Another weekend hotter and dryer than the last. Record highs and all time record highs were set throughout the state during the week. I thought it was hot, at 102, when we arrived Friday but this picture was taken when leaving Saturday afternoon. I moved the thermometer down so it wasn't close to the tin roof of the garage, but at 111 it was just 2 degrees higher than the one on the porch. Luckily, as I write this on Tuesday, we have gotten a break from the heat and a tiny bit of much needed rain – with more in the forecast. This has been the hottest and driest summer I have ever experienced, and I hope I never see another like it.
Garden
After the unbelievable heat of the week, and no rain, we were amazed to find the squash had survived. After a good watering it perked up, and it is still blooming and putting on new fruit. Sally picked over 20 of these butternuts, and found a couple that had split – I presume from getting watered after being dry all week. We peeled them, sliced them thin, and grilled them in a little olive oil. There were very tasty with a little sea salt.
The basil and the two peppers are also doing well, in spite of the heat. Sally picked 4 cups of basil and made a double batch of pesto. She froze most of it, but kept enough aside for us to have on toast with a fresh tomato we had been given but had left at home. She also picked half dozen or more jalapenos. Something had eaten all the leaves off the tomatoes, not that they were doing anything anyway. I never figured out what had eaten them as I never saw any hornworms. I actually thought deer might have gotten in and done the damage, but there were no prints. (I suspect deer are what has been eating the few blackberry canes that haven't died.)
Butterflies
There have been lots of butterflies around this summer. Sally found the one in the picture above (to the right of the squash) dead but complete. I saw several others like that. This orange one was in the garage and was briefly opening its wings and then closing them up. The picture is blurred as I could never catch it with its wings open. I suspect it was trying to keep cool. It was very pretty.
Flush It
Also in the picture of the squash, to the right, you can see the container of bacteria I purchased for $150 (contains 72 packets. This brand is sold primarily for septic systems and they had some amazing testimonials on their site. They also promote them for ponds to eat the muck – reduce the organic matter and thus the food source for algae. Other sites sold bacteria specifically for ponds, but I decided to try these guys. The packets are small and seem to be plastic, but they dissolve in water in a few minutes. They recommended 24 per 1 acre pond. I've estimated our pond at 2/3 acre, and I walked around the perimeter and chunked in 22. The inlet end is the shallowest and the most mucked up, so I put more there. In another month I am supposed to do it again, but the water temperature has to be up so they can't be used over the winter.
The pond was down 3-4 inches below the culverts, there was no water leaking through the dam (that I could tell), and there was absolutely no water running into the pond. I've never seen gum spring totally dry like this. The grass is still green and growing on the south side and I could just detect some water seeping into the pond in that area where there is a small spring/seep.
The tank that catches the water from the spring by the house (I've decided to name it Ben Gay spring since to my knowledge it never had a name) is also mucked up. It catches lots of leaves and limbs from the three big trees clinging to the bluff directly above it. I raked out some of the bigger stuff and then put 1 of these Flush It bacteria packets in that tank. I am very anxious to see how it does here since it should be real easy to monitor.
I also flushed one packet into our septic system since they are also supposed to help in the field lines. (I know our tank is okay since I had it unnecessarily pumped last summer, but how do you know the condition of your field lines?)
No comments:
Post a Comment