Pretty safe to say that it’s not going to be a great tomato year. If we’re very very lucky maybe we’ll get some honker waterlogged fruit with split skins but conditions are apparently favorable for something even less delicious. Late Blight is all over the news and typical of the media we have been primed for panic and widespread tomato mayhem. Truth be told, I am generally irritated by the culture of fear promoted by the press – it’s one of my pet peeves – but the more I read about Late Blight, the more I think “eeu”.

Phytophthora infestans (- can’t you just tell that this is something disgusting?) is the same disease that wiped out potatoes during the Great Famine in Ireland and could do (has done) the same in any monoculture of tomatoes or potatoes here if we don’t keep a keen eye out. The recommendation for anyone growing tomatoes is to check for infestation daily and bag up, throw out, Do Not Compost any plants that show any signs of the disease (for pictures and info, click here). But what really scares the daylights out of me is that we’ve collectively been advised to spray fungicides with clorothalonil – a skull & crossbones carcinogenic – as a preventive measure. Now, I can understand commercial growers doing this to protect their crops and livelihoods, but homeowners? Come on. We’re not growing a monoculture in our gardens – are we? How about we just enjoy something else this year? I for one will gladly pay a ransom especially for an organically grown, disease-free tomato if I have to and would be much happier and probably healthier if my neighbors upwind choose to do the same. And it seems to be a terrific Swiss chard, cabbage and lettuce year…

So far, Blithewold’s tomatoes are clean. The fungus, which overwinters on living tissue, must not have found any errant potato tubers left in the garden. And since we grow our own tomatoes from seed, we haven’t imported it either. But the weather isn’t on our side. Cool-ish days and nights (60-80°F) coupled with humidity and rain – we’ve had plenty of that – are ideal for spreading infection from garden to garden and as long as that continues we’ll have to keep our eyes peeled. (A stretch of stupidly hot weather, if we ever get the summer blaze we’re used to, will knock the disease out of contention.)

How are your tomatoes? Have you sprayed – or will you?

Rated NC 39 for graphic bug sex, violence and strong language

In a garden as beautiful as this (the North Garden this very morning) you might not be aware at first glance of the horrors lurking within and on top. But they’re here. The first Japanese beetle was sighted (by me) on July 6th and was ceremoniously snipped in half with an invective and a flourish (also by me). Ever since that day, we’ve had cans of soapy water at the ready and homicide in our hearts.

Normally I’m a very live-and-let-live sort of person. I don’t always mind an aphid or 2 and I generally think the bunnies in the garden are wicked cute and occasionally photogenic. But when it comes to wholesale destruction of something I love – particularly any plant in one of my favorite gardens, I lose my cool. Gail and I would never ever consider spraying poisonous chemistry to kill pests – it’s just not worth the risk to the volunteers’, visitors’ and our health – or the health of bugs we need and want in the garden. But I think nothing of hand picking, squishing (if I’m wearing gloves), drowning or feeding certain pests to the birds. (That said, our resident hawk family has been hard at work on the bunny population without any help from me.)

Japanese beetles feed on upwards of 300 species of plants and nothing in this part of the world feeds on them. There’s something wrong with that picture, isn’t there? So we try to do our top-of-the-food-chain best to control the population ourselves. We actually thought we might have put a dent in the numbers when we were planting this spring – every hole we dug was full of white grubs which of course we squished on sight. But I guess we weren’t able to get them all. We also have a population of Oriental beetles which are slightly smaller and a boring striped brown rather than the metallic auto body green of the Japanese beetles. The really disgusting thing about the beetles is that they tend to feed in sort of orgiastic pig piles.  According to my favorite bug book, Garden Insects of North America by Whitney Cranshaw, “The aggregation pheromones these insects produce combined with attractive odors produced by food plants often result in large numbers feeding together.” But that does make it so much easier to knock bunches at once into the beetle juice can… I remember thinking last year that there were fewer beetles and I wonder if it’s too soon to say that there are even less so far this year. Maybe the milky spore disease that Dan spread 3 years ago now is kicking in – and maybe, just maybe hand picking isn’t just a cathartic serial killing spree for us. Maybe we are actually slowing them down. Fingers crossed. And here’s a helpful hint if happen to be looking for one: They’re sleepy early in the morning. By mid morning on a hot day they’re more likely to see you coming and fly into your hair.

Have your beetles emerged yet? Do you have homicide in your heart?

In a way it’s a little strange that this seems (maybe especially to non-gardeners) to be the hub of our gardening year – that all of our efforts revolve around this very point.  We know that’s not true at all and yet… We plan and plant and starting right about now or a couple of weeks ago if we’re really on the ball, we maintain – and begin to plan again for next year. Not only that but rather ironically, mid-summer/mid-July is generally one of the least pleasant times of year to actually be in the garden. It’s usually too hot, too muggy, too buggy to fully enjoy the mid summer blooms of our labor and so this is traditionally the perfect time to vacate the premises.

Most gardeners I know actually prefer other seasons to this and design their gardens accordingly. I seem to have a spring garden at home and Gail definitely has an early fall one. The Display Garden is a September garden – although a lot of my shots today were taken here – and the Rock Garden peaks much earlier than now. The Rose Garden, of course, has two seasons before and after the mid-summer beetle battle (they emerged just this week). But unlike most summers on record, we’re enjoying unseasonably mild and lovely English sort of weather and it’s actually quite nice to be out in the garden. The plants are looking like they’re loving being here too. I wouldn’t want to be anywhere else. (Ask me again though in 2 weeks and I’ll sing a different song on my way to Oh Canada…)

In honor of Garden Bloggers Bloom Day (hosted as always by Carol of May Dreams Gardens – visit her site to see what’s in bloom in blogs from around the world), here’s a selection of Blithewold’s mid-July blooms and one bud for next time: (Hover over for caption and click on for larger image)