Late July and the days grow shorter and warmer. Suddenly, the root plants die back and it is time to get them out of the ground.

We grow four varieties of garlic: two hard neck and two soft neck. The “neck” refers to the stems. These are River Giant, and they loved the weather this year! Only a few tried to bolt (creating a hard neck in a soft neck variety), so I was able to braid them easily. I will bundle the hard necks. All will go down into the basement, where it is dry, cool, and dark. We are just finishing off last year’s garlic, which means we planted enough, but not too much. The soft necks tend to last longer than the hard neck varieties, as the paper around each clove clings tighter, protecting them from dehydration.

The red onions are so jewel-like as they come out of the ground. We rub as much dirt off as possible right away, as they are almost impossible to clean if the dirt dries on. When we first grew onions we washed them in water. The onions rotted. They need to be kept as dry as possible if they are to last all winter.

We spread them on tables until the tops are mostly dried. Then I braid them and into the basement they go. We ran out of onions in May. Shortly thereafter, the new crop grew large enough to steal green onion tops. We bought onions from the store twice. It reminded us why we grow our own.

These little tomato-y looking fellers are potato fruit. I found them about a month ago. You can see the leaves beginning to turn brown on the ends. They are very shriveled now.

The russets ripened first. Michael digs them, washes them, dries them in the sun, and then spreads them out on cardboard in the basement with a fan blowing over them. After a week of drying, they get packed in cardboard boxes with newspapers tucked around them. They last longer in the dark. We bought store potatoes twice, and then swore off. Seasonal eating, it’s what we do more and more.

We harvested the last four broilers on July 18th. They averaged 10 pounds each. It was almost as much work getting them into the freezer as it was processing 10 chickens weighing 4 pounds each. We have started harvesting ducks too. However, they are still feathering out after the molt, which makes plucking them very labor intensive. We will give them another week before trying this again.

We work in the early mornings while it is still cool. Keeps the birds fresh as we clean them and the insects at bay.

The sweet clover, goldenrod and black eyed susans appeared in mid-July.

At about the same time we picked all the red currants and started a batch of wine. We should have gathered the black currants at the same time, but we got chased in by the weather.

Big lightening accompanied this rain. Safer to be indoors! I raced inside with my bowl of currants.

I gathered about 3 cups of black currants and made 3 cups of jam. You know I love you if you ever get any black currant jam!

Hot weather. We will have tomatoes soon. No wine and roses. These are days for milkweed and beer!

Thank you Nancy and Diane for coming to share our bounty!