Today's episode is a special interview with Meg Lea of the Fox and Hound Garden in Wisconsin. Meg harvested an unbelievable amount of food from her Zone 4b gardens last year and donated over two thirds of it.
We chat about all things gardening, from planning to production, donations and dollar roadside stands, overambitious plantings and failing forward. It's a great conversation with a fellow gardener that you'll love to listen in to. By the end you'll have commiserated and maybe have an inkling to add a few new things to the garden. Let's dig in!
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00:00:00
So I just tabulated our numbers like this morning from this last
00:00:03
year growing. I grew over 3000 lbs.
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That's. Amazing.
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It's literally just the two of us, so there's only so much food
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2 individuals can eat. If you look at your pictures,
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you know, on Instagram, it's just it's mind blowing how much
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stuff you are fitting into that 1400 square feet.
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That is Meg Leah, a modern homesteader in northwest
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Wisconsin who grows food for her family, friends and her
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community in her fox and hound garden.
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With her partner, a backhoe and a dream.
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In 2019, she turned a grassy lawn into what is now 1400
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square feet of healthy, productive gardens.
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Lots of patience over ambitious dreams and failing forward
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helped her grow into the successful gardener she is now
00:00:52
today on Just Grow Something. Meg and I talk all things
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gardening and gardening for community.
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If you've ever thought that even just a little bit extra from
00:01:01
your garden wouldn't be worth dropping off at the food pantry,
00:01:04
Meg and I beg to differ. We talk planning, preserving,
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sharing the harvest, big flashy tomatoes and dogs in the garden.
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We also talk about the time commitment needed to grow such a
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big garden and huge harvest in a short season area, which is less
00:01:21
than what you might think. And the one must have tool that
00:01:24
Meg uses that has cut her wedding time by 75%, which of
00:01:29
course means it's now on my wish list.
00:01:32
Let's dig in. Hey, I'm Karen.
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I started gardening in a small corner of my suburban backyard
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and now 18 years later, I've got a degree in horticulture and
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operate a 40 acre market farm. I believe there is power in food
00:01:45
and that everyone should know how to grow at least a little
00:01:47
bit of their own. On this podcast, I share
00:01:50
evidence based techniques to help you plant, grow, harvest,
00:01:53
and store all your family's favorites.
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Consider me your friend in the garden.
00:01:57
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free shipping at planter Box direct.com There's one thing I
00:03:01
talk about more than the benefits of mulch in the garden.
00:03:04
It's the benefits of keeping a garden journal.
00:03:07
Now I'm old school and I do things with a notebook and a
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pencil, but Meg's got a digital data guy on her side to help her
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keep track of how things are going in the garden, which means
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she can really dial in what's working and what's not.
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So we're my husband's like a super nerd when it comes to like
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calculating things. He likes to see production.
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So is this plant actually producing?
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Is it doing what it's supposed to be doing, or is it just kind
00:03:34
of a lazy hangouter that we could get rid of, We could try
00:03:38
something different? So we started calculating
00:03:41
numbers when I actually started being successful at gardening.
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So like 2021, I'd say we started counting to see how we did.
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And it's helped me in like variety choice.
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Then I know what I like, what I don't like, and then it gives us
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a rough idea of how much are we keeping.
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And then everything else gets donated.
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It gets given to friends, family.
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I mean, I Ding Dong ditch stuff. I it goes everywhere.
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But there's very little that. I mean, we keep what'll keep us
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fed for a year and then the rest all goes to people that'll use
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it. Have you ever really tracked how
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much you and your family eat in a year by weight?
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Think about that for a hot 2nd. It's Meg and her husband, two
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adults growing 3000 lbs of fresh produce.
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They're keeping what they'll eat in a year and giving away the
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rest. How much do you think that is?
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How much produce do you think you and your family would need
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to produce to keep you fed, fresh and preserved for a year?
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Do you have a number in mind? Let's see what Meg says of that
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£3000, how much stays home and how much gets gifted.
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I'd say less than 1/3 of it we keep.
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So one of my huge garden goals is to try and save what will
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feed us for a year and to like or at least until I get lettuce
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out of the garden again. So what we can hold on to.
00:05:03
So I've got a wall of like pumpkins and squash and that
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kind of a thing. So I keep roughly 1 pumpkin or
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squash variety for each month. So in that way I know I've got
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that to use that month for meal planning.
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I keep two big boxes of onions. I've got a probably a half a
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fridge of carrots. I've preserved a ridiculous
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amount of tomatoes, some Peppers, but then yeah,
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basically everything else. What we don't eat or we don't, I
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don't cook for people, It all goes to everyone else.
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So I'd say we probably about a third we hold on to and then the
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rest goes elsewhere. So Meg says.
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Oh, probably less than 1/3. Like, that's not much, but
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that's 1000 lbs. Even if she weren't giving away
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so much. That's a great yield for a
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family of two and something to aspire to for sure.
00:05:51
But that kind of yield definitely takes some planning.
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Another favorite thing of mine? The garden plan.
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So I like to kind of come up with a list of what are my my
00:06:01
must haves, things that I know produce really well in the
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garden, Stuff that we love to eat.
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I ask all friends and family, I'm like, hey, I'm planning the
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garden. What are some things you'd like?
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Somebody said eggplant. I'm like, you know, I've never
00:06:12
grown it, I don't really eat it, but pan squash is just as good.
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Sorry, we're going to do that instead.
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But then after that it I go to my husband.
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So he's really into all things computers, CAD drawing and he
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draws out my garden on a system where it is by like
00:06:29
measurements. I don't do measurements.
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I'm a throw it and let's see what grows kind of gal.
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He's a let's measure things out so everything has a proper
00:06:36
spacing and we look at how many plants of what variety I can
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start here or if I have to go get starts what I need to get.
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And then we kind of mix from there and come up with what the
00:06:47
plan is going to be every year. And it's it's a fun process.
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It's nice to sit down and go through it.
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And every time you ask me what's the spacing on this I'm like,
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Lord, if I know hold up, let me get out the seed pack.
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Read on the back takes a little bit, but we end up coming up
00:06:58
with a really good idea and I stick to it for the most part.
00:07:02
Every now and again I get a little over Planty, but that's
00:07:05
how we plan it out every year. There's nothing wrong with
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getting over planty and and your husband is like my kindred
00:07:11
spirit. I am a buy it out.
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Have it measured. Plan it out each succession like
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I it's so it's. Not.
00:07:19
Really kind of person, so yeah. Oh, I'm Willy nilly.
