<p>Oh, I forgot to mention we got a small but delicious blueberry crop from our one bush. And it’s just gorgeous now as its leaves are turning color.</p>
<p>Garland, gee I thought you needed a male and female bush to get blueberries.</p>
<p>Despite the frost, I am still picking raspberries every day. The asters, mums and roses are still blooming away.</p>
<p>We thought so, too. But our other one got stomped on by a neighbor kid cutting through the yard a couple years ago, and the one left continues to put out berries. Guess it never read the manual.</p>
<p>This isn’t from our garden, but just an hour ago, a huge, heavy box showed up from UPS–our yearly shipment of apples (about 70 lbs worth) from our orchard-farmer friend in Michigan. He sends us honey, too! I always forget the apples are coming, and it’s always a wonderful surprise to get them.</p>
<p>On the subject of raspberries and how to maximize yield, I did a couple of long posts here:</p>
<p><a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parent-cafe/756848-razzleberries.html?highlight=raspberries[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parent-cafe/756848-razzleberries.html?highlight=raspberries</a></p>
<p>Despite endless rain for May, June and half of July I had a bumper crop of stringbeans, ate the last ones last night. almost 4 full months of beans, I was giving them away to everyone. Also had a good crop of cherry tomatoes, a pretty good showing of Ramapo tomatoes. The bell peppers weren’t so good, the first set of flowers dropped off, and the second set was slow to come; I just pulled the plants with pint-sized peppers that we also ate last night. A nice steady crop of cucumbers. I am on the Jersey shore.</p>
<p>Let’s see… garden went in three days after closing in mid-May. Massive amounts of tomatoes–too much, according to some people–beets that were wonderful when tiny and boring when large (next year I’ll harvest them all when tiny)–butternut squash, sugar pumpkins (pie pumpkins) that produced massively. Herbs did very well (planted by previous owner). Grapes did very well and some of them tasted good (previous owner must have had weird taste buds). Blueberries did well (I’m still getting a few).</p>
<p>I have a large pot of winter greens that is doing very nicely.</p>
<p>Our rains started two weeks ago and I tore out all the tomatoes. If I liked green tomato chutney I could have made ten pounds of it.</p>
<p>A friend dropped off two pounds of wild chanterelles Monday. He’d picked 15 pounds. And no, I don’t know where he went.</p>
<p>Garland, blueberry leaves are the most beautiful of all the autumn leaves if you ask me. And they dry beautifully as well. A couple years my husband gave me a microwave flower press for Christmas – fill it with blueberry leaves, zap it on high for 30 seconds, and they come out flat, perfect texture and with all those glorious colors. They keep all winter long. I lay them out on the dining room table in place of a centerpiece.</p>
<p>As far a raspberries go we have Heritage raspberries, they are a fall cropping berry so you mow off all the canes ever year and they come up in the spring and fruit on the new canes. Much easier then our old raspberries that we had to prune out.</p>
<p>Thanks to all who have been offering raspberry help!</p>
<p>We grew tomatoes, cherry tomatoes, italian peppers, green bell peppers, cucumbers and zucchini in our fenced in garden. All grew fairly well considering the weather this summer, except that the cucumbers got a fungus after a while. Last year our zucchini got a fungus. I grew herbs in pots on the patio: rosemary, basil and bay leaves. These were ok. Maybe the pots were too small. We had less tomatoes than last year. The best crops were the cherry tomatoes and the italian peppers. I am cooking with peppers a lot: Pepper steak, roasted peppers, sausage and peppers (kind of like Bubba and the shrimp dishes in Forest Gump). I really liked roasting zucchini on the grill, but now it is too chilly for me to grill.</p>
<p>I need to take a mushroom class- I have about 6 kinds of mushrooms growing in my yard but I am afraid to try any of them
I do remember fondly when my brother had a friend who was a chef and who picked some of our mushrooms and stirred them up with garlic and butter and they were delicious but I would be afraid to guess which ones they were.</p>
<p>Anothermom2 it is never to chilly to grill. I remember my father grilling hot dogs on the back porch in howling January blizzard and I put on my stocking cap and boots and get out there and grill!</p>
<p>Lololu, I am just a reformed city girl, and I must not be hardy like Iowans are!</p>
<p>I should take a mushroom class,too. But I fear we mostly have toadstools! In illinois, though, you CAN get a nice crop of wild asparagus in the spring, though I have never yet tried.</p>
<p>H grills year round. The dogs love this, for some reason. They believe they are helping ot cook dinner and entitled to a place at the table. ;)</p>
<p>Speaking of recession eating, D caught a 30 inch blue this afternoon, so the Garland house will be well-fed tonight! :)</p>