PEA PLANTING TIME!

Now I obviously have no idea if this is true, but today my mom's neighbor told her:

"It's the fifth warm day of March in a row, today's the day to plant peas."

My mom told me this news this evening.

Coincidentally, I had planted my first round of peas today.  The ground was moist but not mucky and it was lovely outside.  The weeds and rocks were less than lovely, but you'll have this. 

Since I really have no idea what I'm doing and just realized, "Oh dear!  Peas are supposed to go in early!" I'm really quite reassured to know that this was the day my mom's neighbor felt peas should be planted.  It's nice to happen to align with someone's schedule.

Here's hoping he knows what he's talking about!

BLIGHT!!!

My trash can is full of cucumber, cantalope, and zucchini plants--and my one grape tomato plant and sunflower. Bummer. It looks like blight, from what I can deduce from my online research. I don't know, things didn't look so healthy, that's what I do know. Which means I can't even have the satisfaction of composting the vines. I have a feeling my remaining zucchini, cantalope, and tomato plants will meet an early end as well. Serious bummer. On the bright side, this opens up room for the fall planting I meant to do (I got a late start in the spring because I had not yet realized I was going to become a 4 Season Harvest girl--yes, yet another reference to Eliot Coleman--and you have to have your summer crops out of the way by early August if you want to have room for broccoli rabe, rutabagas, red beets, carrots (for overwintering), leeks, spinach, and what have you. So this empty patch (where my cucumber and some cantalopes once grew) will hopefully be a burgeoning plot of broccoli rabe in a few months. I wasn't really prepared for the great loss that an organic farmer can have in a growing season. That cucumber was my joyful companion each time I gazed out my kitchen window. I had such high hopes . . .
Maybe this is my rite of passage.