This space was created to discuss and exchange ideas about promoting good nutrition, food security and related matters – Blogmaster
Carmeta’s Corner
1 minute
680 responses to “Carmeta’s Corner”
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Started some goji berries last week and they are all up. Will soak some sorrel seeds later this week and start them indoors. So far, I have not been successful in harvesting any but I will continue trying.
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One pigeon pea has burst through and one sorrel as well. come May I want to see them one foot tall to transplant.
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Keep up the good work Dame Bajans
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Big plans for 2023 crop
by SHERIA BRATHWAITE sheriabrathwaite@nationnews.com
THE BARBADOS AGRICULTURAL MANAGEMENT COMPANY (BAMC) is putting plans in place to ensure there is a bumper 2023 sugar harvest.
Area Two manager Anderson Eversley said the Government entity had rolled out a new initiative focused on planting hot water-treated sugar cane.
“In 2019 the BAMC took a decision that in the future, all of our commercial canes had to be produced from hot water-treated material. Over the past years, the ratoon stunting disease brought about a decline in the yields. So, as a result, all commercial cane has to be planted from hot water-treated material,” he said. “Between September and November last year the BAMC planted about 700 acres of clean hot water planting material on its farms. What will occur is that in 2023 when this commercial cane is harvested, the output on a per acre basis should rise to between 20 and 50 per cent over normal levels of canes that were not hot water-treated.
“This means that for us we can plant cane in reduced acreage because the output per acre would increase. Our revenue should increase and we should also have more molasses, bagasse and more sugar being made from that output,” he said in a recent interview. Eversley said the hot water-treated canes will also be important during dry spells. “We all know drought is a problem. Under the canes that were not treated, xylem and phloem (vascular tissue) in those canes were blocked so the canes were not able to extract nutrients and . . . growth was retarded.
“With hot water-treated canes, the xylem and phloem are unblocked so the canes are able to take up all the nutrients in the soil and all the water in the soil and the canes will grow to their potential.”
Eversley said the canes planted at BAMC farms were already three to four feet tall.
He added the company was working with private farmers, who collectively had about 100 acres of treated canes in their nurseries. If the best agricultural practices are maintained and conditions are right, it is anticipated that as much as 160 000 tonnes of canes could be produced in 2023.
However, Barbados Sugar Industry Limited chairman Mark Sealy said the dry conditions last October and November might impact
the 2030 harvest.
“What happened was that October, November, we had a bit of drought that affected ratoon canes and affected the planting season, so it didn’t bode well for 2023 plant-cane. So we are still hoping the volcanic ash from last year would help a bit,” he explained.
As it relates to this year’s harvest, Sealy said: “I don’t think they (projections) are as good as we were initially hoping. We put in estimates, some farmers put in a bit more than the previous year, others about the same, so we are not estimating a huge increase.”
He added that despite some setbacks, private farmers were ready to start harvesting once Government officials announced the start of the season.
“We are certainly going to be ready. There were some challenges getting parts for harvesters because of the supply chain but most farms are working feverishly to make sure we are ready for the mid-February start.”
About 92 000 tonnes of cane were delivered to Portvale last year, with 5 695 tonnes of direct consumption sugar produced. In 2020, just over 90 000 tonnes of cane yielded 7 900 tonnes of bulk sugar.
Barbados produced 7 800 tonnes of bulk sugar from 85 454 tonnes of cane in 2019, while 146 831 tonnes of cane yielded 10 961 tonnes of bulk sugar in 2018.Source: Nation
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Nice rain today. Heavy for the month of February. 2inches at Harrison Point. ! inch at the airport.
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My tiny seedlings sure appreciated that rain. My good soil drainage ensured that they were not flooded. Everybody has shot up in the air in the course of just a couple of hours and turned an amazing shade of green.
What is it about water straight from the sky?
I will never cease to be amazed by its effect.
Got my barrels full too but that does not seem to work nearly as well. I guess it’s like chilled Banks beer from the bottle as opposed to in a beer mug with ice. One hits the spot better than the other.