00:07:23
Flowers everywhere. Throw in some herbs and then of
00:07:26
course I end up with powdery mildew and I have to look at
00:07:28
myself and go, well, a little bit better, exactly.
00:07:35
There's nothing wrong with trying to judge things in as
00:07:37
tightly as you possibly can and then figuring out later.
00:07:39
Like, well, maybe I ought to thin this out just a little bit.
00:07:42
I'd rather have. Too much than not enough.
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One of the things I talk about with new gardeners is how to
00:07:48
plan what it is they want to grow, and part of that is
00:07:51
deciding what will be eaten fresh and what will be stored.
00:07:54
Now not everybody wants to can or freeze or dehydrate and
00:07:57
that's OK. If you just want the garden for
00:07:59
fresh produce to be used right away, then that's how you plan.
00:08:03
But if you want to store enough for the offseason, especially
00:08:06
when you were in a short season growing area like Meg, then you
00:08:10
have to think about what stores well and how you plan to use it.
00:08:14
That helps dictate how you plan. Last year my focus in the garden
00:08:18
was storables, so we grew a lot of different varieties of
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pumpkins and winter squash, onions and lots of tomatoes.
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Stuff that I know I can can and stuff I know we're gonna use.
00:08:31
So I have not been able to figure out how to can Pickles to
00:08:34
save my life. So the cukes were strictly fresh
00:08:37
eating and relish, but otherwise I focus on planning what
00:08:41
varieties I know go well in a sauce.
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Stuff that I can put together, let it cook down in a roaster
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pan or can tuck away in the basement.
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We have like a grocery store in the basement.
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It's quite wonderful of just different canned goods and boxes
00:08:56
of onions. But I plan based off of what I
00:08:59
know we're going to eat. That's the easiest way to start
00:09:02
a garden if we're not going to eat it Like radishes.
00:09:05
I love them. I think they're stunning, but do
00:09:08
I like the taste of them? No.
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This is my husband. No.
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Our dogs? Nope.
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So I should really stop putting some of those in, but I always
00:09:16
do. They're just so cute.
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Can't help myself. So obviously Meg didn't get to
00:09:21
the point overnight where she can grow something and keep it
00:09:24
in her garden plan just because it's cute, even though it's
00:09:28
something they don't eat, like radishes.
00:09:30
Meg's garden journey started in 2019, but she said they didn't
00:09:34
even start tracking until 2021, when she says she got sort of
00:09:38
good at it and her learning journey was and still is what
00:09:42
she calls failing forward. Well, the first garden was
00:09:48
what's the best way to phrase this?
00:09:50
I had the funniest looking cucumbers you've probably ever
00:09:52
seen. You know, the the under
00:09:54
pollinated ones, the ones that are big on one end and tiny on
00:09:57
the other. And they were the best Dang
00:10:00
cucumbers. I will tell anyone, but nobody
00:10:03
else agreed with me and it it was a it was a learning
00:10:05
experience. I'd only grown in pots before.
00:10:08
I'd grown some herbs here and there, but this was the first
00:10:10
time I had space and I had weeds everywhere.
00:10:15
It was epic and tiny. But then the second year I'd got
00:10:20
myself into the, you know, those seed swaps online, those, I
00:10:24
can't do those anymore. I did A1 and done year I planted
00:10:27
probably 90 varieties of things. My second year 'cause I thought
00:10:31
I could grow it all. Oh Lord, Karen, that was an epic
00:10:36
mistake. It was a good learning
00:10:38
experience, but it showed me that I was too big for my
00:10:42
britches and I needed to rein it in.
00:10:44
And my husband kindly said I think this next year we'd either
00:10:50
need to rein it in and do 15 varieties of things.
00:10:54
Doesn't matter. Tomatoes is not one option.
00:10:57
You've got to pick a variety of tomatoes, do 15 things, do them
00:11:01
well and you can add to them every year.
00:11:03
But let's be successful on a smaller scale, and then we can
00:11:07
get bigger. So I failed forward.
00:11:10
Every year I look at where I was successful.
00:11:12
I look at where I had to learn more things.
00:11:16
I didn't have bugs my first two years.
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I didn't have any pests. And then suddenly they found me.
00:11:22
And then I'm like, what are you that's destroying my potatoes?
00:11:26
Oh, those Dang potato beetles, I tell you.
00:11:29
But thankfully my husband is so, so kind.
00:11:32
I will catch a bug, I will bring it up to him and he will sit on
00:11:35
the computer and look at what it is.
00:11:37
Go through all the, you know, pages on Google of bugs.
00:11:40
No, thank you. But he will figure out what it
00:11:43
is and help me. So that way that little creature
00:11:46
is not going to ruin my garden and I can keep the ones around
00:11:49
that. I mean, I didn't know what a
00:11:50
ladybug larva look like. And at first I was like, you
00:11:53
guys look weird. What is growing.
00:11:56
Then I realized, no, those are good guys.
00:11:59
Keep them on my Peppers. You can hang out.
00:12:01
But every year I learn. I grow.
00:12:03
I feel forward. I've reigned myself in.
00:12:07
Kind. Of but I've gotten successful at
00:12:09
it, so that's been helpful. I think that experience of not
00:12:15
having bugs, I mean, the weed pressure, yeah, I mean,
00:12:19
depending on, you know, how you're growing or where you're
00:12:21
growing, absolutely. But that experience of not
00:12:24
having something happened the first two years, like the insect
00:12:28
pressure, and then all of a sudden the 3rd, it's always that
00:12:31
third year that something starts to, like, rear its ugly head and
00:12:35
you go, what the heck just happened here?
00:12:38
I thought I was Gardener of the Year and wondered why was my.
00:12:42
Trophy and that's. Yeah, you know, why does
00:12:46
everybody think this is so hard? Did you get to that third year
00:12:48
and you go, oh, now I get. It.
00:12:51
Oh, I get it. Yes.
00:12:54
Like, I thought I could hand water my garden.
00:12:56
I was like, oh, I got this. I'm going to hand water every
00:12:58
day. It's going to be so romantic.
00:13:00
Like you see in movies and the next thing you know, I'm a
00:13:03
weekend and my husband's ordering drip tape.
00:13:06
Yeah, 'cause how many hours were you out there trying to water
00:13:09
things and? They weren't getting.
00:13:10
Soaked in? Oh yeah.
00:13:11
No 'cause the amount of water that I could put down versus
00:13:14
what they actually needed. Uh huh.
