That was a crazy night! We normally have pretty high sustained winds around here, it's on the coast, after all, but the gusts usually spell disaster! When I filmed that video my neighbor was looking for her little dog out there and part of the fence had blown down! My dogs won't even go out when it's like that. So the high winds lasted about 45 minutes, we got an inch of rain in about 10 minutes, and then thunder and lightning and a steady slow rain for several hours after that. The silver lining of all this rain lately is no watering the garden in the early morning all week!
The verdict:
Sunflowers are simply amazing, still tall this morning
This is certainly not what I expected. My Orange Wellington tomatoes are in a container that is massive, sized for a tree, and very heavy. Definitely a W-T-H? moment!
Below are the tomatoes I was concerned about, the UFO's, especially since they stick 8-9 feet into the air and I haven't saved seed yet.
So my ridiculously unstable PVC experiment was a huge success! I kind of had the feeling it would be, since I had tried everything else previously. Last year I had super strong fencepost Florida Weaves going on and they effectively created a brick wall for wind, shredding the tomatoes during Hurricane Season. This year I opted for this floppy mess of a system, the PVC is literally jammed in the corners without rebar and simply tied together with twine at the top! The PVC flexed and swung back an forth in the wind but the vines were so spread out the air flew right in between the whole thing!
A branch of Quadrato Peppers was found about 30 feet from the plant, now I guess I'll get green peppers instead of red!
It actually gets much worse here in the fall, with the strongest hurricanes and tropical storms typically arriving in October, then in November the Nor'easters start arriving. My fall plants are so much closer to the ground then that it isn't as devastating. This is the reason I can't do hoophouses or tunnels here, the winds are too much. I learned my lesson after losing a bunch of money in PVC, rebar, and plastic 2 years ago!
On a high note yesterday was the 2 loaves of bread I got baked, sliced and frozen. I could have done another 1-2 loaves, but want to make sure this particular recipe thaws well. I have a feeling that getting the right recipe will be a big learning curve.
Now I need to get a weekly kinderGARDENS post together, that has been a challenge this year with the heat!
That bread looks wonderful Erin, what recipe did you end up using? What about the kneading etc? How did you end up doing it?
ReplyDeleteCrazy flying peppers around your parts, dogs best be donning hard-hats. ;)
Well, I guess it could have been worse. Pepper plants sure are delicate things, and break by just looking at them!
ReplyDeleteHurrah for not too much damage. And your bread looks fantastic! Congrats.
ReplyDeleteJudy
Your bread came from the store, didn't it....c'mon, admit it. It's too perfect to come from a home kitchen. ;-)
ReplyDeleteGlad you came through the storm OK. I hope your potted tomato survived. Mine that blew over last year didn't. I uprighted them and they just drooped and died from having their roots pulled loose from the ground beneath the pot. That's why I have them all secured with 8' stakes screwed into the eaves this year!
Kelly, I used a recipe from a book I have titled "Bread Machine", it's one of those bargain rack books at B&N I got a few years ago. It has alot of dough recipes that you just use the breadmaker to mix in, then shape and bake by hand. It uses milk and butter in it, supposed to keep better with milk in it? I will post the recipe if it thaws out and still eats well, that is the test since I have to have only one bread day a week and freeze it for later.
ReplyDeleteEG, flying peppers beats the hell out of flying glass any day LOL
Judy & Gran, thanks, and the bread looks good just because I sliced it all before freezing LOL! I am sure my husband will come home and shake his head at me for having to use the bread machine and recipe to make the dough, but hey, he's not here, what else could I do? I don't have his "yeast prowress"!
OMG Gran, that's what that ROOT was from! I'm such a moron, I was righting the pot this morning and was like "where did that root come from" duh... it didn't cross my mind since this pot is one that didn't get the bottom cut out, but it obviously grew through the drainage hole, it was big and looked like a parsnip, so they might be done for by this evening, a shame since that was my largest reliable producer of standard size tomatoes!
Your bread looks incredible! Hope it freezes and thaws well because I would love to have the recipe.
ReplyDeleteGlad you didn't have too much damage, but ripping a whole pepper branch off is amazing! Good luck weathering the hurricane season.
ReplyDeleteGran... they are dead tonight.... RIP beautiful Orange Wellingtons with 31 green tomatoes on the vine...
ReplyDelete*Sniffle* It was nice knowing you, O.W.
ReplyDeleteDo you like mince pies or cookies? There is an excellent green tomato mincemeat. I used to can it every year, as it was the only thing I liked with green tomatoes. Now they have decided it's not safe to can, so it is only frozen, and I just don't have the room in my freezer. I would suspect the texture is a bit changed from the canned version, too.
Glad to see your garden made it through the storm ok! Maybe the orange wellingtons were just too top heavy. Hopefully a few of the green tomatoes will ripen indoors.
ReplyDeleteNice job on the loaves of bread!
ReplyDelete