The Cantaloupe That Wasn't

I'm reading up on Cantaloupe, to see if I can make ours fruit. The first thing I find is this from University of Florida:

"The melon referred to as cantaloupe is actually named muskmelon (Cucumis melo, var. reticulatus). The term cantaloupe is a misnomer that has been used widely in the vegetable industry as a synonym for muskmelon. True cantaloupe (C. melo, var.cantalupensis) is grown in Europe and is a small fruit with a hard, scaly, or warty skin."

This explains why we called it muskmelon when I was a kid. I thought that was just some local Missouri term for the fruit, because everyone I talked to later had no idea what fruit I was talking about. I guess the name muskmelon does not sound very appetizing for folks in the produce isle?

Reading further down, I see that our problem might be not enough pollinators:

"Cucurbits have separate female and male flowers, with the male flowers appearing prior to female flowering. For the female flowers to produce fruit, pollen from the male flower must be transferred to the female flower by insects. Generally, satisfactory pollination occurs when one strong beehive is present for every two acres of muskmelon. Flowers of muskmelon and other cucurbits open just after sunrise and close in the late afternoon or early evening."

So it appears we will have to pollinate both the cantaloupe and tomatoes by hand, unless someone has a beehive handy.

Growing

Eggplant, Japanese - The teacher's pet of the garden, producing lots of fruit! Next time, I'll plant it in a corner spot, so it doesn't crowd out the other plants.

Tomato, Heirloom Tiger Stripe - Growing, flowering, but producing no fruit. Why? We may need to help the flowers pollinate.

Red and Orange Peppers - The eggplant is shading them out, and I may pull one of the pepper plants so the other one can grow bigger in that spot. Maybe I can transplant it?

Okra - See this post from last week.

Citronella - The wind from Irene actually damaged both of these, so I pulled it and planted beans there.

Leeks - I'm not really sure if these are doing well, since I've never grown or purchased leeks.

Marigold, Orange and Yellow - The yellow died a few weeks ago, and there are now beans planted there. The orange is scraggly, but I let it grow enough to produces some seeds, so we can grow them next year.

Flower (I keep forgetting to check the tag!) Pink - It died back quite a bit, but when I went to pull it up, I saw it was producing new growth. I decided to transplant it to a pot, and then planted peas in that spot.

Mulberry - Still fruiting slightly, although something is damaging the leaves. The fruits get eaten by birds and such before I manage to pick them. They more commonly fruit in the Spring anyway, so I'm not worried about it.

Banana - 3 leaves now!

Cantaloupe - This has grown very large, and produced many many flowers, but no fruit that I can see yet. It might need more fertilization, which means I may use the worm compost that David H. donated.

Pumpkin, Early Sugar - These are still very small, and I worry that I started them too early or too late. I was hoping for pumpkin pie from our garden in October, and that is clearly not going to happen this year.

Peas - The peas that were started from seedling on my back patio did not take transplant well last Sunday. I'll have to plant them from seed directly in the garden, probably tomorrow.

Green Beans - I transplanted two of these, and one was snapped by Irene's winds, and the other is doing well. Two or three more seeds have been planted from seed into the garden, and are already sprouting.

Ruby Beets and Red Cored Carrots - This is the second attempt at each of these. They didn't like being transplanted, and they take a good couple weeks to sprout. Wait and see.

Okra

I learned today that I made several mistakes when planting and growing the okra. I bought the plant when it was a good 6 inches tall, from Lowes. Here is a resource I should have checked first. It had several vertical stems, and I assumed it was a single plant. In reality, it was several plants, and I should have separated them to a foot apart or thinned to just one before planting. Also, Okra should have a very large tap root (up to 5 feet!). This just isn't possible in our raised bed, because it is about a foot deep, and protected underneath by chicken wire (for the burrowing creatures) and a weed block cloth.

We did get one large pod out of the plant. Bettie said that if I had harvested it when it was young and small, it would have done well to thicken a good soup. Instead, I let it grow large, and thus inedible. Well we live and we learn. The one pod can be let to dry, and we can preserve the seeds for planting somewhere suitable next season. They apparently grow better from seed than by transplant anyhow.

Eggplant

The recipe I used to cook the eggplant is Eggplant Caponata.

I left out the black pepper and capers, because I don't really care for either one. If you missed the dish this time, don't fret. We will have plenty of eggplant in the future.

Bearing Fruit

Today's garden cleanup was quite successful. Big thanks to Yolanda and John for helping out. We cleared away most of the pallets and pulled errant grass from the beds. We also planted some carrot, beets, and green beans. Storm clouds cut us short of fixing the fence this time.

The compost barrel (the blue one next to the shed) is full and needs to be allowed to finish up. We will still rotate the barrel every few days to mix air into the compost, but please don't add any more material. There will be a new container for us to put kitchen scraps in the meantime.

The eggplant is bearing its first fruit! It looks quite tasty and ready to harvest for this Sunday's shared luncheon. Stir fry sounds pretty good, don't you think?

What Is Where?

I've received many questions regarding the layout of the garden. What is growing where? How are we watering everything? Well here is our current layout, not showing the various junk that needs to be cleared out (Friday, Aug 19th, 3pm). Click the image to enlarge.

Eggplant, Japanese

Tomato, Heirloom Tiger Stripe

Pepper, Orange

Pepper, Red

Okra

Citronella

Leeks

Marigold, Orange and Yellow

Flower (I keep forgetting to check the tag!) Pink

Mulberry

Banana

Cantaloupe

Pumpkin, Early Sugar

The pump is not working, because it needs to be primed each time it is used or the motor will burn out. Essentially a one-way valve needs to be installed in the hose, as close as possible to the water source. Since we can put it on a timer, that would be essential. It is an inexpensive part that will require some tools for cutting and resealing. However, my big concern is that I don't know whether the water in the pond/stream is safe to put on our edibles. I've been told that people who live along this water let their kids fish and swim in it. I'm not sure if that means it is safe. I've also heard that we can send a sample to the water utility and they will test it. I just have to get around to that. Meanwhile, it has been raining plenty. If it hasn't rained in a few days we only need two or three pails of water carried from the faucet outside the church. Alternatively, with as much rain as we get, we might set up a rain collection system.

Quick Note

The garden cleanup will be Friday afternoon at 3pm, weather permitting. We need to trim the grass, pull a few weeds, clear out the old pallets, fix the fence, and possibly plant some more seedlings.

I have lots of updates and photos to upload, as the garden is built and growing quite nicely!