00:13:17
That experience of not having bugs or even weed pressure for
00:13:21
the first two years, and then suddenly that third year things
00:13:25
start popping up like crazy, seems to be a common theme for
00:13:29
new gardeners. It hit me, and it's hit just
00:13:32
about every gardener I've ever spoken to.
00:13:35
But what Meg said is true. Starting small and working your
00:13:38
way up by adding one or two new things every year is a really
00:13:42
good way to expand the garden. I still do that.
00:13:45
I'm constantly tweaking what I'm growing, what varieties I plant,
00:13:49
what new things I can try. But I've learned not to go
00:13:53
overboard. I introduced things gradually,
00:13:56
but planting just a few at a time to be able to tweak the
00:13:59
system a little bit before I go whole hog the next year.
00:14:03
Of course, that's just part of the challenge in gardening.
00:14:06
Deending on where you live. The amount of time you have
00:14:09
available to you for gardening can be another challenge.
00:14:13
You're in zone 4B. What are the challenges that I
00:14:19
mean of the obviously other than the weeds and the insects, but
00:14:23
like you know, weather wise, temperature wise, what are some
00:14:27
of the challenges that you face because you obviously have a
00:14:29
much shorter growing season than a lot of us do.
00:14:34
We do. We can start planting in the
00:14:36
garden. Kind of risky Memorial weekend,
00:14:40
but usually June, the start of June is when everyone's like,
00:14:43
Yep, we can get in the ground and by mid-september we'll get a
00:14:47
frost in September. And some seasons have come to a
00:14:52
halting end at the start of September.
00:14:54
This last season we were into mid-october before we did garden
00:14:58
clean up. So we can, it kind of depends on
00:15:01
the year and some seasons we've had rain, but the last three
00:15:05
we've had a drought. So the pressures there kind of
00:15:11
put a damper on some of the things.
00:15:13
But it also helps with like weed pressure.
00:15:15
There's not as much water getting put down everywhere else
00:15:17
except where I want it, so that that can be a benefit.
00:15:21
But the cold, that's our biggest thing.
00:15:24
We have a little microclimate down in the garden.
00:15:27
And so every now and again that little area is much cooler than
00:15:30
the rest on on the property, it's lower so it it can get
00:15:34
frost sooner, which is such a bummer when you watch all these
00:15:37
beautiful things that have been producing for you and then next
00:15:40
thing you know it, it just abruptly comes to an end.
00:15:43
Yeah, I can't imagine having to wait until June and then you
00:15:47
have to slam everything all in the ground all at once.
00:15:51
Didn't were to be able to get it in and then be done by.
00:15:53
And then it all comes at once too.
00:15:55
Right. Yeah, you guys.
00:15:57
You know, can't do as much in the way of like succession
00:16:00
planting and maybe with the cooler shoulder season stuff I
00:16:03
can imagine you can, but as far as your summer stuff, it's like
00:16:06
a one and done, I'm guessing. Yep, Yep, it starts rolling in
00:16:10
mid to end of July, tomatoes hit in August, and then you have
00:16:15
just that short amount of time into September and then it's
00:16:18
done. I am super happy to announce
00:16:24
that the merch shop over on Just growsomethingpodcast.com has
00:16:28
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00:16:31
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I'm adding more designs every few weeks and I just know there
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00:16:44
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growsomethingpodcast.com/shop to check out all the options and
00:16:50
support the podcast with specially designed merch from
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the show. Just
00:16:54
growsomethingpodcast.com/shop. One of the things Meg and I
00:16:59
discovered that we have in common is that we've both relied
00:17:02
on food pantries at one point or another to feed our families.
00:17:06
Maybe that's part of the reason we are both so passionate about
00:17:10
feeding people. When you've been in a situation
00:17:12
where you've had to rely on the generosity of others, it means
00:17:15
that much more to you to be generous when you're on the
00:17:18
other end. There was a period in our lives
00:17:21
where our food came from a pantry, and I, you know, hurt my
00:17:27
pride. But we needed to eat too.
00:17:29
And I went. I grabbed what we needed.
00:17:31
And I want to be able to give back to people, 'cause I knew
00:17:34
when we were in need, people gave to us.
00:17:37
I want to make sure if somebody else is in that same situation,
00:17:39
that they have a variety of very tasty things, healthy things,
00:17:43
whatever they're looking for, that they don't have to go
00:17:47
without. Yeah, no, absolutely.
00:17:49
We went, we used to line up it, the giveaway for harvesters and
00:17:53
they would, you know. Just.
00:17:54
Throw whatever they had available into the back of your
00:17:57
car. Like here.
00:17:58
OK, this is what we have this month, and you know it.
00:18:01
It may have not been stuff that we were used to eating, but we
00:18:04
figured out a way to use it. Like, I didn't know what to do
00:18:07
with a cabbage, you know? So there was a bunch of cabbage
00:18:10
that month. So I figured out what to do
00:18:11
with. Cabbage.
00:18:12
You know, and that's why, I mean that's what we do now too is,
00:18:15
you know, we've got the, the, the different food, you know,
00:18:17
pantries around here and the one that's just here in our little
00:18:20
town, they generally don't have anything that's fresh.
00:18:24
Even during the growing season, they get some of the leftovers
00:18:27
from like the harvesters giveaways.
00:18:29
But you know, it's mostly, you know, canned, boxed, whatever.
00:18:33
And you're happy, you know, obviously to have whatever you
00:18:35
can at that point. But having something fresh to go
00:18:38
with it, I mean, just watching people, 'cause I go in and drop
00:18:41
it off while they like, right as soon as they open, 'cause
00:18:43
they're only open like twice a month, two weeks out of the
00:18:46
month. And so I'll go in first thing on
00:18:48
that Monday morning, and people are already lined up to get in.
00:18:51
So I'm walking past them with these trays or boxes of fresh
00:18:55
stuff and their eyes just go, you know, like, oh, we get
00:18:58
something like other than a box or a can today, Which that that
00:19:02
that makes it worth it for sure. Exactly.
00:19:06
In the United States in 2022, which are the most recent
00:19:09
numbers we have, 12.8% of households were food insecure.
00:19:15
This means at times during the year, these households were
00:19:18
uncertain of having or unable to acquire enough food to meet the
00:19:23
needs of all their members because they had insufficient
00:19:26
money or other resources for food.
00:19:28
That 12.8% translates into 17 million people, a large
00:19:35
percentage of whom are over the age of 65 and living alone.
00:19:40
I live in an elderly community, so a lot of people that go to
00:19:43
the pantry are people who are probably in their 70s and
00:19:48
knowing that they've got what they need and they love seeing
00:19:51
the different things, like bringing in pan squash.
