Pumpkin Update August 7 2008
As you can see the pumpkins are continuing to grow like crazy. There are two that are 57" around already. If they keep growing, who knows how big they will get. We are not competing for the biggest pumpkin at the fair, but it is fun to grow such a big one. There are probably 20 others started.

Now the real garden story for the week. Notice the corn patch is looking pretty good. We planted four rows every 2 weeks so we would have corn over a longer period of time and the first four rows I planted a early variety that only gets about 4' tall. Well as the ears were beginning to ripen, some animal went down all four rows and peeled the husk back and ate some of the tender corn. Almost every ear was ruined. We just figured it was a raccoon and expected he would be back for more of our tender corn. Mack decided he would put a stop to that so the next night he brought a spot light and his shotgun as well as a variety of other guns to see if he could eliminate the varmit before he destroyed the rest of the garden. I know it is difficult, but I would like you to picture this in your mind. Mack is sitting in his Suburban down wind of the garden so the corn destroyer will not pick up his sent. He is lying in the front seat with the seat reclined as far as possible. He set his watch to vibrate every 20 minutes and placed it on his forehead so it would wake him. I only wish I had a picture of him. That is dedication to the garden. Lucky for the raccoon, he did not appear that evening.

Now for the rest of the story:

Talking to a neighboring gardner down the road he is told there were two raccoons thrown in his dumster by someone. He was also told that the real corn killer might have been starling birds who also love corn. This reminds me of another story, but it it too long to tell tonight.

We have been enjoying a ton of squash, beans and swish chard. The tomatoes are just starting to ripen and I ate one of them tonight for dinner. It is nice to have fresh garden tomatoes even if we don't have very many yet.

Thank you Mack for your dedication to the garden. If we could find someone as dedicated about killing the noxious weeds we would have a beautiful garden. Any volunteers?