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Everything in the herb garden chives, parsley, leaf garlic, sweet basil, rosemary, spinach appreciating the rain.
Will take a look at the root crops, peppers and pumpkins on Monday.
I still have dried and frozen cassava left from last season. Okras, sweet potatoes and yams too. A few pork chops from a neighboring farmer too.
But not nearly enough to take me through a war.
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Free breadfruits so plentiful right now that I can’t keep up even if I eat breadfruit every day.
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Breadfruit demand
OVERSEAS MARKETS have a growing appetite for breadfruits from Barbados, and Barbadians are being urged to cash in on the interest.
This was reiterated by Barbados Investment and Development Corporation (BIDC) chief executive officer Mark Hill, who said his organisation had received an order for 2 000 breadfruits on Monday.
Hill told the Estimates Debate in the House of Assembly that while this item was being sold in Barbados supermarkets for $3.50 each, “that same breadfruit is selling in Canada for CAN$20; it is selling in Britain for £15”.
“We got an order for 2 000 breadfruits, so if there is anybody in your constituency that has a breadfruit tree you can please get them to contact us,” Hill told Members of Parliament during the afternoon session.
“The demand for breadfruit from Barbados, the Bajan breadfruit, is so big. Right now we are doing around 10 000 [kilogrammes] a week in breadfruit and we cannot find enough breadfruits, so if there are persons in communities there is a website that is available,” he said.
Registration
“You can go on there [and] you can register your breadfruit tree and once we see it registered there, somebody comes out and analyse how much fruit
you have forecast to come into the pipeline.
“There are [buyers] in Canada, America and England that are ready to buy that breadfruit that is growing on your tree. So you don’t even have to sell the breadfruit; the breadfruit is already sold even before it finish grow.”
Hill said this was an example that “there is more opportunity in that export space and we therefore want to cultivate a culture of exports, foster a mindset of exports among our entrepreneurs and our enterprises”. (SC)
Source: Nation -
Good to see you ladies are humming along with your gardens. I have some slips about 6 inches and rooting. Will do later this week. Have started three types of tomatoes this weekend, should be up in two weeks. Bajan spinach slow, slow, slow. Two more pigeon peas are up and my pimento pepper from last year is putting out new leaves. I sold ten curry plants to Indians last week and made $200. I gave my Indian friend 11 plants last summer as I did not have enough sunny windows to raise them all through the winter. I told her to give them to her friends, but knowing her, she probably sold them. I gave her the smallest and weakest of course.
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@Cuhdear Bajan February 26, 2022 6:23 PM “Will take a look at the root crops, peppers and pumpkins on Monday.”
The root crops doing fine except that the monkeys have pulled up a few plantings of cassava.
Only 3 pumpkins because this is not really pumpkin season, but those 3 are doing fine. I was worried about the birds, both domestic and wild pecking them, worried about the monkeys too, so I tied an onion bag ($1. each) around each pumpkin and that seems to be deterring the pests. And it looks as though I can recycle the bags if the sun and rain does not deteriorate them over the next few weeks. The peppers have responded to the recent rains by putting out plenty of new blossoms. So things are mostly good this week. I got 2 hours of exercise, fresh air and sunshine this morning. That’s good too. -
Paul: Time to cull monkeys
THE “MONKEY PROBLEM” in Barbados has reached crisis proportions, says chief executive officer of the Barbados Agricultural Society (BAS), James Paul.
As a result, he believes it is time Government steps in and institutes an immediate cull to reduce numbers of the local monkey population.
Paul also urged Government to increase the bounty and give hunters the necessary equipment to eradicate the problem.
“For a number of years we have been calling on the Barbadian Government to recognise the danger that our encouragement of the expansion of the monkey population poses for local agriculture production,” he said.
Paul was speaking yesterday during a press conference at the BAS’ headquarters at “The Grotto”, Beckles Road, St Michael. He said he recently heard Government speak about the question of food production and expanding it, but noted it could not happen if the monkey population was encouraged.
“How do you expand food production in the face of the fact that you are actually encouraging a monkey population that is going to undermine the confidence of the farmers to be able to plant? The monkey problem has reached crisis proportions in Barbados,” he said.