00:19:54
The people that were working at the pantry, they're like, I have
00:19:56
no idea what this is, but of course the people that are there
00:19:59
to get it are like, Oh my, so and so used to grow this.
00:20:02
We called it Patty Pan squash. That's what we still call it.
00:20:04
Mm hmm. Yep.
00:20:06
And it it warms my heart that people get exactly what they
00:20:10
what they need and what they can use.
00:20:12
We have a local food pantry, a kind of a circuit of them, that
00:20:15
are willing to take. And I'll call ahead of time,
00:20:18
'cause sometimes some products will.
00:20:21
Some veg will produce a lot, and there's only so much pan squash
00:20:24
and zucchini and tomatoes that they normally get.
00:20:27
So I'll call ahead and say, hey, it's me again, that gal with
00:20:30
that really productive garden can you take from me?
00:20:33
And they'll they'll say, you know what?
00:20:35
We would love to, but could you call somebody else?
00:20:38
And I'm, I'm not offended in the least bit, I'm like, sure I can
00:20:40
do that. But other times they'll say,
00:20:41
yes, please just come, 'cause then what they don't use goes to
00:20:45
a local pig farmer, and that feeds pigs, which then again,
00:20:48
feeds people. I love it.
00:20:50
It's great. Absolutely.
00:20:52
And then we, when we have an abundance, even when they're not
00:20:55
willing to take and friends and family are like Megan, we can't
00:20:58
store anymore, please stop. I have a little produce stand
00:21:01
that we put at the end of the road and it's called the dollar
00:21:03
stand and it's take what you can, pay what you can.
00:21:07
But things are roughly a buck. So like 2 cucumbers throw me a
00:21:10
buck. Whatever's out there, throw me a
00:21:12
buck. I'll put flowers out there and
00:21:15
then they know they can always, yeah, come up to the house and
00:21:18
ask if they need other things. But that's always fun too.
00:21:22
That's cool. So a little bit of side money to
00:21:24
help pay for some of the seeds and stuff too that you're having
00:21:26
to buy every year. Yes.
00:21:29
That's the nice side is at least that covers my seeds for the
00:21:31
following year. Then I'm good to go.
00:21:34
So I failed to mention How I Met Meg.
00:21:37
She is an OG follower of this podcast and I had followed her
00:21:41
back on Instagram way back when. One of the things that struck me
00:21:46
about Meg's Instagram feed was the ever constant presence of
00:21:49
her dogs while she was in the garden, and they seem to be
00:21:52
eating just about anything they could get their mouths on with.
00:21:56
Permission. Of course, Yeah.
00:22:00
Let's talk about those dogs. Oh, the dogs that are, They're
00:22:04
always out there in the in the garden and whatever.
00:22:06
What are the? What are their names?
00:22:09
OK, so we've got Hunty. He's the baby.
00:22:11
He's a well hunt, technically. He's a little Fox red lab.
00:22:15
And then we have Benz, who is a Catahoula Blue Tick Coonhound
00:22:19
mix, and both those boys will eat some produce.
00:22:22
I tell you what, tomatoes best thing in the world, they will
00:22:26
sit and eat tomatoes. We had a dog previous to them
00:22:29
who would steal tomatoes. When I would harvest them, he'd
00:22:31
just stick his head in through the fence and take tomatoes.
00:22:35
But yeah, the boys are there every time I'm down the garden
00:22:37
harvesting and they're usually between my legs with their head
00:22:40
popping out, seeing if they can steal green beans or cucumbers
00:22:43
or whatever else they can get get.
00:22:45
But they are garden dogs. We had one dog that would park
00:22:51
herself next to the green beans while I was in there picking,
00:22:54
and she would, you know, help herself.
00:22:56
She'd just choose one plant and she'd be picking the green beans
00:22:59
off of them. And then I had another one.
00:23:01
I had brought in a basket of peas and I had set them in the
00:23:05
entryway and I went to go do something.
00:23:07
I I came back walking back in and there were shells of the
00:23:11
peas laying on the ground and going, OK, somebody's messing
00:23:16
with me. What if it wasn't one of the
00:23:17
ways? Were they in there?
00:23:18
I was like, who? And they're No, no, we didn't
00:23:20
mess with the peas. I'm like, so I just left them
00:23:22
sitting there and I went to sit in my office and I'm watching
00:23:24
and hear One of my my dogs came in and very gently reached in,
00:23:31
pulled out a pea, sat down with it between her paws, peeled it
00:23:37
open, ate the peas from inside, and then left the shell laying.
00:23:42
There in my back for another. One I could not believe it.
00:23:45
If I hadn't seen it with my own eyes, I would have never
00:23:48
believed it. What?
00:23:50
But it's good for them. And hey, it cuts down on dog
00:23:52
food fast, so it works for me. Yeah, if they're willing to eat
00:23:56
it, fine, they can have it too. I think the dogs are on to
00:23:59
something. By the way, there is something
00:24:01
pretty spectacular about eating fresh vegetables right out of
00:24:04
the garden that just doesn't compare to anything you can get
00:24:07
in the grocery. I for the longest time could not
00:24:10
stand fresh green beans from the grocery store.
00:24:13
I thought they were limp and fuzzy.
00:24:16
I had grown up on canned green beans and what I got from the
00:24:19
store was just not palatable to me.
00:24:21
And then I started growing my own and choosing Bush varieties
00:24:25
that didn't have the fuzz or the string.
00:24:27
And let me tell you, I will now happily munch on those green
00:24:31
beans raw right off the plant while I'm picking them for
00:24:34
market. Growing your own makes such a
00:24:37
big difference. What is your favorite vegetable
00:24:40
first of all to grow in the garden and then what is your
00:24:42
favorite variety? Oh Dang.
00:24:46
This is a tough, tough one. So to be honest, I hated
00:24:50
tomatoes all my life. Growing up hated tomatoes.
00:24:53
I used to tell people they were poisonous if you had a bra.
00:24:56
I thought they were the grossest thing because the ones at the
00:24:59
store are bland. They're mealy.
00:25:01
They're they're not enjoyable. And then we grew a variety of
00:25:06
they're like a smaller than a Roma but bigger than a cherry
00:25:09
and it's called a shimmer. Tomato grew it because I thought
00:25:12
they were pretty. They were supposed to have
00:25:13
little gold on the outside. And we had a dog that loved
00:25:15
tomatoes so I was like, I'm gonna grow them for him.
