yum yum not

YUM YUM NOT

here at the country n the general upkeep that i have to
do has accumulated over the last two months since i
was down for the count with my ruptured disk

this is the time when i usually do a lot of clean up work
around the property as the spring has caused a lot of
plants and grasses to become overgrown

normally in the heat of july i am not doing much outside
since ive usually done most of the maintenance and clean up
in early june

so now i get up early and as soon as the light is light enough
i go outside to start working
but i am still limited on what i can do
but each week the sciatica improves so ive noticed i can
do more each day and not pay the price at night time when
i try to sleep

my measure of how well im doing is how much vicodin i am
taking
my last one was 10 days ago and i also stopped my
antiinflammatory mobic since it made my blood pressure go up
to 160/90-100 and once i stopped that my pressure is now
back to normal
sure helps to be a doctor sometimes

as i walk around my property this week as i am really getting
a close look at everything as i mow weed eat and move brush
i am devastated by the destruction that those damn grasshoppers
have done to our property
plum trees maple trees peach trees pecan trees citrus trees
honeysuckle vines trumpet vines oregano asparagus
lady banks rose persimmon pear
wonder why they wont eat those hackberries that seem to
pop up everywhere

i do not notice that there arent many if any true native plants
that these things eat
like native grapes salvia greggii oaks mesquite cedar elm
youpon holly definitely not cactus morning glory cedar
texas plum texas persimmon

as i walk around i think i wonder how i can get rid of these
guys
my guineas and chickens get so full of grasshoppers sometimes
that a grasshopper could land on their beaks and they
wouldnt eat them
except of course in the morning when we let them out
they are like a sewing machine going after those hoppers

i wonder could i eat those guys
i know in some countries they do
80% of the people in the world do
ive seen them on those food shows you know the one where
those guys will eat and drink anything

i think i would like mine if i ate them real crispy maybe like a
over cooked fired okra or a real burned french fry so
you could close your eyes and pretend it was one of those things
just overdone
bet the crunch would be the same

one of our friends knew of our plight or should i say plaque
and sent me a recipe for cooking those hoppers

from the book


well we do have a lot of onions and our neighbor just gave
us a lot of tomatoes
maybe use that lime that the hoppers didnt eat
and my wife she just bought some new kabob tools
and i did just redo my grill so we have
just what we need here at the country n to cook those hoppers

everyone is invited over for a kaboob at the country n
especially our friend who sent us the recipes
come as you are
bring a container to take some hoppers home with you
so you can cook some at home

oh and i like the last picture on the cover since i love
chocolate

the organicgreen doctor

the rain was good but...

THE RAIN WAS GOOD BUT...
who would have thought  in the heat of july in central texas
heck on saturday it was 103 degrees here and it was
miserable
then in the last 36 hours its all changed
we have had our house opened up like we do in the spring
and the fall every year
then we got this nice slow rain for hours that where we lived
came to 3.25 inches with more possibly on the way
my rainwater tanks are almost full
had i cleaned one of my gutters correctly
i would have filled all my tanks up
this never ever happens in july

heck one year i was buying water like everyone else was
when i ran out of water
ok that one was my fault too as i left a valve on and lost
2 big water tanks full
equal to how much i ended up buying from the water tank
delivery company

i know have enough water to last me until through next summer

im happy about all of this rain and nice temperatures
so dont get me wrong
but its also sad too

sad too
why
see the fig tree above its about 10 ft tall and a few weeks ago
it was loaded with leaves and figs
within days the grasshoppers devoured all the leave on this one
and now they are working on the peach trees and pecan trees
why wont they eat weeds and cedar trees
and of course they have really chomped on my garden

had this grasshopper infestation not happened i probably would
still have a garden that was booming and blooming
especially with all this rain

i do get some revenge every morning as i go into my garden and
shoo all the grasshoppers into the beaks of my awaiting chickens
who surround my garden space
i love to watch the chickens attack and devour those hoppers
justice is served as the hoppers devoured my garden plants and
my fig tree

