Summer Harvest (After the Rabbits, Raccoons, Deer, Groundhogs, and Foxes Got Done with It)
THE FXBG ADVANCE WEDNESDAY 7/15/26 MIDDAY READ
By Donnie Johnston, ADVANCE COLUMNIST
It’s harvest time.
No more walking behind a plow, pulling weeds or chopping with a hoe. Now all I do is pick, can, freeze and eat off the bounty of the land.
The beans are done. I canned about 70 quarts and 30 pints and gave some to a friend to freeze. Then I turned the patch over to a neighbor, and she and her four teenage daughters picked what was left, about 20 gallons in two separate pickings.
Yes, the teenage girls actually picked, a rarity in this day and time. Good people.
And I was able to share with at least half a dozen other family members and friends.
All told, I got about 65 gallons out of the patch, not a record (85 gallons one year), but a substantial amount. Four pickings. And I still have a few left to pick for supper each night.
I plant with an old two-row corn planter, and my plants are spaced four-to-six inches apart (not sown). That improves the yield. Several individual plants (bush beans, not pole beans) produced more than 100 beans in four pickings. I’m satisfied.
I’m now picking sweet corn. Again, a good season. The problem is that it all comes in at once. Bean season extends for three weeks and tomatoes more than a month. Corn season is maybe 10 days long. I have neighbors that like corn and they are getting plenty of it.
So are the deer and the raccoons, especially the coons. My patch is about 100 yards from a creek, and those coons are in it from the first ripe ear, as are a couple of deer. I have peppered the deer with birdshot, but they are back within 20 minutes. The coons are harder to shoot because they are not as dumb as deer. Some years I resort to trapping them.
The coons also tore up my lower watermelon patch, destroying melons before they were even close to being ripe. I despise those animals.
A groundhog also got a few ears of corn, but I nailed him with birdshot and he hasn’t been back. Amazingly, the crows haven’t done any damage.
Rabbits damaged my sweet potato vines, and a fox gnawed on two of my honeydew melons. I’m ready to shoot anything on four legs that doesn’t wear a collar or a saddle.
Yes, I know, they must eat, too, and I’ll be glad to share when they start helping pull weeds and hoe taters.
My potatoes are ready to dig. Not the best crop I’ve ever had, but enough to get me through the winter. The vines suffered through two freezes in April, which stunted them somewhat. With this heat, I won’t be digging this week.
Haven’t canned any tomatoes yet, but I’ve been eating tomato and mayonnaise sandwiches since the Fourth of July. Hope the heat doesn’t blister them. Not canning as many this year—maybe 30 or 40 quarts—because I have some left over from last season. They are great for spaghetti sauce, macaroni and tomatoes, and stuffed peppers.
Eating stuffed peppers once or twice a week these days. Excellent crop of green peppers, which hopefully will keep growing until frost.
Okra is in, and I have it on the supper table almost every night. Cucumber crop has been good.
Had a fine crop of cabbage, and coleslaw has also been a supper staple. And the best white onions I have ever grown (from plants, not bulbs). Yellow onions have done well, too.
Made about 10 quarts of beet pickle, and still eating fresh beets out of the patch. The chilly weather in April and May did wonders for the cold weather crops.
Cantaloupes and watermelons are the last crops to come in. Cantaloupes and honeydews are starting to ripen, and what watermelons are left are about two weeks away.
It was dry in April, but we had good rains in May, June, and so far in July.
Very few bugs. One spraying took care of the potato bugs, and I saw only one Japanese beetle all summer. For whatever reason, those pests have all but disappeared.
Only one lanternfly so far, but the season is not over. It is the four-legged monsters that are driving me nuts.
Yes, I am eating well these days. Love gardening season. Not hard work if you do a little (maybe 15-30 minutes each day), but plenty of rewards at the supper table.
And with the pantry full, I know I won’t starve this winter.
This year the garden will produce max yield for tomatoes and bush beans in September, which can be the "coolest" month of the warm weather growing season. Why? I hope to avoid heating the kitchen with the usual serial-canning sessions. Less heat, cooler kitchen assisted by a new pressure canner powered by electricity that's hosted by our garage. As for varmits, I've already relocated one young adult and one first-year groundhog; am prepping by garlic-hot-pepper solution spray set-up to deter squirrels; and of course remain on the lookout for those lantern flies (I've seen just one so far). Also I'll mention winter vegetables that start with the kale and broccoli, now two weeks post-germination in the growing room; planting them in mid- to late-August; additionally seeding in September with cilantro, et al. at the top of the to-do list. Enjoy your life and your gardens, Donnie