00:25:18
Changed my mind on tomatoes. So I I would say tomatoes are my
00:25:23
favorite thing to grow, just because they come in every
00:25:26
single color, every single shape, size, flavor.
00:25:31
I'm really partial to the sweeter tomatoes.
00:25:34
The low acidity ones are are my jam.
00:25:37
This last year we grew the big rainbows, I think are my
00:25:41
favorite because they're such a high yield tomato.
00:25:45
But I also really like those accordions, just 'cause they're
00:25:47
they're cute. They're so cute, they're huge,
00:25:50
but they're really good. But you know, I'm kind of
00:25:54
thinking my husband loves cucumbers, so we grow them every
00:25:58
year. He loves the straight eights.
00:25:59
Those are tried and true, but this last year I tried the diva
00:26:03
variety. OK, I'm gonna say this word
00:26:05
wrong. Para and Karthik the word.
00:26:10
Where they Thank you. Oh my goodness sake.
00:26:14
Yep. I'm learning new garden words
00:26:15
every year. It's part of my To Do List every
00:26:17
year. That's one of those varieties
00:26:19
that just doesn't need male flowers.
00:26:22
Female only. And it is a producer.
00:26:24
I tell you what. That they're so.
00:26:27
Good. Oh, they're the greatest.
00:26:29
They're always like, not better. You got the thin skins, little
00:26:33
seeds. Love those.
00:26:35
Yeah. So a little bit more on
00:26:36
parthenocarpy. Parthenocarpy is the development
00:26:40
of fruit without fertilization. And this happens naturally in
00:26:45
some plants, but in many cases now we've bred plants to do this
00:26:49
for our benefit. The diva variety of cucumbers
00:26:52
Meg is referring to is one of those artificial cases.
00:26:56
If you grow this or any parthenocarpic variety in
00:26:59
isolation, meaning you don't grow any pollen producing
00:27:03
varieties near it, they can produce fruit that are seedless.
00:27:07
This also reduces the chances of any bitter fruit.
00:27:11
Now these were originally developed for growing in
00:27:13
protected culture settings like high tunnels, hoop houses,
00:27:17
greenhouses, or wherever pollinating insects are limited
00:27:21
or restricted. But home gardeners are also
00:27:24
growing them now in outside settings to guarantee themselves
00:27:28
a good yield and to reduce the bitterness we can sometimes get
00:27:32
from things like cucumbers. Modern plant breeding is just so
00:27:35
cool. I think Peppers, though, were my
00:27:38
like I won last year on Peppers. I've never been able to grow a
00:27:42
variety of bell pepper that turned color besides green.
00:27:46
It is so hard. Oh.
00:27:48
And in such a short season. And we did it last year for the
00:27:51
very first time and it was epic. Oh, do.
00:27:53
You remember what variety that was?
00:27:56
Oh well. So the lilacs were great.
00:28:00
Those are so good. The other ones, I've got them.
00:28:02
I've saved the seed tags because that was, you know, lesson #1
00:28:06
and garden number one. Save those 'cause you're gonna
00:28:09
forget. I always do.
00:28:11
So what other you said that was one of your lessons was, you
00:28:15
know, with your first year of gardening was to save the seed
00:28:18
tags or the packets, whatever. What other lessons did you learn
00:28:23
along the way? Failing forward, maybe the hard
00:28:25
way? Overcrowding, overcrowding.
00:28:31
Now, I will say you did a podcast episode, oh, in the
00:28:34
early days where you talked about plant spacing and how it
00:28:36
is smarter to have less plants that are spaced out so you get a
00:28:40
better yield from them than to have too many plants and get a
00:28:44
less yield, lower everything. I don't remember what episode
00:28:49
that was, but I was listening to that episode a long time ago and
00:28:53
I was like, you know what that is?
00:28:54
Smart words, because I like to overcrowd.
00:28:58
And you always get less, but if you have less plants and you
00:29:01
tend to them, you're always gonna have a better yield,
00:29:04
better plants, better everything.
00:29:07
That is one of those that has stuck with me.
00:29:09
Hardcore. That's one of those failing
00:29:11
forwards for me. I like that.
00:29:13
I, you know, it's it's such a fine line between having enough
00:29:18
space for the plants but then interplanting to where you're
00:29:21
making a good use of the space. And I think one of the things
00:29:26
that it's hard to learn is like, I mean our lesson with that, I
00:29:30
think I know exactly what episode you're talking about
00:29:32
because I probably talked about the fact that we learned that
00:29:34
lesson with growing tomatoes. It was, oh, we we need 750
00:29:39
tomato plants because we're growing for all these people.
00:29:42
But then you get to that point where now you're getting
00:29:45
diminishing returns because you have too many plants and either
00:29:48
you can't care for them properly, or they don't have
00:29:51
enough space, or they're not getting enough nutrition.
00:29:53
And so great, you have 1000 tomato plants, but they're
00:29:56
producing as much as you did when you had 500, so why not
00:30:00
just do the 500? But then realizing that even
00:30:04
with those tomatoes, you still have room underneath and there's
00:30:08
still space available for something else.
00:30:11
It may not be more tomatoes, but it might be lettuces.
00:30:14
It might be other leafy greens. It could be throwing some, you
00:30:18
know, sweet illyssum seeds down there and having, you know, a
00:30:21
nice little, pretty white flower as a ground cover that's helping
00:30:24
to choke out those weeds and cover.
00:30:25
And at that point, are you sort of violating the spacing with
00:30:29
those tomatoes? Maybe a little bit, but they're
00:30:32
complementing each other. So I think that.
00:30:35
Those are not choking each other out.
00:30:37
Yeah. And I think that's a really
00:30:38
hard, a hard lesson to learn. And, you know, you can listen to
00:30:43
people talk about it all the time.
00:30:44
But until you actually get out there in the garden and try it
00:30:47
for yourself and like you said, you know, fail forward, figure
00:30:51
out what worked and what didn't go.
00:30:53
OK, well, that didn't work. Let's try something else.
00:30:55
I don't think anybody should expect that they're gonna go
00:30:57
into the garden the first, second, third, fifth year and
00:31:01
know exactly what's gonna happen and how it's gonna go and know
00:31:04
everything. Yeah, you can't know everything.
00:31:05
I don't know everything. I'm still learning, you know,
00:31:08
and it's been 20 years, so. Like.
00:31:12
Guarantee I will learn something the hard way this year.
00:31:15
Too. I always do.
