Although I'm bummed about my pumpkin failure, there has been some good news in the garden recently: my artichokes have come back from the dead!

A couple of months ago, both artichoke plants withered up and disappeared. Neither one had ever gotten particularly big, but I was surprised to lose them both, especially since I had been dutifully watering them throughout the summer. I've never grown artichokes before, but I know they are perennials, so I assumed there would always be some leaves showing while the plant was alive.

Perhaps I was wrong, because, a couple of weeks ago, new leaves sprouted up from the ground where one of my two artichokes had been. Then, last week, leaves appeared at the other location. Both plants have suddenly revived themselves and started growing again.

I'm not sure if this is part of the typical growing cycle of an artichoke, or if I just got lucky and the plants decided to give me a second chance. Either way, I'm hopeful they'll keep growing this time and that we'll be eating homegrown artichokes this Spring.

Last week, I heard an interesting story on NPR's Morning Edition about the natural defenses that keep eggs bacteria-free. Apparently, eggs have three lines of defense: the shell, the membrane inside the shell and the white, which contains microbe-fighting proteins. These three layers are very successful at keeping almost all nasty germs out of the egg. I kind of already knew this, but it's nice to hear again since certain chickens (Tina) have a bad habit of pooping in the nesting boxx.
According to the story, contaminated eggs are usually made that way by contaminated chickens. As a backyard-chicken keeper, this makes me feel pretty smart. As long as I keep my girls healthy and happy, I know the fresh eggs they lay for me are salmonella-free. And because my flock has enough space and clean food and water, they're less likely to get sick than chickens crammed into cages in a musty warehouse. In fact, the microbiologist quoted for the NPR story has a backyard flock of his own.

Food security: another great reason to have backyard chickens.

For the full article, click here.

Remember that baby pumpkin I was hoping would grow into a nice jack-o-lantern for my son? Well...



My little pumpkin started rotting a few days after that blog post. I'm not sure what went wrong. Maybe blossom-end rot, although I have been keeping the soil pretty evenly damp, mulching heavily and there are tons of broken eggshells in my compost providing calcium. My other guess is that I didn't pollinate the flower well enough. Who knows, though. I also think the 3-day heatwaves we've been having every other week might have done the pumpkin in. I don't think squash like that dry heat.

I'm not giving up on my pumpkin patch dream just yet. The vines keep growing and making female flowers. Hopefully if the weather stays below the mid-90s from now on, and I can keep the plants well-watered and fed, I'll get a few more chances to grow my son's Halloween pumpkin. I also read somewhere that coffee grounds are a good source of fruit-making potassium. So, I've been dumping out the French press onto my squash hills the last few mornings. Whatever works!



As for the one that didn't make it, I managed to find a use for it: chicken treat.

It seems I have a couple of late bloomers on my hands. While one of my new chickens has been laying since mid-August, the other two have not yet started producing eggs.

At first, I thought the layer was Rita because the first few eggs were light brown and on the small side. The shells of the new eggs have darkened, though, and I'm now thinking Janice, my Cuckoo Marans, might be the layer. She's got her full comb and wattles and seems calmer than the other two new girls, which could also indicate she's the one making the eggs.

The only weird thing is that the eggs seem too small to come from such a big chicken. Janice is basically the same size as Tina, my Black Sex-Link, but the eggs are about 3/4 the size of Tina's eggs. The mystery will be solved as soon as the other two girls start laying. Hopefully, they'll get off their feathered butts and make some eggs soon.