Rainy Season

It's rainy season here in central Florida, and for those of us who are acclimated to the steamy life, it is a glorious time to be here. Stuff grows as you look at it. While showering outside on the porch this morning I was entangled in grape vines so aggressive that Andy had to come to my rescue with the clippers.

All the bald patches and armadillo holes have healed over and the Boston ferns we have everywhere for ground cover beneath the live oaks are wildly prolific. The zinnias in the old claw foot bathtub outside my studio window attract huge numbers of butterflies and hummingbirds. I find myself staring at them when I look up from my table.

It's too hot to do much work in the garden after about eight a.m. Today, I pushed it and was working getting the hay mulch on the vegetable garden before the weeds completely take over. Andy has constructed another wonderful lettuce table and I will grow the other stuff around the sides of the enclosed garden.

Our vegetable garden has tall sides of chicken wire to keep out the deer. Over the years this fence has grown a bountiful amount of Virginia creeper, gourds, and morning glories, so it feels rather like a secret garden. I don't weed much, but continuously apply hay mulch kindly donated by a neighbor. On the paths I use wood shavings from Andy's furniture shop. When I plant anything, I just clear away the mulch, add some great compost from our pile, and those new plants or seeds are good to go.

Right now, in the hot rainy season, nothing much grows. I still have some tomatoes, peppers, and eggplants, those of tropical heritage. The lettuce gave up, but the okra looks promising. Basil is terrific and we eat a lot of pesto. Over the years I have learned how to control the worms that would love to bore into just about anything. I have yet to find a way to discourage the stink bugs that keep damaging the tomatoes.

I read in the Wall St. Journal today about the silly rich people who engage landscape architects to make vegetable gardens for their houses at $50,000 a pop. What I know is that you have to be there full time to grow a decent organic vegetable garden. You have to cruise by every plant each day to check for the dreaded( and beautiful!) tomato horn worms, the stink bugs, the powdery mildew on the squashes and cucumbers, and the tell-tale signs of armadillo action or rabbits or squirrels. You have to spend some time reducing the biomass, otherwise known as weeding. And you have to be able to spend some time just being there taking in the wonder of it all. The hummingbirds are there diving into the native red sage and the butterfly plants I allow to grow next to the fence.

I am so hot! I mop my face so I can see and my feet are filthy. This is not Scarsdale and we will not have our guests have hors d'oeurves in the garden. But we will have wonderful meals from what we grow.

In rainy season we plan for the next garden that will begin around Labor Day. I am ordering seeds for interesting lettuces you cannot find in the grocery store. I am looking forward to those huge wonderful rosettes of collards and I can even think again about beans and broccoli and carrots.