00:31:17
Oh yes, like staking my Peppers. I should have staked them well
00:31:22
before they flopped over and got woody and then, you know,
00:31:25
trailing across the ground. I'm bending all the way over
00:31:27
picking up Peppers last year. I won't do that again.
00:31:31
But that means. It means.
00:31:33
It was a good pepper year though, because you had so much
00:31:35
fruit that they were falling over.
00:31:36
I mean, if they're not falling over, then you don't have enough
00:31:38
Peppers. Oh, we did 200 lbs of Peppers
00:31:42
last year. Wow, I have the numbers next to
00:31:45
me. So in jalapenos, we picked 518
00:31:49
jalapenos. Last year.
00:31:52
I did cubanilla Peppers. We got 176 of those and we got
00:31:55
489 bell Peppers. That's amazing.
00:32:01
I love that you have these notes.
00:32:03
Can we just focus on that for one second?
00:32:05
Because I think people oh. Sure.
00:32:07
Don't pay attention. You know, enough attention to
00:32:09
having a garden journal of some sort, even if it's just like
00:32:15
taking sticky notes with you, you know, or a little notepad or
00:32:18
something when you're in the garden and paying attention to
00:32:21
what's the weather been doing to all of my plants, What are the
00:32:24
bugs doing to my plants, What kind of weed pressure do I have?
00:32:27
And what am I getting as far as a yield from each of these
00:32:32
varieties? Because if you want to talk
00:32:33
about learning as you go, there is no better way than to sit
00:32:38
down at the end of the season or at the beginning of the next one
00:32:40
and look at your notes and go, oh, OK, this worked, this
00:32:46
didn't. What can we fix this year?
00:32:48
So you guys are keeping track of your varieties and your yield.
00:32:52
What else? What are you tracking?
00:32:54
I will take pictures when I see those Dang pesty bugs that are
00:32:57
going to be bad that I need to know.
00:32:59
OK, get prepared. You're going to be picking the
00:33:02
potato beetles. I need to know when I'm going to
00:33:04
start seeing them so that way I can prepare.
00:33:07
I try and keep track of if we're getting too much rain, I mean
00:33:11
rain. I can't predict that.
00:33:12
But I also like to know numbers on things.
00:33:16
So like onions. How many specific onions did I
00:33:18
get that way? Gives me a rough idea on
00:33:20
planting for next year the dates that we get everything.
00:33:23
So I keep one of those little monthly calendars next to me and
00:33:27
I make sure on the days that I'm harvesting.
00:33:29
Then I have a rough idea for next year when I should be
00:33:32
expecting this variety, which means I'm going to want a can.
00:33:36
So then I have to look at my weekends and I can plan
00:33:38
accordingly. I can call my best friend and
00:33:39
say, hey, get your butt over here.
00:33:41
I need to do canning. I need your help, but it gives
00:33:44
me an ability to prepare. That's brilliant.
00:33:47
I love that. And I love, you know the idea
00:33:50
that you're taking pictures? Because even if you don't have
00:33:52
time to write something down, you always have the date that
00:33:55
you took that picture when you go back and look at it.
00:33:57
So you can say, OK, this was the first time that I saw these
00:34:00
potato beetles in the garden. Next year I know that I'm going
00:34:04
to be ready or even for diseases.
00:34:06
For us here, it's always the diseases in our tomatoes at the
00:34:10
beginning of the year. We're very humid and it just
00:34:14
happens that that's what happens.
00:34:15
I mean it's and and you know at a certain point it's gonna rear
00:34:19
its ugly head. So if you can be prepared the
00:34:22
two weeks prior and use your copper spray you know to to to
00:34:26
keep that, you know that pest or that that disease at Bay.
00:34:30
Then the next year you know. Oh, OK Well, this is when I can
00:34:33
spray that stuff and it will keep that, you know, virus or
00:34:37
the disease or whatever from jumping into my tomatoes.
00:34:39
But the pests too, knowing the life cycle.
00:34:42
Yeah, exactly. It just prevents it from even,
00:34:44
you know, getting there. And you don't lose the first
00:34:46
half of your harvest because the plants are trying to battle, you
00:34:49
know, an early blight or, you know, a a, a fungal disease or
00:34:53
something and knowing the life cycle of the pests that you're
00:35:00
dealing with, like you said, knowing when they're going to
00:35:02
show up. But also you can take that
00:35:05
information and go, OK, we know that that is this pest.
00:35:09
What's the life cycle of it? How is it getting here in the
00:35:12
1st place? Is it overwintering as an adult?
00:35:14
Is it overwintering as a larva? Are they just laying their eggs
00:35:17
and those are going dormant and that's what's hatching and that
00:35:20
way you can be better prepared as to how to battle them.
00:35:24
Meg is doing a really good job of doing all the things I
00:35:27
preach. Creating a garden plan, keeping
00:35:29
a garden journal, detailing out the timeline of the garden when
00:35:32
it comes to planting, harvesting pests and diseases.
00:35:36
It's a big garden with a big harvest.
00:35:39
How much time does all this take?
00:35:40
It sounds like it could be really overwhelming.
00:35:44
For two people, you know and and a 1400 square foot garden that
00:35:48
produced 3000 lbs of food. I'm just gonna keep saying that
00:35:53
over and over again. 3000 lbs of food.
00:35:56
How? I mean, what kind of a time
00:35:58
commitment are we talking about every single week again in a
00:36:04
short season for you guys? So we both work from home.
00:36:09
So I get to set my schedule for the most part.
00:36:12
I mean, I'll do a little bit here and a little bit there
00:36:14
during the week. We're weekend warriors.
00:36:16
I do the bulk of my work on the weekends, but it's just taking a
00:36:21
bite out of it here and there. The biggest thing, OK, I know
00:36:24
everyone loves their hula hoe, so don't come for me, but you
00:36:28
all need to Google what a skidger is.
00:36:30
It is like a hula hoe meets a sharp pointy you can cut all
00:36:36
those roots below the soil, not disturb anything, but it is like
00:36:39
the best weed killer out there you can I'm the chop and drop
00:36:44
kind of method, except if you're parsling then you get booted out
00:36:47
of my garden. Everything else chop and drop.
00:36:51
So many people tell me, yeah, so many people like just eat it.
00:36:55
I'm like, but I plant lettuce for that.
00:36:57
Oh, it's so good, you know, Do you know that purslane has the
00:37:01
highest amount of omega-3 fatty acids of any land, plant?
00:37:06
Anything. Are you serious?
00:37:07
I've never heard of that. I am.
