Citrullus lanatus ‘Moon & Stars’
The perfect watermelon for sharing with friends and family–our largest weighed in over 40 lbs. An old-fashioned variety, Moon & Stars, is full of big seed–perfect for spitting–and beautiful meaty pink flesh. We cut our first melon open with a machete and shared it with Woodland garden staff. Congratulations to Alex, our seed spitting champion.
Buckwheat (Fagopyrum sagittatum)
As we face the close of the summer season, production slows or ceases with our warm season crops. I have to pause to give a shout-out to Buckwheat: the uniform germination of this smother crop saved us many hours of weeding and brought in the bees for miles. A couple of nice rains and a week of drying out allowed for perfect tilling. The buckwheat should break down quickly and make room for fall planting. Thanks Buckwheat.
Grab your little ones and run for the house. It’s a plague of mass proportions. The cicada killers are everywhere. RUN!!! Ahhhhhhh.
Tee hee, just teasing.
Our newest growing area has a decent population of Cicada Killer Wasps (Sphecius specious), and until you get used to them buzzing about, working in close proximity with the 1″ or greater beasts can be a bit frightening. Although they can deliver a pretty painful sting, they tend to ignore us and only occasionally lumber up a leg, dragging their cargo beneath them.
A beneficial narrow-waisted solitary wasp, the cicada killer does just as it’s name implies–kills cicadas. The female stings an adult cicada–paralyzing her prey–and then flips it on its back and carries it to a burrow holding a single egg. Within a few days the egg hatches and feeds on the paralyzed cicada or cicadas left by it’s mother, leaving behind only the outer shell.
With a full belly, the larva then prepares for winter by building a case of silk. Overwintering in the soil–it sets its sights to emerge next summer.
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