Paul said all of the books previously written and promoted proved useless and the only solution to the monkey problem and reducing the numbers was to introduce an immediate cull of the population to see a drastic reduction in numbers. However, he made it clear that he was not calling for the species to be exterminated.
“There are just too [many]. We cannot even talk about home gardening, even in the urban areas with the menace of monkeys around. People would just not plant because they would not be able to reap what they plant. We cannot sacrifice the need for food security or the need that Barbadians have even now to be able to supplement their food. If Barbadians have found a way to supplement or find alternative sources of food, why for the lack of will, because we feel tourists are going to frown on it, why have we not seriously undertaken before now a cull of the population?” he queried. Paul said there were good monkey hunters in the country. “They need to get the necessary equipment, whatever that equipment may be to reduce that population. It is unacceptable that constantly Government and other people [are] encouraged to get into agriculture and they are frustrated because monkeys are marauding the country and reaping the crops that they should be benefiting from. This is unacceptable,” he said. He also urged householders
to deal with the monkeys and noted as far as he knew there was no legislation protecting them. He said he was no longer calling for seminars or discussions as authorities were past that stage. “We cannot be satisfied reading a newspaper article or watching it on television from time to time where we see evidence of people’s livelihood being undermined by these creatures and all we can get is animal rights activists telling us leave them alone. It cannot happen anymore. We have to take action now to reduce the numbers,” he said.
(RA)Source: Nation
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It is about time they got rid of some of those monkeys. They can export them to St. Kitts where they eat them.
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Or they can give every monkey loving visitor a free male/female pair to take home with them.
If visitors love the monkeys so much they should be all gone to their happy, loving new homes by year end.
And our farmers can live happy ever after.
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@Dame+Bajans March 4, 2022 3:48 PM “They can export them to St. Kitts where they eat them.”
Probably not advisable to eat a primate.. It is believed that HIV crossed over from other primates to us.
And we dealing with Covid, which is also believed to be a zoonotic.
Maybe we can shoot the male monkeys with darts filled with a medicine which makes them impotent.
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@Cuhdear
Maybe we can shoot the male monkeys with darts filled with a medicine which makes them impotent.
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Trust you to go to the extreme and deprive the poor monkeys of any enjoyment since we apply humanlike traits (anthropomorphism) to some animals. Why not some product to make them sterile as is done with some species? Sometime ago I read that some laboratory in Canada used to import monkeys from Barbados via Air Canada for product testing until an animal welfare outfit heard of it and threatened to boycott AC if it continued the practice. AC no longer transport monkeys to Canada. -
I think that it was Connaught labs in Downsview.
But honestly the monkeys are competing with farmers for food, and it is just not cute anymore. If the monkeys were “back home” hyenas, leopards, tigers, lions and other big cats would be a natural population control.
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In the absence of natural predators
We the people have to be the predators.
And of course predators kill.
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Health Canada used to have a basement at Tunneys Pasture filled with monkeys that they used for testing and experiments. Dont know if it still exists. the Canadian bloke who owns the wildlife reserve used to sell them as I understand it.
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my seedlings are coming along nicely. placed some under the grow lamp. planted about ten bajan spinach seeds and seven are up. will have to give some away. still have spinach in the freezer from last year’s crop.
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Move to dampen sweet drinks fad
By Colville Mounsey
colvillemounsey@nationnews. com
In 2017, Barbados joined a growing list of countries that have introduced a tax on sweetened beverages, and last Monday Prime Minister Mia Amor Mottley doubled that tax.
Arguing that manufacturers had made little adjustment to the sugar levels in drinks since the introduction of the ten per cent tax in 2017, Mottley expressed hope that doubling the tax would do the job this time around.
According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), Non-Communicable Diseases account for 83 per cent of all deaths in Barbados, a statistic which Mottley hopes the measure would help to reverse.
