden. Also some dried, canned, and frozen herb, apple, tomato, and cucumber products. I've not done much to extend my harvest far into the fall this year. So I'll still be a regular at the local produce market.

Naturegirl that is a wonderful question that will help me think about what to grow next year! During the high summer we buy a few heads of romaine...usually organic hearts at Costco. When the corn comes in at our favorite farm store we buy that until they don't have anymore. My corn growing is just like my broccoli growing, well meaning but unproductive so we buy those as well as an occasional head of cauliflower.

I grew celery this year J(awful) as well as pink asian celery(good but not great); as a result we are buying celery and will only grow a few of the pink ones for stir fry and salads next year.

We bought potatoes, then I harvested and we are overrun with red ones that won't store well so may actually CAN some potatoes to see what that is all about. We bought peaches and strawberries but next year the strawberries will be all grown here I hope. My green peppers don't come in until September so we are buying them 10 months out of the year.

Len - I have also been disappointed with growing regular celery and am not that thrilled with the pink celery either. I've tried growing celery in full sun and partial shade. It's still bitter no matter where it's growing. Luckily, both Costco and Trader Joe's have organic celery.

It's pretty chilly here. We had rain overnight and the cold front moved through. At least, it's full sunshine today!!

We try to eat mainly garden veggies in the summer so our cooked greens are peas, beans, chard and kale. For salads, I use what we have, starting off with lettuce, spinach and arugula but when it's gone I don't bother. For a long time, we have tomatoes, carrots, beets, cilantro, parsley and peppers, and then I supplement our salads with frozen corn, peas, and canned olives.

I don't grow corn, so we buy a little in the summer and lots of musrhooms. I buy a few onions, but I try to use home-grown garlic instead of onions when I can. When we have a bumper harvest of apples and pears, I don't buy any peaches, but hubby has to have his bananas. I also buy blueberries and raspberries.

Linda

I dug about 12 pounds of Kennebec potatoes over the weekend, I never weighed them. On Monday I dug this Steam (Maple syrup) tray full which weighed 28 pounds. This is a mix of Kennebecs and Carola Russets. Freshly washed. A little cool for doing that out in the lawn.

I found this potato figure which is as of yet unnamed.

I managed to get a photo before it lost its head.

LOL, that's a good one. Not sure what kind of critter that is!

Cross Pillsbury Doughboy with an Idaho Spud

John - Love it! That's a nice potato harvest.

"Dan" reports it looks like Tusk or a walrus.

Have a great October!

Naturegirl,

I buy lots of vegetables from the local markets or grocery store. I even buy some cherry tomatoes and squash when I run out. Potatoes, mushrooms, salad mix, corn, cucumbers, strawberries, green onions, carrots, garlic, artichokes, and onions are regular purchases-2 or 3 times a month, although this year my Grano Onions were very productive, so I just started buying onions again. About the only thing I never buy from the store are peppers 🌶 because I always have so many (that is also why I don’t top mine because I can barely use all that I grow). I always have a few pepper plants that live through the winter and I have hundreds and hundreds of dried peppers that I need to make into powder right now.

October! https://www.houzz.com/discussions/6004664/veggie-tales-october-2020