sad too since all this rain we got is apparently not going to make a
difference in the lake levels that are the major water source for
the cities around here

so this am im recovered enough from the gis and since my sciatica
is better with the bed rest i plan to reassess my garden and make
a definite decision on what to salvage

i have my summer garden under row cover
ill see how well thats working
i plan to replace the old row cover with new pieces that will
be cut to fit each bed better

then tomorrow i plan on getting my fall tomatoes from the natural
gardener in austin and plant them this week as soon as the soil dries
out
ill cover them well with the thin row cover so the hoppers wont
get to them

yes nows the time to plant fall tomatoes and its the best time
the fall to have a garden in central texas as the season sometimes
extends well into december

try the fall garden this year if you live here
heck you can even bid on the 4 ft square garden im building for
a fundraiser for our walk to end alzheimers team
more on that in the future

another sad thing is that i know that with the next rain that comes
my tanks all 30,000 gallons will start overflowing
if you are a rainwater connoisseur you know thats something that
is hard to tolerate

yes rain is good but it can be a sad thing too sometimes

my motherinlaw was here for 2 weeks
although i hardly saw her or my wife she as they disappeared all
day every day
i always wanted to follow them around like a detective to see what
they did all day
but i didnt
and its best i probably dont know everything

one thing she does along with my wife she is they string up my onions
that i grow
by putting them in panty hose tying a knot then putting in aganother onion
then tying a knot etc until that leg of the hose is full
last year it was easy as the harvest was small but
this year the harvest was bountiful and many of the onions were huge

here are some of these onion chimes
the large ones will fit in my hand like a softball

so i would say the spring garden was successful
just wish it would last longer

the organicgreen doctor

they are everywhere

THEY ARE EVERYWHERE
this spring i had the prettiest garden ive ever had
tomatoes producing like crazy
some of them would take up a whole hand
and they were heirloom delicious sink tomatoes

we had beans and more beans of different varieties
the best were the two foot long asian beans my older
brother gave me

we had lots of lots of squash looking like we were going to
defeat that squash borer this year
by planting tatume squash

luckily we had a bumper crop of onions and garlic

we also have and still have armenian cucumbers being
produced

yep one proud organicgreen doctor of his garden

then

in june it was hot and dry
the fewest rain weve had in june maybe ever
luckily i had plenty of irrigation rainwater to use
but that heat just takes its toil on plants

we were doing ok until about a week ago
when we got that 100+ temps several days in a row

that seemed to activate the grasshoppers
we have grasshoppers every year but
this year its the worst ever
its of biblical proportions

when you go in our garden there are thousands of grasshoppers
it seems in the garden
chopping away at everything green
there are so many that even the country n hens get their fill
early on each day and seem to not be interested the rest of the day

even our two guineas start out the day going after those grass hoppers
but soon i guess get so full they just stop eating them

when you walk out to our car there are so many grasshoppers that
they jump against the metal siding of our house and it sounds
like some one is shooting it with bird shot

here is what use to be a beautiful coral honeysuckle that for
some reason the hoppers really like

they especially like my citrus trees
they even eat the bark off the branches

in the back ground you can see where ive covered up the
citrus plants with row cover hoping to salvage enough of the
plants to keep them alive

i have no pictures of my garden as i dont want any pictures to
look at in the future
as looking at the garden in real time makes me sick

tomatoes destroyed
asian beans gone
other beans about gone
squash either grasshoppered or squash borered
luckily my peas are being spared for now as are my cucumbers
but it appears that they are beginning to eat them now

ive managed to cover up my summer stuff with row cover
okra peppers basil egg plant and some tomatoes
the rest im afraid are doomed

im just glad i dont do this for a living
but even then
its devastating after all the work

maybe ill start having fried grasshoppers every day
i could feed all of texas just from my property

the organicgreen doctor