00:37:08
Absolutely serious. I actually will harvest it and
00:37:11
sell it at the farmers market stand and it is so good and.
00:37:14
People are buying. It, Yes.
00:37:16
Oh yeah. There are people who know what
00:37:18
it is. They're like, Oh my gosh, I
00:37:19
can't believe you have purslane. Oh yeah, it's amazing.
00:37:21
The first time I had it was actually at the cafe here for
00:37:26
our Botanical Garden Pal Gardens and their little Tara cafe in
00:37:30
there. They, you know, use stuff from
00:37:32
all their different. They have a vegetable garden
00:37:34
area and they were using stuff and they had purslane on there.
00:37:37
And I I had known purslane from, like hanging baskets, like the
00:37:40
cultivated type of purslane. And I was like.
00:37:44
And I'm like. Wait, what?
00:37:46
You know, they're like, yeah, you have to try it here, You can
00:37:48
try it first before you choose to put it on your salad.
00:37:50
And it was so good and so, like succulent tea and just it was
00:37:54
oh, it was amazing. I was like, OK.
00:37:56
And then I realized we have it growing wild all over the place
00:37:59
on the farm and it gets in between some of the beds and it
00:38:02
gets into my somehow magically into my raised planters.
00:38:06
And yeah, I let it grow and let it do its thing.
00:38:08
It doesn't ever seem to to harm the other stuff.
00:38:11
But if it starts to get in the way, I just judge it out of the
00:38:13
way and let it keep doing its thing.
00:38:15
So yeah, eat that purse lane. What?
00:38:18
He is the bane of my existence in the garden.
00:38:20
I Oh my gosh, Yeah, we are not friends right now.
00:38:24
That is the one in because. It will.
00:38:27
It will readily reroute if you just chop it and drop it.
00:38:29
It's going to just automatically reroute itself.
00:38:31
So I get that but so this is called a.
00:38:33
Skidger, Skidger. OK, so I looked U the skidger an
00:38:37
it's a sort of heart-shaped tool that's twisted in on itself with
00:38:42
a blade that is sharpened on the inside and the outside so you
00:38:46
can push it back and forth and it will cut in both directions.
00:38:49
You're doing a sort of push pull motion and the tool is cutting
00:38:53
the weeds off at the ground level.
00:38:55
I can see why it's so effective. It's also bent in a way that you
00:38:59
can use it to dig out weeds or flip it over to make a furrow in
00:39:04
the soil to plant into. It's on my wish list now.
00:39:08
I'll leave a link in the show notes.
00:39:10
Yes, SKIDGER, it is saved my time.
00:39:15
I, you know, do everything by little sections here in the
00:39:18
garden during the week, at lunch, while the dogs are
00:39:20
running or out or after work, I'll tackle, you know, half
00:39:23
hour, hour before I make dinner. Usually because I've got to go
00:39:26
pick something for dinner. But I will.
00:39:28
What would take me an hour takes me 15 minutes to weed.
00:39:33
And when you stay on top of the weeds, they don't come back.
00:39:36
So usually, you know, it takes me about a month to get all the
00:39:39
weeds at Bay. For the most part, there's
00:39:41
always maintenance wedding and then it always slips over to
00:39:44
you've got to start harvesting and canning and whatnot.
00:39:47
But no, it helped me stay on top of all of my wedding chores that
00:39:52
I was like a pro. I had very nice gardens this
00:39:56
year, which was a first, so the first part of the season, that's
00:39:59
what. You're focusing on is just
00:40:01
making sure that you're out there every day doing just a
00:40:03
little bit of wedding while you're waiting for things to
00:40:07
start coming in. Yes, 'cause I'm not very.
00:40:10
Patient. That's the one thing that Garden
00:40:12
has been working very hard to teach me is to just be patient.
00:40:15
Things will come when they're ready.
00:40:17
I can't rush everything, so it's nice to just kind of be out
00:40:22
there and peep under the leaves. And I'm like you producing any
00:40:24
flowers, You got any fruit for me yet?
00:40:26
And yes, that is the name of the game.
00:40:30
So is it kind of an you said? Your weekend words is it all day
00:40:33
you know, all day Saturday, all day Sunday, you guys are
00:40:35
spending in the gardens. It's.
00:40:38
Mostly me during wedding time. Which is it?
00:40:42
I find wedding peaceful. I love getting out there with a
00:40:45
good podcast obviously and or good music I jam but just
00:40:50
spending that time out there. But yeah it's I'll work couple
00:40:54
hours here and there sometimes depending on if like there's a
00:40:56
major wedding to be done or something like trellising
00:40:59
tomatoes. That always takes time and it's
00:41:02
it's very relaxing to me. But yeah, we're weekend warriors
00:41:07
are in the evenings, couple hours here and there.
00:41:10
Yeah, that's mainly what our summer looks like.
00:41:13
It gets me outside. I love it.
00:41:16
Yeah, for sure. And then once.
00:41:17
It's time to start. Start the harvest.
00:41:19
Is it just fast and furious for the entire last, like, six weeks
00:41:23
of your season? Yeah.
00:41:25
Oh yeah, and then if people want to come over, I love it.
00:41:28
But I warn them, I'm a feral wife in the winter time or in
00:41:31
the summertime. Kind of in the winter time too.
00:41:33
But in the summertime, my house isn't going to be perfect.
00:41:36
There's going to be tons of tomatoes everywhere, and if you
00:41:40
wanna have a sit down meal, it's gonna have to be outside at a
00:41:42
picnic table because my house is my house full of veg that needs
00:41:47
to be processed. Nope, I absolutely hear you.
00:41:52
On that one I am, I am this house is a wreck and then I
00:41:55
spend you know try to spend the offseason playing catch up and I
00:41:58
don't ever quite get there because I have 6000 other things
00:42:00
that I'm doing like I don't know a podcast online courses and
00:42:04
that kind of thing. But I had AI had a a fellow
00:42:07
farmers market vendor who happens to be a dairy farmer.
00:42:12
Their their family is like the last dairy farm in our entire
00:42:16
county and so she's you know the the quintessential farm wife and
00:42:20
but they also in addition to doing the dairy she runs her
00:42:23
bakery business and brings baked goods to the farmers market.
00:42:26
And one day she looked at me and she goes, how do you keep your
00:42:31
house during the growing season? And I snort, laughed and went I
00:42:37
don't. I don't not.
00:42:39
At. All.
00:42:39
And she had this, like, sort of. Horrified look on her face and
00:42:43
then it kind of made her feel better because she had been.