“The high consumption of foods with high sugar and high salt continues to undermine the efforts to fight chronic NCDs. I, therefore, now propose to further raise the excise tax on sweetened beverages – it was raised to ten per cent in 2017, and we will now raise it, from April 1, 2022, to 20 per cent as a further signal to all manufacturers and consumers that we need to curb our sugar intake,” Mottley said in the 2022 Financial Statement and Budgetary Proposals.
Mottley said Government plans to work with large and small manufacturers to reduce the high sugar and salt content in some products.
“The onus, my friends, is on manufacturers to fall within these guidelines rather than to have a Minister of Finance intervene at the level of taxation. Drop the level of sugar, drop the level of salt, and the level of prices would drop concomitantly,” she said In response, president of the Barbados Association of Medical Practitioners (BAMP) Dr Lynda Williams told the Sunday Sun her organisation fully endorsed all efforts to reduce the burden of NCDs in Barbados and particularly those that would reduce the incidence of childhood obesity.
Williams said: “Taxes on sugar sweetened beverages have been shown to decrease consumption in many countries all over the world.” However, some sceptics have already publicly stated that they expect little to change, contending that the rise in the retail price of carbonated beverages from $2.50 to $3.00 had done little to reduce the sale of these high-in-sugar drinks.
To date, at least 65 jurisdictions around the world – including the United Kingdom, France, Portugal, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and several major cities in the United States – have taken this advice on board and are now taxing sugar-sweetened beverages using a specific excise tax.
According to a 2017 study by the WHO there is evidence to suggest that 20 per cent could be the magic number. The report entitled, ‘Taxes on Sugary Drinks: Why do it?’ states: “Taxation on sugary drinks is an effective intervention to reduce sugar consumption. Evidence shows that a tax on sugary drinks that raises prices by 20 per cent can lead to a reduction in consumption of around 20 per cent, thus preventing obesity and diabetes.”
It was noted that people
who consume sugary drinks regularly – one to two cans per day or more – have a 26 per cent greater risk of developing Type 2 diabetes than people who rarely consume such drinks. A comparison could be made to a similar 2014 WHO research on tobacco taxes.
The research showed that higher taxes are especially effective in reducing tobacco use among lower-income groups and in preventing young people from starting to smoke. A tax increase that pushes tobacco prices up by ten per cent decreases tobacco consumption by about four per cent in high-income countries and by up to eight per cent in most low- and middle-income countries.
Concerns have been raised about unintended consequences like harm to small businesses, job losses or lower productivity.
In a September 2020 World Bank study, ‘Taxes on Sugar-Sweetened Beverages: International Evidence and Experiences,’ analysis of taxes on sugary drinks in other countries shows that, as demand for these products decline, customers start substituting them with products such as diet drinks and bottled water.
Fortunately for Barbados, when one looks at the top selling sugary drinks and the healthier alternatives such as diet drinks, they are produced and retailed by the same companies.
These companies are already producing healthier alternatives to sugary beverages and will likely be the main beneficiaries as consumers switch over. In the above-mentioned World Bank study, it analysed the United Kingdom’s imposition of higher tax rates on drinks with higher sugar content.
One year after the imposition of the tax, while sales had not fallen, the sugar content in these drinks had decreased by nearly ten per cent. Both manufacturers and consumers had switched to lower-sugar drinks.Source: Nation
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Critical role of agriculture
By Dr Chelston Brathwaite I would like to congratulate the Government and our Prime Minister Mia Mottley for the futuristic vision presented for the agricultural sector in the recent Budget speech.
In her closing remarks, Mottley indicated that food and nutrition security is one of the seven medium term transformations and that there is need for a revolution in nutrition security.
She further stated that “We must eat for health, wellness and enjoyment and that fresh and wholesome nutritious food is the daily medicine that is needed to tackle the high incidence of chronic non-communicable diseases. To this end, we are repositioning our farmers to deliver on this mandate for Barbados to reverse the health care bill and give Barbadians the best quality life possible”.
This vision for the agricultural sector as a sector that can improve the nutrition and health of the nation speak to an understanding of the multidimensional role the sector plays in development.
