Pumpkin Massacre

I love scary stuff.  That might seem a bit incongruous with all the other things I'm into like baking, gardening and other various domestic activities, but I've always loved horror in all forms.  Lately I've been really into playing the video game Dead Island.  I can happily hack and slash at zombies for hours while my boyfriend looks on with an expression that is equal parts amused and appalled. 

So while I enjoy seeing a pixilated zombie get hacked to bits, I do not enjoy it when the carnage comes to my garden.  My pumpkins that I have displayed on my balcony in a charming (if I do say so myself) Fall arrangement have been visited by a scourge.  Not of the undead hordes,  but of demented flocks of birds.  While I sleep, these baleful creatures peck, peck, peck away at my pumpkins leaving them riddled with holes and missing chunks.

I have to admit that while the gardener part of me is angry at the destruction of my pumpkins by the same fiends who ate all my strawberries earlier in the summer, the horror fan in me is strangely fascinated by the gore of it all.  Doesn't that look just like a puddle of blood pooling underneath the mutilated pumpkin on the right?  And is the one on the left with the big drip coming out of it's wound...crying?  No?  Just me?  Okay, maybe its time to lay off the Dead Island.

I don't have these kinds of problems

I recently got back from my trip to Yellowstone National Park and it was absolutely amazing.  I had no idea that the park would be so beautiful.  I took over 600 pictures (all with my iPhone camera...love that thing!)  so I'm currently in the process of going through them all.  

Here are a couple to start with...

At first when I saw this planter, I thought "Oh cute, they made a little covered wagon". 

But then I saw that all the flowers had these wire covers on them.  Are they in flower jail?  It all became clear when I turned a corner and saw this herd of Elk!

This is definitely not a problem that I have on my balcony!

Aphids of Doom

WARNING!  This post contains some gross bug pictures so if you are squeamish, scroll past them really quickly.


Last week was kind of a bad week for my garden.  Seemingly overnight my pepper and tomato plants became totally infested with aphids.

I tried a bunch of different things to get rid of them starting with a homemade garlic and dish soap spray I found online.  After that didn't work, I actually broke down and bought commercial pesticide even though I don't like to use it.  Nothing worked and my plants were getting totally destroyed.  


Finally, they were so damaged that I had to pull them out.  This was beyond frustrating because before the aphid attack they actually seemed like they were doing pretty well.


I rallied quickly though and bought some new plants to take their place.  This time I decided on more herbs.  One of the things I was trying to accomplish in my garden this summer was to experiment with what types of plants I could actually grow in the conditions I have (part shade, limited space).  Now that its already late June, I decided to focus my energy on growing plants that I knew would do well.  The herbs I already have growing are doing really well so I bought a few more varieties.  I added rosemary and two more types of basil.

Spicy Globe Basil and Cinnamon Basil

I've never tried either of these types of basil before.  I usually just grow the standard Genovese basil which is what you would use for pesto or caprese salad.  My boyfriend experimented with the spicy globe basil and made this pasta dish.

Sorry no exact recipe because it was kind of an experiment, but it has chipotle pasta that we got at the farmer's market, alfredo sauce, lots of garlic and red pepper flakes, parsley and spicy basil from my garden and shrimp.  Very spicy, but very delicious!

Garden Friends and Pests

On every stem, on every leaf,... and at the root of everything that grew, was a professional specialist in the shape of grub, caterpillar, aphis, or other expert, whose business it was to devour that particular part. 
~Oliver Wendell Holmes

My garden has been visited by pests!  Specifically in the form of aphids.  So far they aren't too bad.  For some reason they really like the dill so they are mostly leaving the other plants alone.  I don't use any pesticide on my plants so I've been researching non-chemical ways of dealing with them.  Most of the advice I've found is to blast them off with a strong spray of water.  I don't have a hose or anything so I'm on the hunt for a spray bottle that seems powerful.  In the meantime I'm picking them off by hand and squishing them.  Its kind of gross, but it seems to be working.

But the aphids aren't the only unwanted visitors I've had.  The other morning I heard some light thumping outside.  I looked out the window and saw birds eating my strawberries!  They got the berries and all the flowers.  The strawberries weren't doing that well anyway so this wasn't a huge loss, but I was frustrated to lose the couple berries that seemed to actually be growing.  There is one bright spot to all this though.  Since my strawberry plants were pretty much destroyed, I pulled them out and now I have room for more flowers.  And the best part is that the strawberries were planted in a sunny spot so I'm not limited to shade plants for once.

I walked around the garden section of the Home Depot for at least half an hour trying to figure out the most exciting flowers I could get for a relatively small spot.  Eventually I settled on this pretty Dahlia.  I love the bright vibrant colors.

I've already professed a weakness for garden accessories so I thought I would share a few pictures of my garden 'friends'.

First up is Hootie...

Hootie seemed a little lonely so I had to get him a friend.  My Dad bought me this little fish.  Now I have Hootie and the Blowfish!  Cheesy I know, but it makes me smile.

And finally, what garden would be complete without a gnome?  So here is mine.  His name is Gnome Chomsky...

Spinach and Lettuce Part 2

I had to pull out my spinach and lettuce today.  I'm kind of bummed that they didn't do better and I've been speculating about the reasons why.  I recently read an article about Thomas Jefferson's gardens at his Monticello plantation and it mentions that Jefferson talked and wrote extensively about both his successes and failures in the garden.  Its a good reminder for me that we can learn as much from our garden failures as from our success (although the successes are much more fun).

