[JRinPA]

I like late fall snap peas just a little frost kissed, but I guess field peas would rot with a freeze? Never tried field peas here.



I also have some okra in the backyard garden. I did make an effort this year to grow plenty of everything. Even more than usual.

I'll pick okra every other day when it starts. I share some. Many here have heard of it but never eaten it, let alone grown it. I was told 6 weeks of picking is good here, but I have been getting longer. When we get an overload a week after a big rain, bag and freeze. I tried some others last year but we didn't like the taste/texture as much as clemson spineless. I really do appreciate the spineless part, too. Some choppee got me good last year. Pod or plant, I can't remember. I just put all that drip tape in the okra/late corn patch a few days back, so I brushed a lot of okra with no issues.

I had them planted through clear plastic that just came off. The clear was 2ft on either side of peas, split and reused from the first corn patch. The peas were in the middle of each row where there are now radish/red beet/parsnip planted. It was lot of work there to cut the thin plastic out around the okra and corn and lay in the drip tape. The plastic kept the weeds down, water and heat in. Still, I miss the black bio mulch I used. We scored that one year for $5 an end roll.

Next year okra may gets its own patch. It'll be drip tape down first. I need to save and mark all these drip tapes on a big roll for next year. I'm thinking vented plastic hoop tunnel. We bought 2kft of that (6ft wide) a few years back that needs used up. I think okra would love the heat under that, even more than AG19. Maybe even wood chips as mulch, though I don't normally do that. This year the okra didn't get tunneled by anything and I feel they are short/behind partly due to that. And of course, no rain. We took a lot of peas out of that patch in early June, so there was no way to do a tunnel until they came out, and I just didn't feel like installing one for just a few weeks. I didn't have a drip tape setup yet, so there would have been no easy way to water.

Whew...umm...thread hijack complete? LOL I need to go work in the garden, it has been 93 in the shade for hours, maybe it has cooled off? I just laid drip tape in the backyard garden yesterday evening. Running it off a drum with a boat bilge pump, like that comm garden patch. But I don't have float switch for this pump yet so I have to babysit it somewhat. Last night I estimated it pumped ~15-20 gal/hour for 4 tape runs of ~15 ft-17ft. It really needed it. Right now I have okra, sweet potatoes, red beets, and a lettuce row in there.