Agriculture today in Barbados should be about food, food that is fresh and nutritious and that can assist in producing a healthy population. Agriculture today must not be about hard work or memories of slavery but about a modern sector that incorporates new technologies and which can save foreign exchange and generate employment and wealth for the nation.
I note that this Government has initiated a number of projects and proposals that will revolutionise the sector. First and foremost is the policy on water. The announcement that farmers will be able to access water at the rate of $1.80 per cubic metre from May first should be welcome news for farmers as water is such an important input in farming, especially the production of vegetables and livestock. In fact, water is the life blood of agriculture for irrigation of vegetable and fruit crops.
The proposed project at Lears Plantation where about 200 farmers will be provided with training, land and other inputs for food production is an important initiative. According to information provided, these farmers will have access to water from a dam which will be built to hold about 21 million gallons of water. This initiative should be a stepping stone to the promotion of water harvesting.
The policy on the reduction of the cost of gasoline and diesel and the promotion of the use of renewable energy will also be important for the sector in reducing the cost of land preparation, transport of produce and the energy input into food processing and food preparation and other activities associated with the production of crops and livestock.
There are several other initiatives which were announced which should be mentioned: The proposed establishment of a food terminal in cooperation with the Government of Guyana; the proposal to establish 50 shade houses for crop production; the strengthening of the FEED Project for some 600 farmers; the promotion of the Black belly Sheep here and in Guyana; the promotion of backyard gardens and community gardens, are all exciting initiatives.
New vision
I hope that the implementation of the new vision will lead to more investments in agricultural research and the development of agricultural technologies for production and processing of locally produced products. I hope also that there will be the consumption of more locally produced foods that we will also link agriculture to the tourism sector and capitalise on the agriculture tourism nexus.
In 2019, it was estimated that 31.5 million tourists visited the Caribbean and although these numbers declined by as much as 97.3 per cent in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic, there are projections that tourism will return to pre-COVID levels in two to three years.
The leakage of foreign exchange that occurred pre-COVID due to the importation of food for tourists is considerable. If the food and agriculture sector can be repositioned to supply 50 per cent of food needs of the tourism sector, the saving in foreign exchange, the generation of employment, the creation of new industries in food production, food storage, food preparation and food processing would create a new stream of income and create a greater contribution of tourism to the local economy. The sector will benefit from the new vision and the new initiatives that have been proposed.
Let us hope that the farmers, the private sector and our people embrace this new vision.
This article was submitted as a Letter to the Editor from Dr Chelston Brathwaite, who has 50 plus years experience working in agricultural development and food security as an administrator, researcher, lecturer and technical advisor.
Source: Nation -
This morning while watching a nutrition show the guest (in Costa Rica) produced a cashew like the ones we grew up with and it reminded me that I haven’t seen one of them in years, along with “fat porks” those were the exotic fruits of our youth.
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@Sargeant
These fruits are still around, people trek to East Coast to pick although they don’t seem as plentiful. You can add sea grapes as well.
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My Rasta hawker located at lower Swan Street sells all those local fruits. There used to be a cashew and fat pork walk on Springfield land in Cattlewash. One year I tried going up the cart road to get some and was met with a ton of new houses, some with pools and the road blocked. I tried the sea side but the ground is sandy and I kept slipping down. Last time I checked it was all bush up the sea side.
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The best places to shop for local fruit and vegetables used to be from hawkers on Roebuck street, Swan street and James street. Also Eagle Hall / Harbour roadcorner.
You all know you can drive throught the eastern parishes and ask where you can buy local fruit.
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Last time I was home I picked fat porks at the park at Silver Sands beach.
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Found pests on my potato slips and some tomatoes yesterday. Had to run for the neem oil and make a spray. I also found some white flies on the basil. Woe am I.
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White flies on basil???? Nothing bothers my basil.
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This is indoors. I brought it in last fall. The white fly is a small jumping insect the size of a grain of sand. The aphids are eating the tender leaves at the tops of the plants. I already had a problem with gnats. I think the white flies spread from the tulsi (Hindu Holy basil). I have been selling plants for $5 on Facebook marketplace. The Hindus use it in their religious ceremonies. I sold two yesterday.
