Tilling in the Corn, Tilling in the Corn....

[Chuck52]

Sung to the tune of that great old hymn "Bringing in the Sheaves:

So my corn experiment was smooshed by the midwest drought and now I'm planning to plow under the dried up corn stalks so I at least get some compost added to the patch. However, I bet the stalks will just wind around my tiller tines unless I first chop them up somehow. I don't have a brush hog, just a finishing mower. It'd probably take the beating OK, but I guess I could also just wade in with my machete. Tha area to be tilled in is about 25x50 feet. That's the first two of my four 25x25 patches I planted. The last two may still make some corn if we get a bit more rain than the 0.6 inches we got a few days ago. Before that we hadn't had any rain to speak of the entire month of July, and the temps were in the 100's for a couple of weeks, too. The deer and coons also did a good job of breaking down any stalks that had miniature ears on them. If we get rain I'll put up an electric fence using the antique BullDozer fence charger I got at the local Ace for $5. I haven't seen much reason to fence in the rapidly dying corn so far.

Chuck

 

[slowrev]

Does not sound like much "we shall go rejoicing" will be involved.
sorry to say.

Have any Harrows ? Several passes with them should chop up the corn. Set them at an angle.

Ben

 

[Bob_Skurka]

Chuck, I was looking at my corn yesterday too. I'm going to be tilling about an acre of it under. The drought did it in.

My tomatoes are going to produce, but are a full month behind. I have 30 pepper plants in the ground, so far they have produced a grand total of 2 scrawny peppers! Out of 6 Honeydew vines we have 1 melon. Got 3 'sugar baby' watermelons in the watermelon patch and they are TINY. Eggplants don't look much larger than when I put the plants in the ground but I have a couple very small fruits growing, not sure they will matue. We also lost about a dozen ornamental trees, and a couple blueberry bushes.

I have to figure out how to get water out to the places that needed it!!!

 

[Chuck52]

Slowrev,

Got no harrows, so I'll have to make do. If I can break up the stalks a bit my 5' KK tiller should grind 'em up and into the dirt.

Bob,

I'm getting lots of tomatoes, but many are small. The best ones so far are the Black Krim. Lots of the tomatoes got sun scalded, too, last week. It was hot enough to barbeque without lighting the grill. My peppers are actually doing better than they've ever done for me, except for the cayennes. For some reason, maybe the wrong variety, the cayennes are really small. I've had a number of bell peppers, and I have always had problems with them before this year. I pulled my onions and dug the potatoes a while back to keep them from fermenting in the ground. Nothing much seems to like temps in the 100's and no water....go figure!

I planted some pecan trees last fall and they seem to have survived with the little watering I have given them. Three of them are far enough from the house that I had to haul a 55 gallon drum of water to them a couple of times. I lost one peach and one plum tree, but I think I may have done a poor job planting those two, as three other peach and plum trees planted at the same time are doing OK, as are the two crab apples and one weird apple tree I planted then. The crab apples and the Graniwinkle apple were all from Vintage Virginia Apples, and are supposed to be good for hard cider, so I worked at them a little more, I guess. /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif I also put in three Carpathian-type walnuts this spring and they are OK, but I can water them with a hose. On the other hand, my tame blackberries are looking pitiful. They're just out of hose reach, and I didn't try to water them. I have hope the roots will survive, since they are in about the wettest part of my property and probably didn't go completely dry. Sure is fun planting stuff, eh? I had visions of many different varieties of fruits and nuts all getting to the producing stage before I retire in about nine years, and hard cider to wash them down with.

Chuck

 

[PineRidge]

Our first planting of corn has produced some of the sweetest corn that I have eaten in a long time. Unfortunately because of the dry conditions the ears were really small. The second and third plantings may do better (I hope).

The tomatoes are starting to come in and look good so far.

The green beans and yellow wax beans have been plentiful. We have been harvesting them in 5 gallon buckets.

Just got a few Zucchini most of the plants withered and died.

The yellow medium hot block peppers have been awesome this season. We stuffed a big batch of them and had the neighbors over for dinner. You would have thought that we served Filet Mignon, they loved them and so did we.

 

[Chuck52]

Before the drought hit here, I got a decent yield of green beans. I kept another row alive through the drought with a soaker hose and got some beans off that....enough to freeze a few pint bags after we ate all the fresh beans we wanted. The yellow and zuchini squash were pretty good all through the drought, with irrigation, but they seem to be about petered out now. Got enough beets early on to can a dozen pints of pickled. I guess all-in-all it hasn't been a bad year even if we don't get corn. It was the first year for the corn patch anyway, and I wasn't counting on much. It is just disappointing when the growing season starts with so much good weather and then goes to heck.

Chuck