So I have a few theories about why the spinach and lettuce didn't thrive.  I think they both suffered from a combination of the weird weather we have had in northern Illinois this year (a hot couple weeks in March and then a cold April) and the general lack of direct sun on my balcony.

The lettuce plants had always been a little bit wimpy.  Even after I thinned them a couple weeks ago (which did help some) they still had very thin, weak stems that wanted to flop over all the time.  I think the problem was that I don't get any overhead sun on my balcony.  It only comes from one direction so the seedlings would always grow in the direction of the sun.  I would turn the container everyday to try to even them out, but they still didn't want to grow straight up.  I think because the seedlings were always stretching to try to get to sun they grew very thin and stretched out so eventually they weren't able to support the weight of the leaves. 

The spinach seemed to be doing better than the lettuce initially.  It grew bigger and stronger stems and was actually able to hold itself upright.  But this weekend I noticed that it had started to bolt.   What that means is that it started to go to seed.  After that happens the leaves can get very bitter and not good to eat.  May is pretty early for a plant to bolt, but I have a theory as to why this happened.  Like lettuce, spinach does better when it is cooler.  I think because I was so focused on letting the spinach get as much sun as possible (to grow upright), the container overheated and the soil got too hot.  This is a problem in general with container gardening.  The soil gets warm and dried out really quickly.  Since the weather turned warm last week I've had to water all my plants everyday to keep the soil moist enough.

Bolted Spinach

All is not lost however in my quest to grow greens.  I'm attempting lettuce again, but this time I'm starting with plants rather than trying to start from seeds. I think that will help with my sunlight stretching problem.  There is still a chance that it is too warm now for the lettuce and it might bolt like the spinach, but I've put it in a bigger container and I'm keeping it a little further back and out of the direct sun so hopefully the soil will stay cooler.

I've also planted kale a couple weeks ago since I wanted some sort of dark green for cooking to replace the spinach.  I've never tried to grow it so I don't quite know what to expect.  It seems to be doing well so far.

Attack of the Killer Mint

I think you should send us the biggest transport plane you have, and take this thing to the Arctic or somewhere and drop it where it will never thaw.
~The Blob, 1958 version

While this is the first year I am gardening on my balcony (mostly because this is the first year I’ve had a balcony), I am not entirely new to the whole garden experience.  I’ve shared a medium sized garden with my parents at their house for the past few years.  My favorite area is the herb garden.  In the past few years I have tried (unsuccessfully) to grow mint in a container.  I envisioned an endless supply of mojitos to enjoy all summer.  However, we have never had luck growing mint (or really any herbs) in containers so last year we made the bold and potentially foolhardy decision to grow the mint directly in the ground.  If you have never grown mint before you might not know that it is extremely invasive.  Invasive being a nice way of saying that it will take over the entire garden if you turn your back for 5 minutes.  Fortunately we were able to keep it mostly in check last summer.

However, last weekend I went to look at the planters because my mom told me quite casually that “the mint came back this year” and I noticed that we had a situation happening.

Mint explosion!

More mint...Yikes!

I had no idea that it would not only survive the winter, but would have taken over so much by the middle of April.  So needless to say, even after pulling a lot of the more scraggly looking runners out, I had quite a lot of mint to use up.

Since I think my liver would have an issue with me drinking enough mojitos to use all this mint, I decided to make ice cream.

Mint Chocolate Chip Ice Cream (Adapted from Martha Stewart’s recipe for Fresh Spearmint Ice Cream)

Ingredients

   1 cup packed fresh mint (next time I’ll add more mint as it wasn't quite minty enough for me)

   1 cup whole milk

   2 cups heavy cream

   2 large eggs

   3/4 cup sugar

   Pinch salt

   About a cup mini chocolate chips

Directions

   1.     Prepare an ice-water bath. Cook mint in a small saucepan of boiling water until bright green, about 1 minute. Using a slotted spoon, transfer mint to ice-water bath. When cool, drain, and squeeze out excess water.

   2.     Puree mint and milk in a blender until mint is finely chopped. Transfer to a medium saucepan, add cream, and bring to a simmer over medium heat.

   3.     Meanwhile, whisk together eggs and sugar in a medium bowl.

   4.     Gradually whisk 1/3 of the cream mixture into the egg mixture, then pour egg-cream mixture into the saucepan with the remaining cream mixture. Add salt.  Set over medium heat, and cook, stirring constantly with a wooden spoon, until thick enough to coat the back of the spoon, about 8 minutes. (Do not let the mixture come to a simmer.)

   5.     Strain through a fine sieve into a heatproof bowl, pressing on mint to extract liquid. Set bowl in ice-water bath. Let cool completely, stirring occasionally. Freeze in an ice cream maker according to manufacturer's instructions. Add in chocolate chips in the last 5 minutes of churning time.  Transfer to an airtight container, and freeze until firm.  

Frost

Last night, there came a frost, which has done great damage to my garden.... It is sad that Nature will play such tricks on us poor mortals, inviting us with sunny smiles to confide in her, and then, when we are entirely within her power, striking us to the heart. 
~Nathaniel Hawthorne, The American Notebooks

One of the joys of April in Illinois is the constantly changing weather.  Two weeks ago the weather was warm and sunny, but today it is windy with a freeze warning in effect for tonight.  My balcony has a deep overhang so my plants are mostly protected from the frost, but I’m covering them just to be safe.

 My balcony looks a little ghetto with all these plastic bags covering it