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Transplanted my bajan spinach seedlings today. Baked the potting soil first to kill any pest eggs or dormant pests. Dont want anymore infestations.
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Planted yams this morning, And it rained all day. Still raining.
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Picked my first asparagus yesterday. Wow!
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It appears that my organic pest repellant is working. Cucumber and cabbage leaves attack halted. Gotta order some more.
Finally got some full-sized sweet peppers to grow. I believe I was overwatering. Finally got some full-sized pomegranates. Plenty of sweet mangoes on my tree. Sour sops too. Reaping celery, tomatoes, eggplants, hot peppers, broad leaf thyme, parsley, kale, okras, basil, chives, garlic chives, bunching onions, spinach. watercress and lemongrass.
Beets, carrots, cabbage, lettuce, cucumbers, sugar baby, cantalope, honey dew melons coming on nicely. So too cassava, dill and beans.
Sweet potatoes just planted. Radishes and turnips too. Pumpkins and squash as well. And chinese cabbage. Corn in need of help. I should have researched. They need deep watering.
I have finally conquered oregano. Straight into the soil, no pampering in a seed tray.
Coriander, thyme, marjoram, onions, zucchini, ginger, turmeric still to be conquered.
The pineapple did not produce. Special medium seems necessary.
Broccoli and cauliflower need cooler weather. No sense planting them now.
Plenty of beets and pigeon peas in the freezer still.
Good food easy so!
It is only commercial farming that is hard. Not kitchen gardens.
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Forgot the sage.
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The birds and I have come up with a system. They peck the high ones that I cannot reach and I pick the low ones. When the high ones drop I leave them on the ground for an hour or two for them to finish off. When they stop eating I put the remnants in the composter.
Due to our agreement, my sweet peppers and tomatoes remain untouched. As soon as the rains come in I will plant even more spinach so that there will be plenty of the seeds for the birds to enjoy after the mangoes are gone.
I have given many mangoes and this morning my lazy ass finally decided to do my own mango drink thereby reducing both my grocery bill and Barbados’ food inport bill by just a little.
Due to our agreement, my sweet peppers and tomatoes remain untouched.
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Mangoes was the topic. Delete last sentence. Worked hard last night and this morning. Excuse the errors and omissions.
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“The birds and I have come up with a system. They peck the high ones that I cannot reach and I pick the low ones.”
You could hire me as a scarecrow and pay me with mangos.
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Letter from America
Mangos can cost as much as $2.00 each and though they may look good on the surface, but when you cut them the inside can be ugly and nasty. I am wondering where my grocer buy mangos from.Avocados are the same. They look good when you cut them open, but if you leave them exposed to the air for some time they not only turn brown but start to develop something like strings.
They say “you can never go back” but I am hoping that I can go back to the time where I can suck on a mango and not cut it open and examine it first or eat and avocado and not wonder what it turns to after I ate it.
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They say “you can never go back”. I am hoping that I can go back to the time where I can suck on a mango and not have cut it open and examine it first or I can eat an avocado and not wonder what it turns into after I ate it.
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We had hurricane weather this weekend. Thank goodness I waited to plant most of my stuff. All I have in so far are thyme, parsley, coriander, celery, bok choi and english potatoes. I planted my peas and three kinds of beans but they are not up yet so no damage. Caught a rat by the compostors. Found the burrow and flooded both ends, nothing came out. Spoke to the neighbor and she caught one, so could be the partner. Put paper in the holes last night and it was still there this morning but they could have another ‘house’ in the vicinity. Wil set the traps again tonight. City says to remove bird feeders ( joke). But I have stopped adding compost for the time being. My neighbour also caught the raccoon I saw in my yard. Will plant the ginger shoots tomorrow and my spinach.
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@ Dame+Bajans,
Glad to hear you surived the “derecho”.
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Hants, I was out of power until 7 yesterday morning. My friend got his back this morning at three am. There are still 200,000 in the city without power. 700 hydro poles down. Two trees on my street, a large maple toppled over from the roots and across the street my Chinese friend’s was struck by lightning and had another branch snapped. The city is a mess, lots of the traffic lights are still out and people are not treating the intersections as four way stops. People on septics and wells are in worse condition. The gas stations ran out of gas yesterday and you could not get a bag of ice anywhere in the city.
