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Shanel Loveless

Lessons Learned!

Each year I learn and gain more knowledge during and after the close of the planting season. This year, I really planted a lot of vegetables in our family garden and learned a lot. Certain varieties, especially heirloom, need much more room to grow. This caused a situation in my cucumber bed, and had I quickly treated with a copper fungicide spray I would have saved my plants. Unfortunately, we were so busy that I neglected to get the affected plant and within 3 weeks all plants were affected. This resulted in having to just pull up the crop. Prior to this I was pulling out over half of a bushel a day of cucumbers.


My zucchini was one such plant that was also planted too close together, which resulted in powdery mildew. I quickly broke a few of the overhang branches off and remedied the issue quickly. We had zucchini coming out the ears. We made zucchini boats, fried zucchini, and then I also froze some boats, and some slices for winter. It was a great harvest.


Fortunately, my eggplant was planted far enough apart and each plant produced significant harvest. There is nothing like pulling from your own garden and feeding your family. It brings me such great joy to know we have food readily available all summer, and when we preserve we have great vegetables in the winter. We managed to put up a lot in our freezers, and canned some as well.


I will close this with a very funny lesson learned. My daughter and I were canning Salsa and decided to forgo the necessity to wear gloves while pitting and cutting jalapenos. Let me just say...WHAT A MISTAKE! Our fingers/hands were on FIRE ya'll, no joke! So learn from our mistake and wear gloves while dealing with hot peppers. Also, if you do happen to make the same mistake as us, soak your fingers/hands in vinegar for about 10-15 minutes. It works wonders!


Share what you learned this year!! I think it is awesome to share our challenges, not only to provide learning to others, but also to just vent our frustrations!


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