Cooking Junkies Forums - rec.food.preserving

Borer's

George Shirley — Fri, 24 May 2013 22:12:39 GMT

George Shirley wrote:
>bigwheel wrote:
>
> > Ten bucks a half pint sounds like a fair price to me. I also have a big
> > weakness for apricot pies..cobblers..fried pies are especially nice in
> > that flavor. I had an apricot tree and it got big making a nice tree but
> > I guess the boers got it since it up and died. About the only way to
> > grow fruit around here is to hit it early and often with nasty old
> > pesticides.
> >
> If it is the same borer as the peach borer you can plant onion chives in
> a foot-wide band around the tree and the borer's won't come near the
> tree. We lost two peach trees to borer's before someone told me the trick.

i wonder if garlic, onions, garlic chives or leeks
would also work?

chives are certainly easy. they have nice purple
flowers the bees love. spread easily from seeds
so they can be a challenge to contain if you let
the flower heads go too long.

for some reason chives get a really strong gag
reaction from me when i dig them up that others
from the onion family don't. probably why they'd
make a good border. :)

songbird

PLINK!

gloria p — Thu, 23 May 2013 17:59:37 GMT

gloria p;1836327 Wrote:
> On 5/23/2013 3:35 PM, bigwheel wrote:-
> gloria p;1836218 Wrote:-
> I was out yesterday with a dear friend, "running amok" as she calls
> it,
> AKA shopping.
>
> On the way home we stopped at Sprouts to look at the cherries they
> advertised. The cherries didn't look very good--small, not sweet, so
> we
>
> bypassed them.
>
> On the way out of the store I saw apricots on sale ($1.88/lb which is
> a
>
> bargain here believe it or not!)
>
> The result is 10 half pints of apricot jam. All sealed except one
> which
>
> is back in the kettle for a second try.
> --
>
> --
>
> gloria p-
>
> Love those Apricot preserves or jam or whatever. Think we usually
> wound
> up with preserves. Great job on that. Sure the finished product will
> be
> worth the manual labor.
>
> -
>
> It really isn't that much work once you get into the rhythm of the
> project. The last year we had a big crop of apricots on our trees I
> made over 80 jars of jam in addition to all the fruit we ate and gave
> away.
>
> That sounds like a lot of jam but once your friends, neighbors, and
> family taste it you don't have any problem giving it away. People
> practically beg for more.
>
> gloria p

Ten bucks a half pint sounds like a fair price to me. I also have a big
weakness for apricot pies..cobblers..fried pies are especially nice in
that flavor. I had an apricot tree and it got big making a nice tree but
I guess the boers got it since it up and died. About the only way to
grow fruit around here is to hit it early and often with nasty old
pesticides.

--
bigwheel

Dewberry jelly and jam - done

George Shirley — Fri, 17 May 2013 21:27:17 GMT

That's a nice report, George. It sounds as though you have made a
relatively smooth transition to your new home. I'm glad the grands will
get a preserving lesson from you.

Our trees are suffering from the heavy April snow and cold. This
weekend is about the first time it is safe to plant tender annuals,
herbs, and vegetables but we will be gone for almost a month from mid
June so we are not planting until we get back if then. We'vve learned
you can't depend on other people (no matter how well-intended they are)
to make sure our little plot is watered regularly. It can get hot enough
so that the automatic lawn sprinklers 2x/week aren't enough to keep
things alive.

I'd never heard of dewberries till you mentioned them and I Googled.
I am jealous of your wild gleanings.

gloria p

Dewberry jelly in the offing

George Shirley — Fri, 17 May 2013 14:34:55 GMT

Miz Anne picked a bucket full of dewberries yesterday and today I have
them steaming in the steamer since about 0830. So far about two quarts
of pure juice and more coming on all the time. I'm already having
visions of pint jars full of dewberry jelly, our first time to make any
since about 1976.

Yesterday I made a dewberry cobbler for our middle grandson and his
family. This weekend we will make a foray into the roadside business of
picking dewberries and blackberries, all ripening rapidly. Grandson and
his ten-year old son will be helping and then I will teach both of them
how to make cobblers and jelly.

The green beans are blooming, we have green tomatoes about as big as an
apricot, the sweet chile's are blooming and bearing, the radishes are
getting pulled daily, the squash is blooming and setting fruit. The
blueberries are starting to ripen and the fig tree is producing more
figs every day. All is well in our little world.

George

Mother's Day

George Shirley — Sun, 12 May 2013 14:52:58 GMT

On 5/12/2013 8:52 AM, George Shirley wrote:
> Happy Mother's Day to all the mother's on this group. We're off in a
> couple of hours to our daughter's for a big family Mom's Day dinner and
> hooraw. With one wife, one daughter, one daughter-in-law, and two
> granddaughter's in-law we will have a crowd, about 23 people counting
> the wee ones. Enjoy your day Mom's.
>
> George, Miz Anne, and Tilly Dawg

Thanks, George.

I hope you and Miz Anne had a lovely day.

Son and his family were here for the day and I had a nice long phone
call from daughter in California.

It was a gorgeous day, weather-wise. Went to our neighborhood park in
sandals with my little grandsons and the tops of my feet are just a step
away from sunburnt.

gloria p

Perusing the garden

George Shirley — Sat, 27 Apr 2013 14:34:46 GMT

George Shirley wrote:
....
> Have to go buy a fence post today, found that the builder didn't bother
> to put a post in where our back fence ties into the next door neighbors
> fence. Sort of leaves a four-foot section of our fence flapping in the
> wind. The previous owners never noticed it I guess, or just didn't care.
> Will get the materials to put a gate in the back fence while I'm there.
> Seems all I've done to this house since we moved in last December is
> build, refresh, repaint, or do some other work to make this "OUR" house.

but then it is your house when you look at
something done right (or the way you want it :) )
and can smile.

glad to hear all the plants are still coming
along. the chard here hasn't even attempted
to come up yet. we have had frosts/freezes
overnight yet, but it is getting warmer, we
should head up to near 70 today.

not a frost night in the forecast for a
whole week -- i might get some peas planted
tomorrow. have plenty of bags of goodies to
bury in the gardens. helps raise up the low
spots and is free organic material that will
break down in time. guy says he'll have about
60 more bags yet. good exercise and much
appreciated almost free fill because otherwise
i'd have to cart it in by the wheelbarrow load
after having to pay someone to truck it and dump
it. this way it works out well as he gets to
reuse the bags. that pays his gas for bringing
them over, plus they get free goodies once in a
while in return.

it's a wonderful arrangement. also includes
all the wood ashes i can use.

> I've lost over thirty pounds in weight so something must be going right.
> Cardiologist took me off three of my blood pressure meds yesterday, have
> been having extremely low BP readings. We will see how this works out.
> I've been taking those pills for twenty years so I may go into
> withdrawal without them.
>
> Almost skinny George, Tilly Dawg says "Hey!"

congrats George. hope the med changes work
out well. just not having the added expense
and doctors visits to checkup and refill, etc.
well worth avoiding if you can.

good to hear from you. watch those blueberries
or a blueberry monster might get them. heehee.

songbird