00:42:47
And again it's that sort of like previous generations idea of
00:42:51
farm wife was hey, your job was to take care of the house and
00:42:54
make sure the meals were on the table and bring field meals and
00:42:57
all that kinds of stuff. And that has sort of evolved a
00:42:59
little bit, especially when you're also the other half of
00:43:02
the farm. Well, she was doing this bakery
00:43:04
business like full time while her husband and boys were also
00:43:07
doing the farm full time. It was like, I look at her and
00:43:10
she had kids. Exactly.
00:43:12
You know and I'm. Like and the grandkids were the
00:43:14
I mean she was she's she's a generation above me older than
00:43:17
me and so her kids are like my age and so she still had
00:43:20
grandkids and stuff and they all multi generational farm and I
00:43:23
just kind of looked at her and was like you know I appreciate
00:43:27
what the expectation used to be but you are working full time
00:43:31
doing this while the rest of the family is working full time
00:43:35
during doing the farm. Why should it be your sole
00:43:38
responsibility to make sure that the house is clean and the meals
00:43:42
are on the table. And I at first she was sort of
00:43:45
taken aback by that. And then she, she stopped for a
00:43:48
second. She went, you know, you're
00:43:50
right. I said.
00:43:52
I don't. I don't think anything is going
00:43:54
to. Change, you know, for you, but
00:43:55
at least at least it lets some of the pressure off, you know.
00:43:59
And so yeah, I think that was, it was just funny.
00:44:01
I was like, I don't keep my house.
00:44:02
There's just no, there's no way there's no way.
00:44:05
So. In our season of exactly our
00:44:08
season of life, we don't have kids, so I'm not chasing around
00:44:11
anyone else. It's just me.
00:44:13
I can plan my day, how I see fit and I enjoy it.
00:44:18
There's going to come other times where that's not going to
00:44:20
be the case and I'm going to have to scale down the Garden
00:44:22
and that's going to be fine too. But you got to give yourself
00:44:25
grace. There's only so many, so many
00:44:28
hours in the day and only so much time you have.
00:44:30
Yeah, our kids are. All grown and out of the house,
00:44:33
and it's just the two of us now. And it's I get to, you know,
00:44:36
Yeah. I'm not worried about anybody
00:44:38
else's activities or what anybody else is doing.
00:44:40
I, you know, I mean, I still pick up after my husband, like
00:44:43
there's teenage boys in the house, but that's a whole
00:44:45
different subject. But, you know, but like you
00:44:49
said, it's it's I'm on my schedule.
00:44:51
We are on our schedule. We don't have anybody else's
00:44:53
schedule we have to adhere to. And that also includes whether
00:44:56
or not I choose to run the vacuum or not.
00:44:58
So there's that. OK, so we have established that.
00:45:03
I am absolutely feral moving on, but if somebody wants.
00:45:07
To kind of do what you're doing where it's like, yeah, I'm gonna
00:45:10
grow enough for myself and my family for the year, but then I
00:45:16
also want to grow enough to be able to give away and to bring
00:45:20
to food pantries. Where should they start?
00:45:23
You said you were a little over ambitious that first, you know,
00:45:26
the first year or two. So what lessons can you share
00:45:30
for people who wanna who wanna try this?
00:45:34
My biggest thing would be to start small, start manageable.
00:45:39
Because if you set yourself up for failure and you're not
00:45:41
likely to do it again, you're not likely to try again.
00:45:44
When you're successful, you're going to keep at it.
00:45:47
So the biggest thing is to start small and plant a little extra
00:45:51
if you know if you math it out and you're like, you know what,
00:45:53
I use one onion a week. Going to need 52 onions?
00:45:57
Well, try planting 60. Try planting just a little bit
00:46:01
more, but start small, be successful, and then expand a
00:46:07
little bit after that. That'd be my biggest advice.
00:46:11
I love that. Thank you for being here, Meg.
00:46:14
If people want to see your gardens, they want to see the
00:46:17
pictures of the of what you're doing and those handsome little
00:46:21
doggy boys that are running around in the garden all the
00:46:23
time. How can they find you?
00:46:26
Well, I'm over. On the gram and and just that
00:46:29
it's our Wisco homestead. And yeah, you're more than
00:46:33
welcome to come ask questions, hang out, see what I'm up to.
00:46:37
Usually I'm in the garden. Usually in the garden I love.
00:46:41
That I will leave. A link to Meg's Instagram
00:46:46
account at our Wisco Homestead in the show notes in addition to
00:46:51
the fabulous photos of her beautiful garden, she's got some
00:46:54
great reels showing a lot of what she does with the goodness
00:46:57
coming out of that garden. And of course, pictures of those
00:47:01
puppy dogs too. I hope this talk with Meg
00:47:03
inspired you to do something new in your garden this year.
00:47:06
Whether it's try a new variety or add a few more rows that you
00:47:10
could donate to a food pantry or even just give away to a
00:47:14
neighbor in need, there truly is nothing more powerful than food.
00:47:20
Until next time, my gardening friends.
00:47:22
Keep on cultivating that dream garden and we'll talk again
00:47:24
soon. Thanks for listening to another
00:47:27
episode of the Just Grow Something podcast.
00:47:29
For more information about today's topic and to find all
00:47:32
the ways you can get in touch with me or support the show, go
00:47:35
to justgrowsomethingpodcast.com. I have a problem with big flashy
00:47:41
tomatoes. I like them very big, very
00:47:44
sweet, and very colorful. So right now, I haven't found a
00:47:48
determinate variety that meets those criteria.
00:47:52
That's a good point. I like the.
00:47:53
Yeah, I like the really cool looking ones, you know, and the
00:47:56
and the bigger the better. You can like show off that giant
00:47:59
tomato that like, you know your entire hand fills your entire
00:48:02
hand. Yes.
00:48:04
So those accordion. Tomatoes.
00:48:05
Oh yeah, Oh, accordion tomatoes. They're.
00:48:10
Bright orange. They are ribbed, look like a
00:48:13
little accordion. And all my, you know, my
00:48:16
neighbors are all farmers. So I give them tomatoes and
00:48:18
they're like, this isn't a tomato.
00:48:20
I'm like, it is. And they try it.
00:48:22
They're like, this is the best tomato I've ever had.
00:48:24
I'm like, well, I'll have them again next year.
00:48:26
Oh, I may have to add. That to my list this year?
00:48:29
Oh, yes. Oh yes, I'm writing that down.
00:48:32
All right. Until.
00:48:35
Next time my gardening friends. Keep learning and keep growing.