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Well, my pumpkins, brussel sprouts, zuccinis and cucumbers are in. My okras, sweet potatoes, beans, bok choi and mustard greens are in. I am halfway there.
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Planted some more sweet potatoes today.
Planted some okras too. Will plant some more tomorrow, because I had to run inside from a short sharp shower.
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@TheOGazerts May 20, 2022 5:45 PM “They say “you can never go back”. I am hoping that I can go back to the time where I can suck on a mango and not have cut it open and examine it first.”
This is the time of year that you have to beg your relatives, friends and neighbors NOT to give you any more delicious tree ripened mangoes. Just working my way through a set of Julies that a neighbor gave me on Saturday. Another good thing about mango season is that the monkeys are enjoying the mangoes too so they are leaving the other food crops alone.I mean who wants to dig and eat a muddy sweet potato or carrot when so many ripe delicious mangoes are right there.
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Planted some more okras last week.
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Sold some callaloo last week. Okras stunted, not doing well. Six inches tall and flowering. Nights to cold, they dont grow. Reaping cucumbers, pea pods, english potatoes and my celery sweet for days. Planted them in the home garden so I can water often. Last year they were hollow in the stalks because it was too hot and they did not get enough water. Will be digging the garlics next week. Picked two zuccinis yesterday. Would have had more if I did not pick the fingerlings last week, but I wanted to eat some. I have pole beans but I am leaving those for shelling. I will eat the bush beans when they are ready. I planted yard long this year but they are only now climbing. Sweet peppers are huge, had to stake and tie up the bushes. Eggplants are flowering. All of this after six weeks as I plant only the first week of June.
Picked two litres of red currants yesterday evening and made some currant and blue berry muffins first thing this morning. Took me two hours to clean and wash them last night. I will pick the black currants later this week. Not sure whether I will make Ribena or wine.
Invited and old Bajan lady to the allotment yesterday. She picked a two liter ice cream container of red currants and another of black. She took home a bag of callaloo and all the mustard I had. I have Asian mustard greens here in the home garden.
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It rained all day on Saturday, but all sun since then. Temperatures in the high 20’s-low 30’s.
This year’s cassava is ready, but I still have some frozen from last year.
So much spinach that I am begging family, friends, neighbors and complete strangers to take some off me. I’ve hatched a plant for a friend. She will pick it up this week.
A neighbor gave me a paw-paw so huge that it may take me a week to eat it all.
A fellow from my natal village gave me a big breadfruit on Friday
Leaf garlic flourishing as usual, that thing is so easy to grow.
Chives ready and some going into the pot every day.
Rosemary herb is doing wonderfully well, enough for me and for all extended family.
I planted okras in stages so that I can have a longer harvesting season. The first set will bloom in a week or two.
The sweet potatoes are almost ready.
The wiri-wiri peppers are still bearing. We planted some scotch bonnets and flavor peppers last week.
The parsley is still doing well.
Oh dear, I have 3 coconuts on the counter that I need to shell and grate, so that when I feel like coconut bread it is ready.
The pumpkins are growing nicely should be ready by November, and the yams by Christmas.
The sweet basil finally died on me. I will buy a plant or seed when next I go to a nursery. -
I have been picking my Egyptian onions as soon the the ones on top get to the size of a grape so that the ones on bottom will be bigger. My garlic chives are doing dixie.
English potatoes are ready and the celery is three feet tall. I have lots more callaloo to sell or give away. Too early to blanch for the freezer. My okras are not doing anything. they still only about 6 inches tall. Planted them June first and they should be 18 inches by now, but the nights have been too cold and the soil has not warmed up enough. However all the cold loving plants are doing well. I will be picking my first broccoli on sunday. I have been picking snow peas. Will be pulling my garlics on Sunday, so the pumpkins can run in that bed. these ones are big, big, big.
The blogmaster invites you to join the discussion.